One of the popular theories on the Sandbox says that if you have a drastic, or better yet "unnatural" increase in the "rate of procurement" of IBL's then you can trigger this G filter. Well, what about a DMOZ listing and the *hundreds* of directories that pick up your DMOZ listing? I launched 2 sites a few months ago, one managed a listing in DMOZ and the other didn't. They were roughly on the same level of competitiveness and both had very similar IBL's. Yet the one that got the DMOZ listing and subsequent*200 IBL's* in 2 weeks got boxed, while the other didn't. Granted this is far from anything but anecdotal, I was wondering if this could be an issue. In order for it *not* to be an issue I would imagine G would have to have some hard-coded exceptions. I mean, when your competitors only have 100 IBL's and it took them 12 months to get them, and you get 200 in a week or so...this MUST raise an "artificial" flag. Understandably, this isn't an issue for a lot of people (getting in DMOZ is like winning a small lotto), but it is still an interesting issue and definitely has real-world application. For instance, I would no longer submit my brand new sites to DMOZ. Anyone care to specular or provide their experiences with new sites that got listed in DMOZ? Thanks.
Are there other factors that may have caused the sandbox effect? Also, are you sure the site is in the sandbox? Clearly some people believe that building links too quickly can cause problems with Google. However, there are some good examples to the contrary. For example, writing a good article can get a site hundreds or even thousands of links in a very short time and I have never heard of this getting anyone penalized.
This site was soo incredibly similar in every way. Of course there *could* be something else out there that caused this, but i doubt it. As per your counter example of getting thousands of links quickly and doing well in the Serps. That argument still fits my originally described model. The exception to getting links "too fast" and getting thrown in the box is to get them "really fast" (think...when Live8 concert site launched...it got 10k backlinks in 1 day and in a few days after launch it was #1). I still think that unless Google has manually overridden DMOZ listings, this could be a definite trip to the box.
You would think if a site got listed into the DMOZ (and subsequently Google's directory), then it would be deamed a quality website and thus no need for the sandbox. But, reasoning that makes sense doesn't go over well with G.
The sandbox has to do with the age of the site, nothing more. A DMOZ listing neither helps nor hurts you getting out because it doesn't affect the age your site.
How does that model explain two sites vying for the same keyword, with similar IBL's getting out of the 'box' 6 months apart? The simple "age" factor has been debunked on various forums, especially WW. Where have you been? [note: I am talking about another pair of sites I run]
mjewel- I also believe in the age filter, but as with everything else, it doesn't seem to be too consistent. However, I don't believe your definition of the sandbox is the one used by most. Being penalized for duplicate content or building links too fast (if this really does cause problems) will land you in what most refer to as the sandbox.
There are many reason why two sites will not rank well. Unless you have a different definition that the originator of the word, the sandbox is a filter is applied to certain sectors where google will not count your backlinks when figuring in SERPS. Backlinks will still show, PR is unaffected, it will just be hard for your site to rank well for any competive keyword without benefit of backlinks. No two sites can be identical, because if they were, you would be talking about a duplicate content penalty - and the sandbox is not a catchall term for sites that don't rank well. WW, enough said.
I thought it was decided that the sandbox is a filter for the age of your incoming LINKS not the age of your site. But yeh the sandbox is so sketchy you can never tell what the exceptions are
No, it's a filter that is applied base on the age of the site. It's a "proving" time period for a site to try and cut down on people registering throwaway domain names and using black hat SEO, etc. When they started it, goolge grandfathered DOMAIN names as long as ownership did not change. This was to prevent someone from just buying an old domain name and getting around the filter. I'm talking about doman names, not established sites. If you buy an established site that is not in the sandbox, it does not go back in - provided at least if the focus of the site doesn't change. A lot of people used to argue that the sandbox didn't exist - and Matt Cutt's from google just admitted they have something (although they don't called it the sandbox) which could be considered the sandbox. I think some sectors that are not competitive (prone to problems) might be exempt - although I haven't personally experienced that. Far too many people wrongly blame the sandbox for their site not ranking well. There are many other factors to not ranking well - but usually they don't have enough quality backlinks from relevant sites. Look at the top 5 ranking sites for the keyword you are trying to rank for and then check how many "inanchor" backlinks they have compared to your site. Assuming they aren't using hidden text, 10 h1 tags per page, etc, that is the problem 9 out of 10 times.