I have studied Google Answers carefully and hope this question
conforms to your guidelines.
My site, www.containerandpackaging.com, has been published and in the
Google index for about two years now. We have had a page ranking of 4
up until about 3 months ago, when our site suddenly dropped to a page
ranking of 0. For three months, I have frantically searched the web
and modified our site in an attempt to get back in Google’s good
graces. Here is what I know:
Currently, I have 800+ pages in the google index.
When I do a search for “containerandpackaging” in Google, there are
over 3000 results, all of which reference our site, however, there is
no direct link to our site until the 90th result. For this reason, I
believe our site is somehow penalize, though apparently not banned.
Google shows 0 backlinks for my site, although I know I have at least
9 backlinks with a PR4, 2 with a PR5, and 1 with a PR6. Beyond that,
I have several hundred customer sites with PR 3 or lower that link to
our site.
About the same time as our drop in Google, I changed our listing in
the dmoz and google directory to more accurately reflect our company.
I thought that the change in listing might be the cause for our drop
in PR. However, in the past few days, Google has apparently used a
new dmoz dump and our site is correctly listed in the google
directory, however, we still have PR0.
I have searched for any site we link to that are disreputable and have
removed any links. I have searched for possible link farms that link
to our site and requested our removal.
A little more background that might be useful: We sell over 1500
containers. I display each of them dynamically through a .asp page.
I also have Industry specific sections where some of those same items
are also displayed again. Is this duplicate content? In order to
avoid duplicate content, I have a robot.txt file that disallows
indexing of those industry specific portions of my site.
Basically, why are we penalized (if we are penalized) and how do we
get back into Google’s good graces? |
Request for Question Clarification by
serenata-ga
on
03 Nov 2003 23:50 PST
Hi Conpak ~
I have spent some time trying to pinpoint what may be happening with
regard to your site's SERPs on Google.
If you could answer a few questions, it might help to pinpoint ** IF
** there is something wrong or if this is a glitch.
1. What is your relationship to cpscandlesupply.com? I see you have a
page up there, but the visitor isn't really redirected to
containerandpackaging.com.
2. In the past you were using Guaranteed Search Engine Position.com.
Do you still use their services?
3. Do you use WebPosition Gold or other software to check your
rankings, position or another service?
4. Have you tried resubmitting your site to Google using the add URL
tool?
5. You said you were, in essence, cleaning up the links, and I notice
your links page is being redone. What was there before that you felt
may have been a problem?
Lastly, if you felt you had done something to be penalized, have you
written to help@google.com to ask for help or assistance?
"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."
- ://www.google.com/webmasters/2.html#B3
Right at the moment, there are no red flags evident to point to, so
perhaps we should look at what existed prior to your drop of a few
months ago.
Thanks - and mystified, too,
Serenata
Google Answers Researcher
|
Clarification of Question by
conpak-ga
on
04 Nov 2003 07:03 PST
Serenata -
Thank you for your rapid response. Yes, I'm mystified as well.
1. cpscandlesupply.com was another site I put together for our candle
customers, however, it did not produce any real traffic and seemed to
divide hurt our traffic on containerandpackaging.com, so I shut down
the site and tried to redirect all traffic back to the
/CandleContainers section of containerandpackaging.
2. We quit using guarenteed Search Position about 1.5 years ago.
They didn't do anything except bill us and send me lots of calls as
their referral.
3. I do not use any software to check my rankings or positions. I do
occasionally go to googledance.com to check on what's happening to
google, but that would have no tie to my website. I also occasionally
visit a site called www2.marketleap.com to check backlinks and other
statistic on my site, but again, that should have little connection
with my site.
4. I have not tried resubmitting my site, as googlebot comes to visit
my site at least once a day and appears to be quite active there.
5. I had exchanged several links with a candle company that had 5
different sites that I deleted:
http://www.discountcandleshop.com/
http://www.nwcandlemaking.com/
http://www.floatinglights.com/
http://www.holycandle.com/
http://www.seasonalcandle.com/
I was also linked to this site which I deleted and asked to be removed
from:
http://www.topcandlesites.com/
I also had some reciprocal links with some of our customers and
vendors.
In a rash rush, I deleted the links with no record of what they were.
Sorry.
6. I had thought to post this question here before writing to
help@google.com, though that is my next step.
Thanks again
|
Request for Question Clarification by
serenata-ga
on
04 Nov 2003 07:29 PST
Hi again ...
I was going to ask if there was something your host might be doing to
keep bots out. Believe it or not, there was actually one host that had
blocked all search engines from his servers, the extra bandwidth was
'crashing' them. But as you've just indicated, you're getting visits
daily.
I have poked about your pages for hours, and I truly don't see a valid
reason for being penalized. Nothing really waves a red flag here.
There are definitely things you could (and actually *should*) be doing
vis a vis design & basic HTML; but again, I cannot believe that your
site as it is can be reason to penalize you. Note that I said "as it
is", as the archived copies I have been able to see are at least a
year old and then not the entire site, etc.
Anecdotal information on Webmaster World would indicate that a series
of changes to Google's algorithms began or coincided with the time
your problems began.
Recently, within the last four days or so, it appears there was
another crawl with a LOT of people getting 'dumped' and they're all
trying to figure out what it is they've done.
Here's just an example from the Google News discussion forum at
Webmaster World, "Dropped from SERPs, Site with top rankings for a
whole year now dropped from Google SERPS"
- "http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum3/18039.htm
It could be a glitch; but at this time, I honestly feel your best bet
may be to just go ahead and ask Google. There is no guarantee they'll
answer; on the other hand, there's no guarantee they won't, either.
Good luck, maybe you can get some ansers.
Serenata
|
Clarification of Question by
conpak-ga
on
04 Nov 2003 09:33 PST
Serenata,
Again, thanks for the help.
I will contact Google, however, you mentioned that I need to work on
design and basic HTML. Can you expand on this a little bit, or give
me a reference to look at that would help me with the HTML and design.
Thanks.
|
Request for Question Clarification by
serenata-ga
on
04 Nov 2003 21:19 PST
Hello again, Conpak ~
You asked, "... you mentioned that I need to work on design and basic
HTML. Can you expand on this a little bit, or give me a reference to
look at that would help me with the HTML and design."
I'd be happy to, but do you want me to post that as an answer here?
Or would you rather close this question and submit another
specifically addressing design/HTML issues?
Just let me know, and I'll be happy to give you information and examples.
Serenata
|
Clarification of Question by
conpak-ga
on
05 Nov 2003 06:36 PST
Here is fine for me. However, if I need to open a new thread, that
would be fine as well.
I contacted google and got two responses, both form responses not
really providing any information, so I'm nowhere closer to an answer
than I was a week ago. I'll just keep searching I guess.
|
