My website used to be within the first page of Google for the brands
of copiers that i sell.  My site is http://www.businessneedz.com  Has
my site been penalized?  I do not spam, or use any other technique
that i am aware of.  Please help me.  I am very concerned.  This is my
only source of income.

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Clarification of Question by sirfroggz-ga on 06 Dec 2003 20:23 PST

Digitalcopierneedz.com is not linked to BusinessNeedz.com.  Customers
that go to Digitalcopierneedz.com have to call me to place an order. 
People that go to BusinessNeedz.com can use the online ordering or
call.  Digiatlcopierneedz.com is not linked to BusinessNeedz.com.  I
have another site called http://www.panaboard.com that links the
products shopping cart to my BusinessNeedz.com Shopping cart.  This
can be removed farely quickly.  Please let me know what i need to do.

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Request for Question Clarification by robertskelton-ga on 06 Dec 2003 20:41 PST

I beg to differ. The "buy" links on this page go to businessneedz.com :
http://www.digitalcopierneedz.com/ricoh.html

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Clarification of Question by sirfroggz-ga on 07 Dec 2003 19:08 PST

How do i go about getting re-listed.  I did not realize that linking
back to my shopping cart was against Google Regulations.  I certainly
never intended to do anything against Google.  Any help would be
greatly appreciated.

Hi there,

Aside from Google search engineers, no-one can tell you exactly what
has happened, we can only make educated guesses. I have been studying
the latest Google update in depth, and all dramatic drops in ranking
are related to keywords in links to the site in question.

And this is really a guess, but I believe the problem is your other
site, digitalcopierneedz.com. When someone goes to buy something, the
link goes to businessneedz.com. The link contains the name of the
product. The combination of the word copier being well optimized for
your site, and the brand name appearing in many links from
digitalcopierneedz.com, meant that until now you ranked very well.
Google has introduced a filter to stop this happening for commercial
keywords, and this filter is the cause of you losing the high rankings
that, all other things being equal, you didn't really deserve in the
first place.

Following the latest Google update, one of the most heard pieces of wisdom is:

"Don't plan your business around Google search results. They are
constantly in flux, and #1 today could br #259 tomorrow"

robertskelton-ga
Google Answers Researcher

Digitalcopierneedz.com is not linked to BusinessNeedz.com.  Customers
that go to Digitalcopierneedz.com have to call me to place an order. 
People that go to BusinessNeedz.com can use the online ordering or
call.  Digiatlcopierneedz.com is not linked to BusinessNeedz.com.  I
have another site called http://www.panaboard.com that links the
products shopping cart to my BusinessNeedz.com Shopping cart.  This
can be removed farely quickly.  Please let me know what i need to do.

How do i go about getting re-listed.  I did not realize that linking
back to my shopping cart was against Google Regulations.  I certainly
never intended to do anything against Google.  Any help would be
greatly appreciated.

You are still listed, do a search for "toll free at 1-866-530-8502":
://www.google.com/search?q=%22toll+free+at+1%2D866%2D530%2D8502%22

The only thing that has changed is that Google has implemented a
filter to remove pages from the top of search results that were there
due to commercial keywords in or around links to the page. For the
most part results have improved. I think the way to look at is that
you were forunate to have the high ranking previously, and now it has
ended.

More about the filter:
http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=282350


There have been reports of pages regaining their ranking, so while
Google is still tweaking things, keep checking the results.

To see pages that are affected, try http://scroogle.org - it shows
filtered and unfiltered results.

What is Google now looking for in a website.  What would you change on
my site inorder for my site to rank better.  I have been adding more
content ie.. more information on my copiers and fax machines.  What is
google looking for now?