Okay so I had a directory running phpld v3 which was penalised around Sept 2007 like many others. I had sold some home page links at the time and expected that was the reason. I removed the paid links and submitted a reinclusion request but still remain penalised. I have decided to look closer at the directory and attempt to remove any outstanding issues and then file a second reinclusion request. This is what I will change to begin with: Remove deep links mod Add meta descriptions to each category Add sites to all empty categories Exclude duplicate categories arising from sorting using robots.txt. I hadn't given away free templates with footer links so that won't be an issue. Before this reinclusion request I would be interested in hearing anyone else's related experiences including any successful attempts at reversing a penalty. I think between us we could identify the issues to work on to make the removal of a penalty a reality. thanks Al
Is it a serp penalty, indexing penalty or pr in the toolbar penalty - I would be interested in seeing the site if you want to pm me with it...
yea I shoulda made it clear which penalty the PR went to 0 and it doesnt rank number one for a search of domain (without the TLD) it ranks first for a search of domain.com it also has 173 pages indexed
Simply explain why you think you were penalised and what you have done to rectify the problem, thats all I did which was successful.
besides all the aspects that you mentioned, you seem to forget what is the most important. PM me, so we can continue discussing this on private.
Can you discuss it openly please, unless it can further harm discover's site as it may help others. Last thing we need is being secretive about something that could help.
It requires a little or a lot more than merely ensuring categories aren't empty. They like to see all the non commercial categories to be quite full. Imagine if you wanted some good websites on Christianity or Insects - those categories should have 20 - 50 links. It seems this is the sort of content they want. This isn't me being bitchy either - as I have no idea which directory you;re referring to so have no idea how much content you have. I'd also hope that every site you link to is of a good quality (so you can brag about that to them) and that they don't have spammy titles or descriptions. It was a little different with me, as my directory was niche and yours is general. However there is one more golden piece of information that i'll give you. It only works if your directory is totally clean as I;ve said in my post.....and content rich with lots of good informative sites listed. Make a list of all the reasons why you shouldn't be penalised. Along with a sob story about how much you spent on this directory and now it's dead because of the penalty. Post it into the Google Webmaster Help group in Google Groups. You'll get a load of cocks giving sarcastic replies. Infact they'll probably remind you of how you shit on the newbies in this very forum. This is what I did....and the Google employees read it, just like Rand at SEOMOZ told me they would. And 1 day later I was back in the SERPs. However I don't know if this will work for you as CReed tried the same thing and he's still stuck. Hope I actually helped some of you. Red reps welcomed from the children as always.
Mikey you always seem to expect reds from people but your one of the youngest here. Although not strictly connected to getting unpenalised, i wonder how directories with about 20 messy sitewides dont get any sort of penalisation. With my general directories theres no penalisation pattern either. I dont care about not ranking for the domain, but obviously theres more to the penalisations than not ranking for your domain, i think (not sure) that i dont mind the pr gone i only ever had pr1 temporarily on mine anyway But it doesn't matter how much its said, there are still thousands of pr chasers. But you know what, i think it doesn't matter if pr was returned to every last directory and all types of penalisations were lifted on them, i think the damage is done now. Theres no reasonable way to even help yourself out as it seems to be hit and miss, and even if you do get some satisfaction from pr being returned and all that, will it honestly bring any more business? i dont think so. I have one directory thats "ok" i can say and does it get more business to it? not really. Ive seen some people here add allsorts and work hard and they still get penalised and pr removed. Its just stupid, it really is stupid. Regarding this old talk of niche diretories are whats needed, um no its not, anybody thinking that google is seeking that needs to think again, makes no odds now, general, niche, bidding, whatever... Theres no common sense and reasonable rule to follow, theres no reasonable way to get out of a penalisation where you could say this is doable. So a handful of owners have a good moan and a chat and cool their out of it, are you really doing more business from it, i bet not? The worst damage of all to directories is all the s**t talking, that cant be undone now, and someone who through sheer frustration trashed the business to pieces and ended up suffereing with the rest of us too. All the digs caused the endless threads asking if directories are no longer useful, are they harmful, are they still able to make money, i bet you even some of your online buddies have reported each other, i bet all sorts has gone on where theres been endless attempts to wreck directories. Your seo self proclaimed gurus dont help either, these guys need something to write about each monday morning and need to vent their frustration over a boring weekend so create hysteria and will write up and exagerate things in order to create content on blogs and sites to get a few more subscribers. All that shouldn't be forgotten, theres a handful of people doing this and they will move onto the next business to attack too, thats how they work. Part of what made problems for owners was mass misinformation, so even if you can reverse a penalisation, you cant reverse what damage people did to trust in web directories. If that had not been created then we would not be worrying about this now. It shows how delicate online business is, just create a wave of craziness, it spreads and search engines dont even need to do that much. Infact google have only done a little to cause problems for us, the worst of the damage was through online voice.
