I run a wedding website at http://wedding-band-ring.com - my Google
ranking is good - not excellent yet - but good. I have been
trying very hard to get link exchanges, etc. with similar sites to
improve my ranking. Recently, I noticed that when I do a search at
Google for my site "wedding-band-ring.com" and click on "Find web
pages that link to wedding-band-ring.com" it comes up with no matches
- although just a few weeks ago when I had checked I had over a
hundred sites linking to my site according to the Google index.

Has something happened to my website ranking on Google that will be
altered on the next Google update? I'm just afriad that my site, which
is a major portion of my income is having problems in the Google
index. 

I know that my listing still intact currently, but I am afraid it
could lose its position or presence in the next update.  Have I done
something to mess up my Google listing? And if so,
what can I do to fix it? Can you tell me specifically what has
happened in relation to my specific website? Not just the general
Google guidelines?

Thank you! 
Afshin

Greetings, applesofgold!

Do you have the Google Toolbar installed in your browser? If not, I
recommend that you do so. You can download it here:
http://toolbar.google.com  
(The toolbar requires Microsoft Windows 95/98/ME/NT/2000/XP and
Microsoft Internet Explorer version 5 or later.)
  
If you call up your website with the Toolbar visible in your browser
window, it will show your "Page Rank" on a scale from 0 to 10.
According to the Google Toolbar, your current Page Rank for your home
page is 3. I suspect that this has recently dropped from a Page Rank
of 4 or higher, and that is why your "backward links" are no longer
being indexed by the Googlebot.

While Google is pretty protective of the algorithms they use to
determine Page Rank as well as the other aspects of their Search
Engine, questions like this are the subject of much research and
speculation by webmasters.
  
Because of Google's secrecy, it is not known for absolute certain, but
the general consensus among webmasters is that Google only indexes
backward links for a page if IT has a Page Rank higher than 3, and
only indexes the backward links that are coming FROM pages with a Rank
higher than 3.
  
From Senior Forum Member "Beachboy" at WebmasterWorld:  
"Your index page is PR3, Google won't show any inbound links unless
the page you're doing the query on is PR4 or greater."
http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum3/4784.htm?highlight=inbound+links+higher
  
From Senior Forum Member "Birdman" at WebmasterWorld:  
"It is thought that Google only shows backlinks from pages that have a
pr4 or higher."
http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum3/7309.htm?highlight=inbound+links+higher
 

I suspect that the reason your website's drop in Page Rank is that you
are participating in at least one -- possibly more -- "Link Exchange",
also known as a "Link Farm". Google does NOT like link farms, as it
considers them to be sneaky attempts to circumvent the Googlebot's
Page Ranking algorithm. When Google catches a site doing this sort of
thing, they are usually
terminated from Google's index with prejudice.


It looks like your website has paid for premium placement on

ChristianAddUrl.com
://www.google.com/search?num=100&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=%22wedding-band-ring.%2Bcom%22+site%3Achristianaddurl.com+&btnG=Google+Search
and
ChristEngine.com
://www.google.com/search?num=100&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=%22wedding-band-ring.%2Bcom%22+site%3Achristengine.com&btnG=Google+Search&filter=0
and
Catalogs.com
://www.google.com/search?q=%22wedding-band-ring.%2Bcom%22+site:catalogs.com&num=100&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&filter=0

I can not say for sure, but I do not think that the Googlebot would
consider these link farms.

Then there is
http://wedding.band.911.biz/
http://wedding.ring.911.biz/
http://wedding.ring.911.ca/

These are advertising, and I do not believe that the Googlebot would
consider them linkfarms.

Then there is
Just-Wedding-Links.com
://www.google.com/search?num=100&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=wedding-band-ring.com+site%3Ajust-wedding-links.com&btnG=Google+Search&filter=0

I asked the opinion of another Researcher on this, and they also
thought this site is borderline and might *possibly* be considered a
link farm.

If I filter out the sites above, I see references to your site on
around 166 other pages:
://www.google.com/search?q=%22wedding-band-ring.%2Bcom%22+-site:christianaddurl.com+-site:christengine.com+-site:catalogs.com+-%22just-wedding-links.com%22&num=100&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&filter=0

Exploring that list of Search Results I see these cached results,
which look quite suspicious to me, and which I am pretty definitely
sure the Googlebot would consider a link farm:
http://216.239.39.100/search?q=cache:7T7lzMUXHgIC:9f7b4.yachtinginturkey.info/chnl0.asp%3Fkeywords%3DWedding%2520Bands
http://216.239.39.100/search?q=cache:znJjmJjK4AAC:casinoandonline.us/search.asp%3Fkeyword%3Dcredit%2520card%2520guide
http://216.239.39.100/search?q=cache:W9TBZFr6C9AC:4418b.nowcomics.net/search.asp%3Fkeyword%3DDOWNLOAD%2520ASF%2520STREAM
http://216.239.51.100/search?q=cache:UnVAPOeFXocC:www.hipay.com/search.asp%3Fkeywords%3DWedding%2520Bands
http://216.239.51.100/search?q=cache:J0X8MWPC4IcC:bridal.thewasher.com/chnl1.asp%3Fkeyword%3Dbridal
http://216.239.51.100/search?q=cache:TYIYbksgUpIC:bridal.madguide.com/chnl1.asp%3Fkeyword%3Dbridal
http://216.239.51.100/search?q=cache:SpYKjAETsPwC:www.icritias.com/menu.asp%3Fchnl%3D1%26keywords%3Dbridal
http://216.239.51.100/search?q=cache:JC8uPT-uLhQC:business-office.net/Chnl1.asp%3Fkeywords%3DBridal
http://216.239.51.100/search?q=cache:1GCHLqHh4uwC:mad4beauty.com/Chnl1.asp%3Fkeywords%3DBridal
http://216.239.51.100/search?q=cache:nMndqkv0Nx4C:www.onlinemusicplus.com/chnl0.asp%3Fkeywords%3DRussian%2520Photographers

