Hi Dautenhahn ~
Please remember that Google Answers Researchers are independent
contractors. As such, we are not privy to inside information about
Google. We do not have access to any information about Google's
closely-guarded search engine algorithms, nor to information on which
sites, if any, Google may have penalized or banned from its index.
Most of us who undertake answering questions concerning Google's
PageRank and indexing do so from a position of experience and
knowledge gleaned from reputable sources, including Danny Sullivan's
"Search Engine World" or Webmaster World and other search engine
optimization resources.
- http://searchengineworld.com
- http://webmasterworld.com
To answer your first question, "All of my domains have been dropped
from the Google Index ... can you tell me why [?]" ... the answer, as
stated above, is "no". We can't even tell you if it is so, or if it is
merely a glitch somewhere, either on your server or on Google's.
We can, however, give you some ideas why your sites "may have been"
penalized or banned.
I'll attempt to answer the second part of your question, "what I have
to do to get them to show up again?" further below.
====================
Google's Guidelines
====================
Google is straight forward in its Webmaster Information and Guidelines
about what it considers a good site for indexing and what isn't, and
reasons why you might not be included and/or dropped.
For instance:
1.) Your site might not have been available on the last crawl, and
might have been dropped.
"Occasionally, websites are not reachable when we try to crawl them
because of network or hosting problems. When this happens, we retry
multiple times, but if the site cannot be crawled, it will not be
listed in our current index. If it was a transient problem, the site
will likely show up in the next index, which will be completed in a
few weeks."
- ://www.google.com/webmasters/1.html#A1
or
2.) It might have been a glitch on Google's part.
"A technical glitch on our side may have caused us to 'miss' your
site. In crawling more than 3 billion pages every few weeks, our
system experiences hiccups from time to time. Again, this is a
transient problem, and your site will likely show up in the next
index. Please be patient with us during this period, as we are not
able to modify our index by hand to add sites missed in this way."
(See "My Web Pages Are Not Currently Listed, 3. Other Reasons")
- ://www.google.com/webmasters/2.html
or
3.) There was a change in PageRank or in pages linking to yours.
"The contents of your page or the links pointing to your page changed
significantly and you no longer have a sufficiently high PageRank, or
your page had low PageRank to begin with and a small change caused you
to be dropped from the Google index." (See "My Web Pages Are Not
Currently Listed, 3. Other Reasons")
- ://www.google.com/webmasters/2.html
or
4.) The use of WebPosition Gold or unauthorized programs to check
rankings, position, etc.
Google specifically warns against using such programs in three
different places. The fact that you "have other domains which I use it
for that are still listed" does not mean that you haven't been
penalized for using it on the sites which have disappeared from
Google's indexing, it may only mean that Google hasn't gotten around
to dealing with those other sites.
In its "Quality Guidelines - Basic principles", Google warns about the
use of such programs.
"Don't use unauthorized computer programs to submit pages, check
rankings, etc. Such programs consume computing resources and violate
our terms of service. Google does not recommend the use of products
such as WebPosition Gold™ that send automatic or programmatic queries
to Google." (note the specific reference to WebPosition Gold).
- ://www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html
And in its "Quality Guidelines - Specific Recommendations", "Don't
send automated queries to Google"
- ://www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html
And once again in its "Terms of Service"
"No Automated Querying
You may not send automated queries of any sort to Google's system
without express permission in advance from Google. Note that "sending
automated queries" includes, among other things:
* using any software which sends queries to Google
to determine how a website or webpage "ranks" on
Google for various queries;
* "meta-searching" Google; and
* performing "offline" searches on Google."
- ://www.google.com/terms_of_service.html
If you have been regularly using WebPosition Gold or any such software
and haven't been penalized yet, you can consider yourself lucky,
according to the discussions in Webmaster World.
You may find this WebMaster World discussion on the use of WebPosition
Gold of particular interest, including the observation from one
chagrined member, makemetop:
"Many people have had this happen to them (both IP blocking or a total
site ban) - including me!"
- http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum3/8573.htm
Google simply states, "It's not safe to assume that just because a
specific deceptive technique isn't included on this page, Google
approves of it. Webmasters who spend their energies upholding the
spirit of the basic principles listed above will provide a much better
user experience and subsequently enjoy better ranking than those who
spend their time looking for loopholes they can exploit." (From
Google's "Quality Guidelines - Specific recommendations")
- ://www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html
The simple answer to the first part of your question about why your
sites are no longer listed is that even Google may not tell you why.
