I have an 11 year old site which has always done quite well in the SERPS. I actually remember when all these other updates took places in recent years, we were always fine. Did a link campaign about 7 years ago i.e. directories.. helped push the rankings a little, but nothing since then and have grown alot since then. Since about March 17th (around that time) my website has started to fall in positions and I am getting a lot less visits. We have now 50% of what we had at that point. Even yesterday it dropped alot again and I am very desperate considering that I have a medium sized business with alot of people whos livelyhoods now depend on me. Its a listings website showing property. We also have a wordpress blog which we update daily. We dont copy content or employ any bad practice.. I am clueless. I know its hard to say without you being able to look into analytics/webmasters tools at this point.. but does any of the above sound familiar with a penalty or update?.. any ideas? BTW.. Google webmaster is not showing any penalties when you login but I dont know if that means anything. Thanks in advance
Yep that is Penguin 2.0 result. Directories campaing dosnt sounds good to me, google dosnt like this stuff. Anyway you should try to look into webmaster tools and find most non-relevant links target your site. Then send request to google to ingnore these links. Or contact webmasters to remove spamy looks like links.
Wrong. Penguin 2.0 was on 22 May 2013. The closest update to around the time of the OP's problems was Panda #25. So you did no advertising/marketing whatsoever? Given your niche, I find that very hard to believe. You can't just stagnate, you need some kind of marketing efforts otherwise you're going to drop. So, be honest and explain what you've done (even if it's incredibly shameful). So it has been a gradual decline since then? So you should do what every responsible business owner does and make a business plan, make sure your website is part of it, be active in marketing (this doesn't mean spamming). Scraped property listings or are you actually a realtor/letting agent/estate agent? For specific advice, you give very little to go on. At the very least, you need to provide your site's link. You are opening yourself up for generic, misguided and bad advice.
Hi Guys Thanks for the responses... Ryan - Wrong. Penguin 2.0 was on 22 May 2013. The closest update to around the time of the OP's problems wasPanda #25. - That's what I wasnt sure about. So you did no advertising/marketing whatsoever? Given your niche, I find that very hard to believe. You can't just stagnate, you need some kind of marketing efforts otherwise you're going to drop. So, be honest and explain what you've done (even if it's incredibly shameful). - Well we market on other websites, and we write fresh content daily for our site. I agree, we should have done more, but we have also been re-doing out internal system so treading water in a profitable way has been fine for me. I honestly havent tried to garner dodgy links. If I had, I would just say and you could tell me I have been an idiot and to remove them. We havent. The closest to that is back in maybe 2007 when I commissioned an India company to gather links in a kind of grey hat manner. So it has been a gradual decline since then? - yes it has. Yesterday we are now at about 50% of what we were in March. I am pretty sure (if this means anything) that our sove So you should do what every responsible business owner does and make a business plan, make sure your website is part of it, be active in marketing (this doesn't mean spamming). - I agree.. we are doing what we can now. Probably PPC Scraped property listings or are you actually a realtor/letting agent/estate agent? - We are an estate agent. Original content. No scraping. For specific advice, you give very little to go on. At the very least, you need to provide your site's link. You are opening yourself up for generic, misguided and bad advice. - You might be right but I am looking for clues, and the idea that we have bad links pointing to us may be a clue which I am looking into now. Any other ideas would be appreciated.
What does that mean? If you haven't been doing it carefully (such as nofollow paid links) then this could well be your problem. There is what you consider dodgy and what is dodgy (in Google's eyes, I suppose you could say). It's hard to be objective about one's own site, but you have to be. You have to question every paid and placed link (rather than earned - ones someone made because they wanted to, such as reviewed your service). Property can be one of the coolest sectors. You need to think big and think beyond just PPC. You're not just selling property, but also a dream. People love to look for their dream home, even when they can't afford it. Social media is an excellent opportunity for estate agents. Even the worst house is potentially someone's dream - their dream fix-it-up project. Learn about SMART goals and set goals. As an example: increasing YouTube subscriptions by 15% in three months. If say you make videos of the properties, you could even have someone talk about the ones that need fixing up, ideas about how to turn it from a ruin to a castle (metaphorically speaking). Or if you just do photos, then Facebook likes increase by xx% by sharing photos of the loveliest homes, views from their windows, before and after shots of houses people have renovated, etc. The short version: Appeal to people's dreams through visual media. So it could be coincidence that your problems started around Panda time. on the other hand, it could be the way you list your content. You need to ask questions such as: is it useful for humans or designed for search engines? What's missing? What's there and doesn't need to be? But you could get real people (who don't know SEO or web design) to give views on your site - e.g. family and friends or customers. Make a survey.
Its designed for humans in an seo friendly manner. i.e. (description example) This Great Portland Street flats to rent are situated in one of London’s most prestigious areas. The W1 flat to let is located on the 5th floor and is open plan. Facilities at the on site gym include 24 hour access, a swimming pool, a communal meeting area and a commissioned reception. The West End residential property provides excellent transport links and is within walking distance to Oxford Circus and Great Portland Street Underground Stations. An abundance of shops, cafes, bars and restaurants can be found on the famous Oxford Street, situated only a few minutes walk from the building.
Is every page like that with just one or two words changed (such as the street, tube names, etc)? Also, think beyond written content, but layout, site structure (no problems crawling, no duplicate content, etc). Actually, I have a feeling duplicate content can at least be part of your problem, if your site is the one I think it is. I'm not saying you copied content from elsewhere, but instead that you are placing the same content on other sites. Regarding "Just advertising properties on well known portals." do you mean adverts they run that are similar to Adsense ads? (I assume the links they place are no-followed - or should be.) I wouldn't worry about those links as they seem to just be sites that automatically generate links. Typically, Google ignore these links (as in gives them a zero value), even though it lists them in Google Webmaster Tools.
As you said that your site contains property listings, so the listing description should be unique so that your site would have fresh content.
You need to place your links on the high PR Blogs and forum threads to improve the SERPS. Dont kept your website content idle, whenever you have time, improve on the content and website design, and also keep posting your links on genuine sites.
forget google, if you dont have any seriouse site with real value and authority or you content is not written by a known wrighter with G+ account you are going to have a hard time. and in addition who knows what the next update will bring.... look for other ways to get your traffic, social engaigement is a good way, listbuilding also and there are many that will provide you the stability over time and make you in charge of your traffic and not to tepen on google any more.