Our domain was initially a PR1 before this current SEO campaign. Initially we did some onpage optimization and dropped to a pr0. (All link building has happened since the PR0 and we have not yet been updated with a new PR) About two months ago we started a very aggressive SEO campaign. ($>3k) We began to fly through the rankings for our keyword. Unlisted -> 250 -> 125 -> 95 -> 85 -> 76 (yesterday) Again this was all over the period of a couple months. Today our keyword is ranking over 500 places down. Our backlinks are fairly good. Some very relevant / Some not, but overall they are decent links with very few junky websites. The pr's are spread out evenly (0-7's) Our link text is quite varied, again not incredible, but definitely not bad. ______ I'm wondering if we are being penalized for moving too fast? Is it possible that we are being penalized, but as long as all of our links stay up for a month or so we will begin moving again? I know everybody asks these same questions about their sites, however, any light that can be shed would be greatly appreciated! Thanks-
It is impossible for anyone to tell (other than a Google search employee) why your particular site is where it is. When you use words like aggressive to describe your seo campaign, it certainly sounds like that may be the culprit. Moderation is really the best medicine, IMHO, when it comes to SEO. Unfortunately, we all want what we want right now. The best advice I can give you is to try and step back and think about what your website is and why it should rank for what you want it to rank for. Why would someone link to it? Why would they link to it with the anchor text that you have pointing to it with your seo campaign? Is it realistic to think that your site would have the links pointing to it that it does? In the timeframe that you acquired them? How do these things compare to what the top sites for your keywords have? I am not sure if that helps, but I think it is pretty sound advice. Unless you are trying to rank for some obscure term then expecting to rank in the top ten within two months, and staying there, is pretty unrealistic.
It is hard to say without a URL and the KW in question. Keep in mind some 'everflux' comes into play and rankings can shift. By tomorow you may be back to 70 In the end NOTHING past page #3 of the SERPs is worth much of anything. Losing a 76 to a 576 is really no big difference. You need to work on the SEO stuff more until you get top 30. If you lose that? Then start to worry. Until then it's all the same.... 50 or 500 in the SERPs How long since you started the SEO campaign and what did you (they) do?
This is a very good point. Analytics has us only receiving ~20 uniques/day from organic google. We are shooting to list above 5 on the first page for our kw. In the meantime the serps are our only real method of gauging our seo progress. I'd rather not give out the site/keyword, however, the keyword we are aiming for also accounted for about 65% of all of our PPC traffic. The last thing that would help at this point would be for us to freak out and start changing things... Our SEO campaign has consisted of a few high quality directories / payperpost / and other relevant purchased links. I just didn't know if it was accepted that Google routinely penalizes sites that attempt to move to fast??
I'd continue on with some more basic link building - say directory submissions and some article markteing usually is a good kicker.... Obviously you want to ensure you have your on-page ducks in a row. I'd also suggest, time and and $$ willing - to target a few terms at any given time as well. Never put all your SERP eggs in one basket. The real 'money terms' can often be elusive. I can't say for sure without more info ( U can PM URL and KW if ya want) - but I wouldn't worry yet.. if you drop completely out of the idex? Then U may want to lower the life rafts.
Sometimes the websites have a tendancy to "slingshot." In other words, fall way behind then come back, sometimes lower or higher than they were before. I don't think you're website will stay there though.
To conclude this part of the story- I was wrong about us being in the 500's. Our actual domain was returning as 900+. It slowly changed over the next few days- gaining maybe 10 positions. On Sunday- 5 days after the dropoff, we suddenly returned to the Google Rankings at position 51. This is higher than we have ever been before and a full 25 places from where we had disappeared from. Over the last 3 days we've moved another 4 places or so up. Still not sure what happened. It could have been an algorithm change, or as we feared: being penalized for buying too many links too fast. So right now we are just playing it cool and keeping all of the links stable- not adding anymore. In a week or two we will start adding more inbound links again, albeit more slowly- just in case.
As suggested, its hard to say without being in with google. But you should buid up links as you always have but do it at a steady pace, dont buy 3k worth in 1 week. Buy that over the course of a month or so. This will help you in the long run, but SEO is never overnight.
Man, this happens to me every time I post a new article on a PR5 site with very good backlinks all of them organically obtained. A new post's page first takes a couple of days to rank usually in the 100s and some times on the first page for some not super-competitive keywords but better than long tail ones. Then after a couple of days, it drops out of the SERPS. And then usually 3-5 days later, it comes back at a higher position than the very first time. It happens every time! I have just concluded that it has to do with the amount of time it takes for Google to process the page and rank it with respect to all other related pages and also get the data out to all the data centers. In other words, I believe that it is normal and now I know to wait a couple of weeks to check if a page ranks for a keyword that I am targetting.
Be patient. My link numbers and indexed pages have been all over the place in the past 4 days. This always happens right before an update. Just keep working as normal, and it should all settle down soon. (Did you say $3k for SEO?)
It's not likely to be an algo change. Such a change would effect tens of thousands of sites. Yes it could be a "too many - too quick" penalty, but penalties normally last at least 30 days and often much more. My theory is that when G sees many changes with a site, programming says that the 100 to 200 hundred factors that go into ranking should be re-calculated. And, I believe that many of the factors are circular calculations (dependant on each other) requiring that they be set to zero before other calculations can be made. Further, I believe that there are many subroutines that need to be scheduled before one can say that all calculations are complete, and that this can take days. So, I think that while a site is going through this process, its document score is temporarily very low which results in the massive drop. Once all calculations are performed, the site takes its new rightful place because of a higher doc score. /*tom*/
My rankings lately dropped from the 2nd to the 3rd page for the term 'online games' also, and I was likewise concerned until I read this thread. While longcall911’s post seems rational, I will update this thread with my findings within the coming days to either support or refute these claims.
Hi guys, quicky update I tried what my friend suggested and put my link in my sig on other forums, and it already got re indexed properly.
This can be a very good expamle of Over-Optimization. I just wrote about it on my blog. Might be interesting for you to check out. Aggresive SEO on a website without much authority can hurt!!