Google says as much:
" 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." (From Google's
"Quality Guidelines - Specific recommendations")
- ://www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html
=========================================
What To Do To Get Your Pages Relisted
=========================================
To address this part of your question, I'll start out with some
generalities and then apply them to what I find for each of the
domains you have listed.
Google's Recommendations & Suggestions
======================================
Read and utilize the recommendations and suggestions contained in
Google Information for Webmasters
- ://www.google.com/webmasters/index.html
and Webmaster Guidelines
- ://www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html
PageRank - Links to Your Site(s)
================================
Google's main responsibility is to return relevant information to its
users who are searching for information. Accordingly, with billions of
websites out there, it endeavors to return sites which its search
algorithms determine are 'important'. This includes sites which link
to your own.
Google recommends you "[m]ake sure all the sites that should know
about your pages are aware your site is online." (Google's Technical
Guidelines, "When Your Site Is Ready")
- ://www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html
Google explains its PageRank in "PageRank Information"
- ://www.google.com/webmasters/4.html
and in "Our Search: Google Technology/PageRank Explained"
- ://www.google.com/technology/index.html
A Word of Caution: Don't engage in linking schemes and link farms, as
you will be penalized for doing so. Links to and from relevant pages
with good content are what is meant in discussing links in its
PageRank.
Correct HTML
============
Everything on your web page affects search engine listings, either
positively or negatively, whether we are privy to the determinants -
to the degree - they may affect those listings.
Sometimes it may be that incorrect HTML may prevent a search engine
from indexing a page. A good rule of thumb, according to GoogleGuy, a
Google engineer who posts regularly to WebMaster World, is that
"what's good for the visitor is good for Google." (See the thread in
Webmaster World, "Google News: How important is HTML Validation?")
- http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum3/
Pay attention to such things as the doctype declarations. This affects
how browsers parse and display the information on your website - the
friendlier your website is to visitors, no matter what browsers or
method used to access your page, the better the chance of your site
being indexed by Google and other search engines.
Information about the necessity of inclusion of DOCTYPE Declaration
can be found in Web Design Group's article, "Choosing a DOCTYPE" -
- http://www.htmlhelp.com/tools/validator/doctype.html
and in A List Apart's Essentials article, "Fixing Your Site With The
Right Doctype" -
- http://www.alistapart.com/stories/doctype/
Google mentions Correct HTML and checking your internal and external
links in its Design and Guidelines.
- ://www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html
Submission to DMOZ & Yahoo!
===========================
Google recommends submitting your site to both DMOZ and Yahoo in at
least two different places.
In Google Information for Webmasters, "When Your Site Is Ready",
"Submit your site to relevant directories such as the Open Directory
Project and Yahoo!"
- ://www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html
and "What else can I do to get listed in Google?":
"Google partners on the Web include Yahoo! and Netscape. If you are
having difficulty getting listed in the Google index, you may want to
consider submitting your site to either or both of these directories.
You can submit to Yahoo! by visiting
http://docs.yahoo.com/info/suggest/. You can submit your site to
Netscape's Open Directory Project (DMOZ) by visiting www.dmoz.org.
Once your site is included in either of these directories, Google will
often index your site within six to eight weeks."
- ://www.google.com/webmasters/1.html
====================
Your Specific Sites
====================
Using the above recommendations and suggestions from Google plus
information from other sources, I'll address your specific sites.
www.moaa.info
1. No DOCTYPE Declaration -
I'd suggest using <!doctype html public "-//w3c//dtd html 4.0
transitional//en">, as it offers the broadest possibilities for
interpretation in the newest browsers and deprecates nicely for the
older browsers. This will help your visitors see what you intend them
to see.
2. Metatags -
You aren't using metatags, such as keywords or description tags, at
all. While the importance of metatags isn't weighted as heavily as
they once were, there are still search engines which give appreciable
weight to them (such as Inktomi).
If you add metatags, make sure the descriptives or keywords are also
included within the content of the pages.
3. ALT Tags -
Accessibility requires the use of ALT Tags for images. Google
recommends the use of them as well. "Make sure that your TITLE and ALT
tags are descriptive and accurate" (See: "Design and Content
Guidelines")
- ://www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html
4. Spelling Errors -
There are several spelling errors or typos contained within the text
of the pages, such as "Assocaiation", and "Applicaiton" on one of your
text links. While these may not necessarily count against you, they
are noticeable to your visitors, and can easily be eliminated by the
use of a spell checker.
5. Page Titles -
You have assigned a page title to each of the pages within this site,
such as "Benefits" and "Six Basic Principles", etc., but put those
title tags to work for you. Restate the name of your site, such as
"Benefits of Members of MOAA" or better yet, "Benefits of Membership
in Minority Opportunities Athletics Association" - that is not
spamming, but more common sense.
