I stumbled on this post on BlackHatWorld. The poster suggests that if archive.org for a domain name's history has a large gap and then a single entry which says "Not Found" or "Forbidden", the domain name could be penalized. Does anyone have experience with such domain names? Is this usually a sure sign the domain name has a penalty?
there are a couple ways to determine that something is wrong with your site. Your site home page does not appear in google index (very bad sign) Your traffic goes from consistent to taking a noise dive (very bad sign) The process has so many working parts, and google has 100s of ranking factors that keeping your site on track can seem like a chore. here are some factors: Bad design = high bounce rate. Bad content = high bounce rate. (either one of these is a signal to google that no one likes your site.) too many Bad backlinks no authority backlinks over optimized anchor text slow site speed prolonged down time site not mobile ready onpage SEO is bad duplicate content thin/useless content any of the above factors can knock you out of the serps also.
I provided useful info on what good indicators are for getting a penalty.... so why would I focus on archive.org as an indicator, its not.... If site is not found, then archive.org simply has not captured of the site. If it is forbidden, then I assume the site has robots.txt blocking archive.org
I was asking about possible penalties on expired domain names, not active websites. It is much easier to tell if an active website has a penalty, you can look at GWT or Google Analytics and the organic traffic will give you a very good idea of whether you have been slapped by Google.
@dscurlock Sorry for the confusion. I didn't make it obvious in the OP that I was referring to expired domain names.
my bad, I dunno, ROFL... It really depends on how much I want the domain, if the expired domain did turn out to be penalized, then it still would not be the end of the world; you could hire someone for bad link removal; I think there is even software out there that can track bad links down, and then you can disavow the links.... however, I think I have seen a couple fiver sellers that look legit that could deal with a penalty.... Unless you have the abiity to see all the backlinks on the expired domain, then I doubt there is a way until the site is set back up, and the links start showing up in webmaster tools again....
Yeah but even if you disavow the links the penalty is not lifted straight away. I wouldn't bother with a domain name that was likely to be penalized. Why would you when you could start fresh with a new domain name.
It really depends on how bad you want it... and you are right, it will take time, but i rarely sit around doing nothing so I would hit that bitch up with super high DA backlinks.... but I would have to want it really bad for me to put the work, and money into bringing it back into the safe zone again where it could be useful.... Why would I want it when I could start new? Either way sucks bro...the penalty domain may have authority worth going after where-as the new domain could take many, many months to build up.... If you ask me, brand new domains are penalized for the first 6-8 months, and rarely hear about sites making money in under a year.... you simply have to weigh your options....