For quite sometime, (+3months), I only had one single BL according to Google and almost all my pages indexed. Now, this morning, all my pages appear to be indexed, (I haven’t checked the exact number), and I have about 30/40 BL. Does that mean I am out of the sandbox? How can I tell? I must admit that I haven’t seen a big jump in the logs. FFMG
Google just updated the backlinks today morning. Thats why you are seeing new BLs. This does not imply you are out of sandbox. Sandbox is a probationary period where your linkbuilding has no effect in SERPS. If you are out of sandbox, you will be ranking pretty well. [ Use keyword tracker to check rankings ]
How do you rank when you do a search using your keywords? Are you getting the volume of traffic you need given the metrics of your business model? If yes, that is all you need to know, right? Some feel the sandbox is real, others feel its not a actual penalty but more like part of the mathematical algorithm that makes up the search results. Things like the age of the site, the time until the URL registration expires and the age of the links that lead to your site could all be part of this formula and could make a person believe there is a sandbox when in fact there is not.
I see, how often do they update the BLs? I thought it was an ongoing thing, (updated as Google was coming across them). Also because I only had one single obscure link for so long I thought it was a tell-tell sign of the sandbox. FFMG
I do ok with Yahoo and MSN, (first page), but I cannot tell how far down I am with Google. Do you know a tool that will tell me how far down the list I am? Most tools I know only list the top 50. Not really. Because it only happened today, it is very hard to tell if there has been a jump in Google traffic. I think there is a sandbox, but the name is misleading. It sounds like a punishment or something. I agree with you that it is only result of the algorithm been used. But because I cannot tell what the formula is I can only speculate if I am going to get proper traffic from Google. At present I am getting almost nothing from them. FFMG
Publically viewable link count ( remember the link: command only shows sampled out put, there are more than what you see as you BL in google ) is updated every month as far as I know. Google may be dynamically updating the links internally, but public update is usually done once in a month.
I still don't get any backlinks with Google, although I have many articles and sites with back links established (MSN shows quite a few). Beginning to grow a bit concerned that somehow my site has just missed the boat (established early November). Any ideas? Secondly, if someone could provide the keyword tracking tool URL, that would be appreciated. Many thanks. Paul PS: Sorry, just saw the marketleap tool after posting. Many thanks.
Having pages indexed has nothing to do with the sanbox, the sanbox only affects search engine rankings.
The marketleap tool shows 316 MSN links to my domain, and google still a big zero. Any thoughts as to why would be appreciated.
If you have good rankings for your keywords in google you can assume that you are probably out of the sandbox. If you do not have rankings for your keywords you are not really lucky use this too to track your position.
Thanks for that, unfortunately it only gives me the first 3 pages, so I am not sure if that it that means I am not ranked at all. But I guess if I am not in the top 3 pages, I am nowhere. FFMG
I agree. The odds someone will go to page 4 or beyond, visit your site and buy something is very small.
When you see your site rank for moderatly competitive search terms then that is a good sign your out of the sandbox.