The non-cached version of these links are either dead, or resolve to:
http://www.getfound.com
http://www.fireyourweddingplanner.com

I would definitely get de-listed from GetFound.com. I suspect that
they are the biggest part of your problem.

I also recommend that you look at the list of sites I've mentioned and
the list of sites at the following link, and figure out in which ones
you got listed shortly before the trouble began (The last Google
"Dance" began on April 11, so you will want to look at the sites on
which you've gotten listed since around March 1). If they appear in my
text above, they are quite likely the culprits.
://www.google.com/search?q=%22wedding-band-ring.%2Bcom%22+-site:christianaddurl.com+-site:christengine.com+-site:catalogs.com+-%22just-wedding-links.com%22&num=100&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&filter=0

Then, write a profusely apologetic to the Powers That Google at
help@Google.com. Explain that you did not understand the concept of
"Link Farms", and that you did not realize that getting listed on
http://www.getfound.com and possibly certain other sites would cause
your site  to be banned from Google's index. Tell them that you have
repented from the error of your ways, and promise to never ever do it
again.
 
Although Google does not **have** to let banned sites back in to their
index, I DO know of sites that have been able to get re-listed by
cleaning up their act in this way.
 
 
Before Rating my Answer, if you have any questions about this
information, please post a Request for Clarification.
     
I hope that this Answer provides exactly the information that you
needed. Best Wishes on getting your Google Search Results straightened
out!
    
Regards,    
      
aceresearcher

---

Request for Answer Clarification by applesofgold-ga on 30 Apr 2003 17:41 PDT

Thanks for your research. I really appreciate it.  

I recognize some of those sites, but not all of them.  

Some of them, such as the two that appear to be link farms :

http://www.getfound.com 
http://www.fireyourweddingplanner.com

I did not even submit my site to - they must have taken my information
from somewhere for their own purposes.

Do know if Google responds to inquiries fairly quickly? I would expect
it could take quite some time?

Thanks again for your help.

---

Clarification of Answer by aceresearcher-ga on 30 Apr 2003 18:04 PDT

Thank you for the excellent 5-star rating, applesofgold.

According to the Google FAQ for Webmasters, on why Page Rank might
decrease or pages might no longer come up in the Search Results:
"Your page was manually removed from our index, because it did not
conform with the quality standards necessary to assign accurate
PageRank. We will not comment on the individual reasons a page was
removed and we do not offer an exhaustive list of practices that can
cause removal. However, certain actions such as cloaking, writing text
that can be seen by search engines but not by users, or setting up
pages/links with the sole purpose of fooling search engines may result
in permanent removal from our index. If you think your site may fall
into this category, you might try 'cleaning up' the page and sending a
re-inclusion request to help@google.com. We do not make any guarantees
about if or when we will re-include your site."
://www.google.com/webmasters/2.html#B3

I do certainly think that Robert has identified a critical problem for
you (thanks, Robert!). The links on
http://applesofgold.com/linkpartners.html 
are nearly all for almost identical sites, and Google seriously frowns
on these, and could quite likely ban you from their Search Results
altogether because of them. Simply removing these sites from your page
of link partners is not going to fix your problem. The Googlebot has
the ability to notice during the indexing process when sites are
nearly identical.

Before you request help@Google.com to re-list you, I strongly
encourage you to combine all your sites into one site, eliminating
duplicate pages. You will do far better in their Search Results if you
do this. When people search for gold watches, your "watches" page will
be in the results; when people search for
christian jewelry, your "Christian jewelry" page will come up. There
is no need to create different clones of your site for this; it will
only hurt your Google Page Rank and Search Results.

Best wishes,

aceresearcher

Well researched for amount specified. Clear, easy to understand. Well
informed. Thank you.

I agree with aceresearcher-ga - the sites in Google's cache appear to
be link farms.

Another likely problem is duplicate content. I presume that most or
all of the sites on your link partners page belongs to you:
http://applesofgold.com/linkpartners.html

Google is quite good at noticing when someone creates a network of
sites, with very similar content, that all link to each other. The
only reason for doing this is to artificially increase link
popularity. I would not be surprised if some or all of your sites end
up with a PR of zero.

My advice... Stick with one site. Make it as good as you can. Get
genuine, quality links.

The reality is that it is almost impossible to get a site like yours
to the top of search results without cheating, because when you ask
the question "why would anybody genuinely want to link to my site?" it
is hard to come up with a good reason. This is not a reflection on
your site in particulat, but goes for the genre of your site.