I was just wondering if there is a chance for a site being sandboxed by google after 3 years ranking well for the targeted keywords. The content of site is same and nothing changed in site structure and design. It was on #1 position for many keywords but now its no where found in google. The google bot visits daily and it shows PR too which confirms that it is not banned. Also it is still on top in other search engines.
The bot visiting daily is no reason to think that the site isn't being penalised, it could be checking to see if whatever is causing the penalty has been removed. In my experience I have had one site sandboxed that was a 2 year old site, but that was after a redesign and some IBL being obtained. It could be that you have used something or other that is against the Google guidelines, but has only recently been worked out by G. Google will penalise a site if it has erroneuous code, and the length of the penaly depends on the length of time that the code remains on the page after being found by G and flagged as such. Have you suddenly got a raft of inbound links to your site, or has anything chaged? Or, did this happen about two weeks ago when Google introduced their new algo? If this is the case, then Google simply doesn't consider your site worthy of ranking. (sorry)
It was my understanding that sites do not get sandboxed, just the links pointing to them, maybe i'm wrong. Anyway, once you reach number one you have to work just as hard to stay there.You say the content has never changed or the structure in three years, this could be the reason. It could be possible that your competitors are building more content and getting more backlinks rather than google penalizing you. Analyse the sites ranking better than you and see what they are doing.
my impression was that the "sandbox" was basically for brand new web sites and people that google was punishing. It seems to me that you are obviously not a new site and if you still have PR, you are not being punished. Hence, you shouldn't be in the sandbox. I don't know if this will help, but I strategically hid a 4x4 and two shovels in my site so if I get stuck in the sandbox, I will be able to dig myself out in record time.
How Long it was kept in the sandbox ? I am interested to know because the client wants me to redesign it and if its not sandboxed am afraid it will after redesign. I am sure that won’t be the case because the site has very less compotators for the targeted keywords and it ranked very well so far. Thanks everyone. It was helpful Zeb
it was held up for 12 weeks. "then Google simply doesn't consider your site worthy of ranking. (sorry) " I am sure that won’t be the case because the site has very less compotators for the targeted keywords and it ranked very well so far. Google changed its algorithm two weeks ago, that is what I was saying. Many sites that previously were holding top spots, simply went away, as google considered them no longer relevent.