What I want to know is this; Am I in violation of some search engine rules and could I be banned because of all the domain names I have pointing? Some of them come up in search results on some search engines. This I thought was a good thing. Because I haven't been banned in the two years I've been pointing these domains I don't know what to think. Plus, I hesitate to fix what isn't broken.
In Google, I rank well. This is where a lot of business comes from. I never see multiple pages from our site or any of the pointed domain names The high rank we experience in Google is because the main site is designed search engine friendly. Different pages appear in different searches, depending on the search words.
So what are the facts? I purchased these domain names many years ago because I was thinking ahead. Plus, the person that is searching is rewarded with exactly what he is looking for and the page title and content reflects the same.
I read that Dot Com's were the Real Estate market of the 21st Century. Shouldn't I reap the rewards. I may have missed out on the lake front properties, but I do own a large plot of Dot Com Real Estate.
So what is it? Spamming or smart marketing! What am I doing right? More importantly, what might I be doing wrong. What can I do better?
Thanks in advance to those who offer guidance.
The thing to do now though is use 301 redirects to redirect from those extra domains to your main site.
I don't know that maintaining the status quo will get you banned, but it may mean you are lower in the rankings than you might otherwise be.
If you are worried, pick one of the domain names and make notes of where it appears in the search rankings. Then, do a 301 redirect to redirect from it to your main site. Wait. And then check your rankings again to see what impact it had.
If it helped or didn't hurt, start changing over other domains to 301 redirects.
If it hurt, you can always go back to a simple pointer.
No guarantees, but I think you'll likely be better off with the 301 redirects than your current situation.
The result?
Evrything was fine for several years. We had good SERPs, good traffic, and the visitors seemed satisfied.
But then we somehow caught the attention of some nit-picker over at Yahoo who thought we were in violation of the 'duplicate content' rules. Yahoo dropped every single one of our domains from their SERPs. They even dropped those domains that had their own, exclusive content ... that wasn't duplicated on any of the other sites.
After over a year of begging, pleading and threatening them, they finally agreed to let ONE of our domains back into their SERPs. And that's where we stand, today: 15 distinct sites without any duplicated content ... and only one domain in the Yahoo SERPs. They refuse to even check out the distinct sites.
Google didn't care, as long as we weren't trying to deceive anyone.
Fair warning ...
<edit>Welcome to the forums, carvedup!</edit>
[edited by: StupidScript at 11:48 pm (utc) on Sep. 25, 2006]
IF your domain names are now associated with content websites that offer value to the visitor then let your visitors know: Google does a good job of indexing and representing the value of your websites - as they now exist - and Yahoo can't seem to a) get a clue; or, b) get over themselves.
Search engines depend on websites for their existence. No web content = Nothing worth searching for. I think it's time that people who operate websites that have value, yet sink or disappear for no particularly good, present reason, ought to let people know something like "Here's a good search engine. One that works. Here's a search engine that hasn't a clue."
You might also give some thanks to the websites that send you traffic and raise your rankings . . . but . . . but . . OMG, that might look like reciprocal linking! Shudderrrrrrr!
Power to the websites.
Now, how does that grab you?
You see, there was a time before search engines, when people found websites because authoratative or popular websites linked to those emerging websites. Then, the process of linking became co-opted and corrupted. Maybe it's time to take back something, somehow, like by turning back the clock a bit in people's minds.
OMG! No! Bow down, beg forgiveness and pay homage and make sacrifices to the great search oracle or you will perish!
"We now return to our regularly scheduled programming . . . "
One flaw that I found in two of my earlier web pages is that the people had loads of talent but almost zero knowledge of search engine exposure. When my page never came up in searches I looked into why and learned all I could. I found page titles like "Information Page" and meta descriptions that had not one key word. When I change those things and added key word text in the actual page I earned I ranking that I was happing with. But I'm still a tweeker, looking for a little more.... a little better. That is how I ended up here.
