Interesting Article about Google Banning and Web Position Gold

that was interesting. Thanks Prof for taking time to pass it on.

I hope this means they’ll soon crack down on content theft in a much more organized and just manner which shouldn’t be that hard.

Checking your ranking is not something you really need to do. What you should be doing is looking at your traffic. What words are bringing you traffic? What is your conversion rate? Which links or engines are bringing you traffic? Where can you improve? What spiders are visiting you? How often? Which pages are spidered consistently?

A ranking program cannot answer this. Your log files will tell you everything you really need to know. IMHO Investing in reporting software for your visitor’s behavior and how they found you is much more important than investing in a program that reports your position on an engine.

I have used WPG for many years. I have never had problems with it in the past and I am on a private network. I do have a Google API key which allows me to run up to 1000 queries.

I have noticed that the http Get requests as of this week are failing even with the Google API for WPG. WPG is owned by NETIQ ( Webtrends). Last time I saw this it had to do with a footprint the software made and better emulation was used to correct this.

I also use a program called Ranking Manager to run the same type of reports. It also uses a Google API and I am not having any problems with it.

The Seo Company that got all of their clients banned blatantly used techniques that were spelled out as SPAM by almost every Engine I can think of. I won’t comment on them further either.

As for linking we have found that you need to check and see whom you are linking to. It is not that there is a penalty you are seeing on inbound links, it is that the value of those links inbound to you have been devalued. Only sites with a PR4 and above actually count as links in Google. This is one reason why the numbers in other enignes are so vastly different.

I do not see a penalty for sites linking to you but I do see penalties happen when you are linking out to a bad neighborhood. Link Farms – any site or links page with more than 100 outbound links. (please note that this does not apply to REAL directories or other engines)

Yes, to appear in an engine you do need to be compliant with their rules. 98 percent of the time when I am asked to check a site that has disappeared from the SERPS it is due to a compliance issue. Most of these issues are due to poor coding which is easy to correct and very easy to avoid in the first place through validation.

The Engines to be profitable must provide a good user experience. Bad user experience leads to less market share. The key is: are you providing quality content?

If you go back a few years Yahoo was an engine that actively changed results on a page based on the user’s activity- how long did they go to a page. Out of the results which entry received the most clicks. This was a measurement of quality. At one point it had a very heavy weight and as it became obvious companies had found ways to manipulate this aspect, it was given less importance and better tracking was used. You are seeing the same backlash with linking in Google a redistribution of what aspects of rating a page are important.

As we move forward with technology you can see from the patent papers filed by the engines that more things like word relationships-themes, User location, Business location, and reputation ( determined by anchor text and the value of the site containing the link) are all very much part of the ranking process.

In the very near future you will be competing for ranking in a “personalized Search” experience. The user (you) become a member of Google’s/or MSN/ Yahoo! service offerings and based on your answers to various surveys, and your own behavior as a “member” the search results will be customized to each members preferences. ( kind of like online dating ) You will only see matches that would appeal to you based on information that has been collected about you.

If you are having a problem and can identify it you need to correct the problem , wait 90 days. If you are still not reindexed you should contact Google. Admit what the problem was- IE bad links, text manipulation etc and explain you have corrected the problem.

If you don’t see a problem but now you don’t have any inbound links from Google. Take a good look at your link partners. Were their sites devalued?
If they were, it would explain why your site fell in rankings. You no longer have as many valued links pointing to you from “trusted” or “valued” sources.

Very interesting post, DivaG. :bigsmile:

Only sites with a PR4 and above actually count as links in Google. This is one reason why the numbers in other enignes are so vastly different.

I’ve heard this before, but it’s not correct.

LOL If it was true then I wouldn’t have any links :hehe:

In testing we found that only links with the PR4 threshold actually made an impact on our reputation. That is what I mean by counts. Not as in number but as in links that make an impact.

Also only PR4 and higer actually consistently showed up in a backlink check at Google. As with anything in SEM it is all fluid and in a state of constant change. I am only reporting on what was actually tested.