tedster - 11:06 pm on Jul 15, 2008 (gmt 0)

Right - the last couple of months have seen changes in the Google SERPs that defy explanation from any previous basis. The same things that are reported to happen "after adding Google Analytics or WMT or a Sitemap" are also being reported by webmasters who did none of those things.

Establishing cause and effect is not as easy as saying "this happened after that." It's called the post hoc ergo propter hoc [skepdic.com] logical fallacy. That fallacy creates magical thinking and mythogloy - including SEO mythology.

I say we should look at our ranking challenges with fresh eyes, without all the assumptions that we think are true. Google has changed something in the ranking criteria, and we're not sure what that change is. A drop in ranking may not be "a penalty", but rather just a failure to do well with regard to some new measure or other. In other words, the url just doesn't rank as well as it did, and there may not be a penalty involved at all.