I only became aware of all this when we launched a new web site and added Java Script redirects to the old. about two weeks later the old page fell off of Google like we never were there. When I checked it out I found that we had lost our ranking. After a web search for information I picked up on the redirects as the possible problem since we were not banned. If not for that I would be totally oblivious to domain spamming issues. If not for this bit of luck I would have woke one day in the future and found that we were banned.
I Now see how much power these search engines have. No warnings, no hearings, just bam see ya. I didn't realize how many eggs I had in so few baskets. You have me re-thinking my whole internet marketing plan. I have been in business for 25 years by always operating from a position of strengh. Competition can't hurt you if they can't find a weakness.
I will taking your advice to heart. Later today I will turn most of them off. The new site uses the trademark name.com and has no pointers. It all ready achieved a page one appearance in MSN just three weeks out. That totally amazed me. Yahoo picked it up a couple of pages in. In a month or two and I will only need the old site for people who bookmarked it.
I have a personal connection with the people that own the host server. I will see about hosting some of those domains as separate sites, put the rest in the 301 redirect and link them all together.
Being legitimate and honest is not always easy, but it supports longitivity. These new sites can be more information and educational about our products and service. Very reader friendly with lots of keyword text.
Thanks for making me feel welcome!
IF your domain names are now associated with content websites that offer value to the visitor then let your visitors know: Google does a good job of indexing and representing the value of your websites - as they now exist - and Yahoo can't seem to a) get a clue; or, b) get over themselves.
I've been thinking about this and, you know, I guess it is about time that I remove the Google stuff from one of my informational sites.
I removed AdSense weeks ago. I sell widgets, and I link to my widgets site from my informational site (which isn't totally about widgets). Despite the fact that a lot of the content has nothing to do with widgets, AdSense would run competitors ads for widgets. So I took it out. Then, I found (mentioned on WebmasterWorld) that there were tags that would let you mark the actual content area of the page. I tried that, and put AdSense back in. That worked for a while, then it was back to widget ads again. So, enough of that! My own widget sales are better for me than the AdSense income, so, poof!, no more AdSense.
But, I still have a Google search box. But, I have decided to remove that now. Yahoo does a much better job of ranking my informational site than Google does. Google used to do better, but no more. There are terms that I should be #1 for. And, I am #1 in Yahoo. And, I used to be #1 in Google. But, now it's a long, long, long way to find these pages in a Google search. There will be tons of partial matches before you ever get to mine.
But, as for my widget site, the site where I sell widgets, I do about equally well in Yahoo and Google. But, for the informational site, Yahoo trounces Google.
Search engines depend on websites for their existence. No web content = Nothing worth searching for. I think it's time that people who operate websites that have value, yet sink or disappear for no particularly good, present reason, ought to let people know something like "Here's a good search engine. One that works. Here's a search engine that hasn't a clue."You might also give some thanks to the websites that send you traffic and raise your rankings . . . but . . . but . . OMG, that might look like reciprocal linking! Shudderrrrrrr!
Power to the websites.
Cool. And, why do the links have to be related? Because Google says so? Lawyers buy widgets too. So do doctors. And mechanics. So, if a lawyer site sends traffic to my widgets site, I can't return the favor as a thank you? I mean, if lawyers buy widgets, then a link to a lawyer site might be of interest to my customers who are lawyers, right? Who is Google to penalize me for being courteous?
Now, how does that grab you?You see, there was a time before search engines, when people found websites because authoratative or popular websites linked to those emerging websites. Then, the process of linking became co-opted and corrupted. Maybe it's time to take back something, somehow, like by turning back the clock a bit in people's minds.
Search engines helped shape the Internet. They helped make things easier to find.
But, nowadays, they seem to be doing a good job of mucking it up. You can do a search one day, then a month later do the same search, looking for a certain site you found on the first page, only you can't find it again because the algorithm has changed, or because your search was on a different server than the first search, etc. How does that help the searcher now? Now every search is the equivalent of hitting the "I'm feeling lucky" button! You never know what you'll get!