6. Listing in DMOZ & Yahoo!
I was unable to find this site in either DMOZ or Yahoo. You may want
to submit it after you have made some changes and added important
links.
www.findabead.com
These pages seem to have been generated using a much older version of
Front Page - Version 3.0. You should be aware that this old a version
doesn't even deprecate for the newer versions of Microsoft's Internet
Explorer, so it will look strange in a LOT of browsers.
1. There are no metatags, ALT tags, or DOCTYPE Declaration.
2. There are spaces in the page title and links, which can stop the
search engines cold in crawling these pages. With no DOCTYPE
Declarations, some browsers will not be able to follow the links.
3. On the Page entitled "Special Order Charms" (special.htm), the
links to the charms do not work as they are pointing to the author's
own hard drive (file:///C:/My%20Documents/BEADS/ ...), instead of a
clickable link.
In addition, there are many pages with the statement, "Please note
that this page is currently being updated.", which indicates the site
is not completed.
4. No listings in any directories or search engines.
This site may have been included in search engines or directories
before, but a check of DMOZ, Yahoo, and AllTheWeb
(http://alltheweb.com), does not indicate that the site has ever been
included.
After the coding is cleaned up, you may wish to submit them.
www.hometown-solutions.com
This site is not complete at all. "Coming Soon" will not get it
listed.
www.precisionmazes.com
I did find Precision Mazes listed on All The Web.
The site was created using Microsoft Office, which produces such
proprietary code that it does not deprecate, even for older versions
of Microsoft's own browser. In addition, there are no ALT tags, no
easily recognizable navigation system, although All The Web indicates
there is a contact page and a gallery.
Of the four sites above, only Precision Mazes showed upon the WayBack
Machine.
- http://www.archive.org/
======================================
When You're Ready to Submit Your Site
======================================
After you are satisfied that the site is to your liking, you can
submit it to Yahoo! and DMOZ.
Don't forget to write to Google and ask them to reinstate your sites.
Make sure you pay special attention to Google's admonitions under
Quality Guidelines - Basic principles about using unauthorized
computer programs to submit pages and don't use WebPosition Gold.
Some search engine sites to which you may want to submit your site:
* DMOZ -
- http://www.dmoz.com/
* All The Web -
- http://www.alltheweb.com/help/webmaster/submit_site.html
* Hotbot & Lycos InSite (requires registration)
- http://insite.lycos.com/searchservices/
* Yahoo! -
- http://docs.yahoo.com/info/suggest/
* Zeal -
- http://zeal.com/
=================================
Understanding The Search Engines
=================================
It's a fact of life that just about the time one figures they have
this search engine optimization thing all figured out, the search
engines will change their algorithms enough to make it all confusing
once again.
To keep up with the "thou shalts" and "thou shalt nots" of search
engine optimization, check in with both Danny Sullivan's Search Engine
Watch -
- http://www.searchenginewatch.com
and Webmaster World -
- http://webmasterworld.com
In addition, Shari Thurow's book, "Search Engine Visibility", with a
forward by Danny Sullivan of Search Engine Watch, is available on
Amazon or Barnes & Noble. Her accompanying website to use in
conjunction with the book is here:
- http://www.searchenginesbook.com/
The Link Exchange Digest, one of the first and longest-running
Internet marketing and search engine/linking newsletters, is an
excellent tool with information beneficial to most website and small
business owners. It is free to subscribe, and there is always some
helpful information to be derived from each issue. You can subscribe
by mailing to led-join-request@list.audettemedia.com.
The Adventive lists have been taken over by Andrew Bourland under his
new enterprise, Up2Speed. Andrew Bourland who also started ClickZ and
other informative websites. The I-Sales, I-Search and I-Design lists
currently have search engine discussions going, and you may want to
subscribe to those lists to help stay current. The Up2Speed
subscription page is here:
- http://www.up2speed.com/
You may be pleasantly surprised with how many ideas and new "friends"
eager to lend a hand that you may find by becoming a subscriber to
those lists.
I realize this may be more information than you require. But the
simple truth is that search engines want to return relevant
information for search terms used. In order to get listed where you
feel you should be, you do have to pay attention to the basics of good
Website design and search engine practices. If you don't, you may just
find yourself not listed at all.
==================
Search Strategies
==================
- Search engine optimization
- search engine watch
- search engine recommendations
Best wishes and
good luck in your search engine listings,
Serenata |
