Frustrated with Google! I like them but they do not like me or one of my sites. I thought it was the new site penalty at first but the site is now over 6 months old. Our Google PR is 5 and we have an ongoing reciprocal linking program so that we are always getting new links. We get page 1 rankings on Yahoo, Altavista, MSN, Hotbot + others Any suggestions? Site: www.1st-for-florida-property.com Thanks
Here is my guess.... Visit here: http://www.copyscape.com/ - Enter your url and you will see another url that looks like it has a lot of duplicate content. (http://www.1stforfloridaproperty.com/) Then, go here http://www.123promotion.co.uk/tools/compare.php and enter your url and the above, very similar, url. Your results will look something like this: 1. Whole HTML Code: Matched content: 100% 2. Whole text: Matched content: 100% 3. HTML Code within body tag: Matched content: 100% 4. Text within body tag: Matched content: 100% My guess, is the duplicate content is no good on almost identical domains. They probably found both and thought "hey, this doesn't look right"... Just my opinion...
Excellent anaslysis NewComputer. PR5 means you're indexed well enough but after that, they have serious questionmarks about your content. Fair enough they won't rank you if it's all duplicate.
Agree, I had similar problems just as duplicate content. I had a pr6 and a pr5 that would be indexed for a day then disappear never amounting to much because of a ServerAlias www.site.com www.2ndsite.com. They'll never both be indexed. Not saying this is what you're doing btw, just a comment.
One step further, I believe that if G (or the others) feel what you are doing is purposely trying to game, you will find them both dropped, as I believe is happening above. I have experienced this on the other SE's and seen the ramifications of doing what web is doing above. Whether on purpose or not, it is absolutely hurting you to have two identical sites on two different domains (that are indexed) in Google.
NC, what about if the other site is a URL which is on a domain which does not belong to you but appears to be an 302 direct to your domain. I have this problem, and trying to get the sites to take down the directs. Do inurl:mydomain.com (in the holiday homes link) and you'll see what I mean!
That's a nasty problem wwhomes. I know somebody who solved such an issue buy contacting both the site's host and the site's owners/webmasters. They probably don't have a clue or are on a mission to take you out on purpose.
Tops, yeah I have done that. One of the sites I am advertising on so I am sure they will remove it pretty soon. The other site has a directory, where all of the links are 302 directs (I think!) so they will be loads and loads of sites with this problem. I have no idea if this is an 302 direct, just what someone told me on another forum, how could I tell? p.s. sorry for hijacking the thread - please PM me if you can help!
ISP contact would be the best way. I would forward the email you sent to them and forward it to the ISP. Ugly situation, and again, one that I am unfortunately all to familiar with... PS: What about doing a block from that IP or something whereby basically eliminating access to your domain from that domain?
Both sites have emailed me and will remove the link tomorrow. The two URL's are supplimental results (with 1969 cache date) how long before they disappear from the results. I've heard you can include the URL's on a robots.txt file and then visit a page on Google, enter the URL of the robots.txt file and they will remove them within 24 hours. Not sure if anyone is aware of that. If I've learnt anything is not trust anyone who links to you, and I'll certainly be more on the ball where that is concerned from now on! EDIT: thanks to everyone who PM'd me with advice!
Thanks for the advice. But 1st-for-florida-property.com, 1st-for-florida-property.co.uk and 1stforfloridaproperty.com are the same site! Surely Google cannot penalise you for making sure you have variations on your domain name. How many users remember if there are hyphens etc? Google are penalising you for being user friendly. Cannot believe it?
Webvivre, they are the same site therefore it is classed as duplicate content. They are examples that I have seen who have duplicate content, different URL's, i.e. .com and .co.uk but they do not appear to be affected. I'd think about removing one of the URL's and remove the pages from Google. You can do that via the Google site, but it can be time consuming if you have a number of pages indexed. ------------- Top30, last night I emailed Google about the 2 URL's I mentioned in PM - tonight I have received a response from them and it appears to be a personal response! I'm amazed, hat's off to Google if it is a personal response!
Are you telling Google what they can and cannot do? hehe, They can, and they are in your case, doing what they feel is best for a consumer experience. There is a tonne of info out there about the negative results from duplicate content. If I were you, I would drop the two pages that have not been cached since mid November and put up and under construction page or a redirect to get you indexed.
If it's just the domain variations you want then just 301 redirect them to one 'main' one. WWHhomes: cool! Did they say what it was though? What they were going to do? PM it if you like! I emailed a guy with a directory all 302 redirected. Wasn't expecting mutch but got a good nice reply saying they were aware of it and changing it this weekend. I won't blame anyone for not knowing (in fact, it's quite complicated all) but at least these people resonded well and were open to suggestions.
Update: one of my URL's that were a direct 302 has now being removed, I'm waiting for the final page to disappear and I'll then let you know what I did to get rid of this problem. The email from Google was partly personal, i.e the first paragraph, the rest was the usual stuff, read guidlines etc.