I usually get them in threads like this, the abuse telling me to sleep with my sister/mother. As for why some get away with no penalty? Because they haven't been spotted.....yet. Google recently culled a massive amount of bid directories. Although the owners are quite in-experienced and so a lot don't even realise. Google doesn't strictly want niche directories. They just don't want empty directories, and having a smaller niche directory makes that easier, i reckon.
yea well filling categories with sites I think is an important step adding sites to non commercial areas would be something I would be doing anyway yea and I wont be showing the directory around either especially the point is not the actual directory but trying to find the general steps which need to be taken to get any directory out of this penalty. getting this directory out of penalty is more a test of how possible it is rather than something I need to focus on also. yea I would be including good quality sites I appreciate you mentioning this but its not a course im prepared to take as this isn't going to work a lot of the time like you say I want a way of making changes to the directory and then filing a reinclusion request. I also dont see how general or niche makes a difference wouldn't worry about it and thanks for suggestions In a way dropping PR for all directories would be a good thing but it would have to be for all and not some. If submitters can be made to look deeper than PR it would be a good thing for us all but I think google has missed an opportunity to do this and instead has unfairly applied penalties What I think has happened is that initially sites were penalised in a wave either manually or automatically Some were connected to being reported im sure Some sites have since made it out of a penalty but the majority haven't. I think this is mainly because webmasters still do not have a clear idea of what is needed to get out of this penalty and seeing plenty of offending sites unpenalised makes it even more confusing
I don't think there is any rhyme or reason for penalties to sites. That is obvious from seeing all the ones out there using tactics which are clearly against the webmaster guidelines and still they have pr4 - pr5 or more. I don't think it is as much a matter of not being spotted as not being reported for some made up garbage by a jealous competitor or someone who may have taken a comment to personal on a forum. <this may be the reason many leave dp> Getting a penalty reversed or staying out of a penalty may be more about who you know or whos eye you can catch on a blog somewhere than what you do imo. There are already examples in this thread that might indicate it is worthwhile to pay and be a member of Rands club. In the end everyone is just guessing as to the reason because google is not telling which seems rediculous to me. It seems that if they are going to somehow penalize a site google should at least have the courtesy or professionalism to tell that site owner why.
yea it makes me not want to even bother to try and reverse a penalty when I see the sites not penalised after doing much worse than I did. maybe I am naive to think I can reverse the penalty from applying some changes to my directory. I'm lucky I don't depend on reversing the penalty because the way google has left things doesn't leave me with much confidence on being successful
I genuinely think its in vain, ive been looking at various changes beyond the obvious today that i could make to my directories, would be time consuming and i personally dont think it would be worth it now. I dont feel it would increase submissions and i dont know about anyone else but im in it for the money Seriously im just waiting for all of my directories to have some sort of penalisation and no pr, how sad is that? but its gotta be faced. We cant help ourselves if we dont know what were meant to be correcting in the first place. Its like a jigsaw puzzle with half the pieces missing, i just cant sort the mess without the required details.
I think the worst part is that the penalties aren't applied evenly If they were we would have a clear idea of what we should and shouldn't be doing Google probably doesn't want to give too much away in relation to how to reverse a penalty but if it was just as simple as doing as Google says in its guidelines that would be reasonable but it isn't like that from what I've seen
I can't honestly say I believe that - here is one example and where there is one there are thousands.... You and I may think that green bar is about as useless as can be and we might even be right. BUT there are many people who the first thing they look at when they visit a site is that stupid green bar. Which brings up a whole new line of thought on the topic of pr and its worth. I have some conflicting thoughts I have been throwing around in my head. I look at directories as basically having two sets of clients. First set is visitors who come to the site looking for resources or information (content). Second set is of course the submitters who would like to have their website listed for any number of reasons. Personally when I review a submitted site I look at a whole list of factors to determine its quality but pr is not one of them. So that is basically my take on pr. However, as someone who provides services online I also see a different side. Business is about taking into account what your clients want and providing it for them - isnt it? Not just one set of clients but both sets of clients. ie visitors AND submitters. Visitors and submitters are different yet completely intertwined with each other. They are like the circle of life for a directory. Visitors could care less about pr. Some submitters could also care less about pr, but some of those submitters are - whether right or wrong - concerned with pr. More than anything I like visitors. I like traffic and being able to provide resources and content to visitors. How search engines feel about sites is best measured in how much traffic they are sending them imo. The problem is you can't have visitors without submitters. Submitters provide the means to grow the directory with resources, content and covering maintenance. For me everything goes back in to improve the site for both sets of clients. So here is where the conflict comes in to play. Though I could not care less about the pr of a site when I review it. Though many directory owners here (myself included) have said how useless pr is (and it is). I come back to this - Business is about taking into account what your clients want and providing it for them - isnt it? Let me put it another way. If I walk up to a soda machine in a health food store I certainly don't expect the clerk to come lecture me how bad drinking the Coke will be for my health.... A whole lot of businesses have gone under thinking they know more than their clients.....
Funny you should say that. I joined SEOMOZ pro which at the time was $50 a month. Used it merely to personal message Rand and explain my problem. He told me what to do, I did it, and the penalty went. Interesting