(Unfair) Removal from Google's Index This is the very unfair email that I received today: Dear site owner or webmaster of ....com, While we were indexing your webpages, we detected that some of your pages were using techniques that were outside our quality guidelines, which can be found here: http://www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html In order to preserve the quality of our search engine, we have temporarily removed some webpages from our search results. Currently pages from single2.com are scheduled to be removed for at least 30 days. Specifically, we detected the following practices on your webpages: * The following hidden text on ....com: e.g. +keywords removed by me+, [...] We would prefer to have your pages in Google's index. If you wish to be reincluded, please correct or remove all pages that are outside our quality guidelines. When you are ready, please visit: https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/reinclusion?hl=en to learn more and request a reconsideration request. Sincerely, Google Search Quality Team ============================================= My comments continued: 1. My site does not have any hidden text 2. Google did not provide me with any offending URL, only with some keywords of "some" page. I checked the suspected page and I found that the keywords in that page are NOT hidden, but are of the same colour as the other text on that page and is not white, but dark blue, while the background is light blue. The text is very well readable, just like black on white. 3. Google email has NO contact info whatsoever. Only email as "from". 4. When I went to the following page provided by Google's email: https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/reinclusion?hl=en I found that there's NO WAY I can resubmit my site for reinclusion because of the following reasons: a. The "Requesting reconsideration of:" drop-down box with "Choose site" has NO sites listed. Nothing, just "Choose site" itself. b. Reconsideration statement (checkbox) By submitting this form, I acknowledge that: * I believe this site has violated Google's quality guidelines in the past. * This site no longer violates Google's quality guidelines. * I have read and agree to abide by Google's quality guidelines. Now tell me please HOW can I check that box if my site by my best opinion and knowledge HAS NOT violated Google's guidelines. Google thinks (mistakingly?) that it did, but I think it did not. So how can they force me to check that boxin this case? That is unfair! c. "Request reconsideration" button on the bottom of that page is disablewd even if I logged in with my Google account. Something is "unclean" there. I'm afraid that Google is bullying me into some kind of weird submission. I've been thinking a lot lately and there's no other way just to contact a lawyer about Google's unfair SEO practices. In this case the only "contact" I'm presented is that "reconsideration" form which DOES NOT WORK! Which leaves me with NO way out! Please share your thoughts, suggestions and opinions with me. Thank you.
I just got one of my sites removed that only had a few blog posts so I'm not sure what is going on with google
Well, it must be some kind of mistake then, but it does not make Google's name more reputable. In fact my site is still appearing on Google.com. I mean there must be some laws and regulations regarding companies like Google, because Google owns a lot of information and a lot of small and big businesses' incomes depend on their listings within Google SE, so any foolish error by Google can cost us dearly.
You forgot to remove the url 'single2' from the text you pasted, you edited it initially but left it in further down by mistake? I don't know if that's a legit e-mail, I had a site pulled from the Google index - it was there but then it vanished. I never received any contact from Google - I submitted a re-inclusion, and the site was re-added. Maybe it's one of your competitors trying to stress you - double check and ensure your in the directory.
Regarding the Google email it's real, I checked the links and where it's coming from (IP etc.). As I said before my site has no hidden text or hidden links and that email is a Google's mistake. No wonder they did not provide me with an URL of the offending page. Probably an automatic mailing.
Get webmaster control panel / tools set up on your site from Google. Log in and see what info is there. At the least you should find the correct re-inclusion information. Also, to be on the safe side, perhaps change the text colour if you think that is what it may have been, though i suspect it is something else. If you gave us your site url we could investigate and flag things for you. No point moaning if you don't give us the chance to help you based on fact rather than word
Sunnymonkey, thanks. I went to reinclusion page, logged in, selected the checkbox, entered the text, but "choose site" has no domains listed... So how do I make the "choose site" drop-dow to have my site there? Without it I can't submit the reinclusion form..... The failures of BIG BROTHERS like that that's what's most frustrating. In fact I lost $1300 by clicking on some bad site on Google lately, it got a bad trojan into my PC and destroyed my hard disk, I had to buy a new PC. Talking about "inclusion" they should clean up the top results that are full of trojan sites and porn and then hit the small guys who don't do much harm if at all. I went to Google tools and there's something wrong, it does not work, it asks to add my site, I added it, but it's confusing and too complicated for me. I downloaded "Site Overview" but all I see is this: "Site Information,Sitemaps,Errors,Warnings,Verified? http://www.domainname.com/,0,0,0,Unverified" It asks to add a metatag or html but I'm not able to do that. I'm only in control of some texts on the site. The rest was done by webdeveloper who asks for big money now to update it. I tried to provide a free service for people, but I think I'll just let the site go...
Your site is full of spam at the bottom. Go to your site, click view source, scroll down. That is why you were removed. Totally against TOS. Also, you left your domain in your original post above so I had already seen it, just wanted to be sure it was the right site. Get rid of that text before you request a re inclusion.
"In fact I lost $1300 by clicking on some bad site on Google lately, it got a bad trojan into my PC and destroyed my hard disk, I had to buy a new PC." and that sounds VERY odd, but without more details I wont comment.
Ughhh yea..you see that's called keyword stuffing and Google penalizes that. You were probably reported by someone (I don't think the googlebot algo can differentiate between a tag cloud and keyword stuffing)..but you definitely did break their terms, so it's fair removal.
Google will easily pick that up these days, it's not even the words as such, its the styling that was applied to hide it. This post smells odd all over as why would you be talking about dumping the site, how did you not know the words were there, and how would you know you had a trojan, yet not know that you could get rid of it with a simple scan, or at worst a healthy format / re-install? Ho hum, whatever... hope we all helped you.