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Update Florida - Nov 2003 Google Update Part 4

         

Kackle

5:57 am on Nov 22, 2003 (gmt 0)



Continued from: [webmasterworld.com...]

Kackle - can you explain the "dictionary" for me? And how I might benefit from it - Im reading your posts hard but dont see where youre coming from.

Sure. But you have to act quickly. Google will fix this one just like they fixed the hyphen.

1. Google is depreciating pages/sites that are over-optimized for certain keywords or keyword combinations. It does this by looking up search terms in a dictionary of target keywords or keyword pairs that it has compiled. This dictionary is Top Secret, because if you knew what was in the dictionary, you could avoid these words in your optimization efforts.

2. If the search term or terms hit on a dictionary entry, the search results for that user's search are flagged. This means that before the results are delivered, the order of the links, or even the inclusion of links, are adjusted so as to penalize pages that have overoptimizated for those terms. Most likely the title, headlines, links and anchor text are examined. It's possible that external anchor text pointing to that page has also been pre-collected and is available for scanning, but this is much less likely. (Besides, external links are not something within your immediate control, so don't worry about it right now.)

3. You want to find out which keywords that are relevant to your site are in Google's dictionary. Compile as many relevant keywords you can think of that searchers might use to find your site. Now take these words singly and in pairs, according to how users might search. Run two searches for each combination and compare the results.

4. If the results are strikingly different for the pre-filter and the post-filter search on a particular term or combination of terms, it means that some variation of those terms has been flagged because something was found in Google's dictionary.

5. Do lots of searches and you can come up with a list of "sensitive" words that you'll want to avoid when you re-optimize your pages.

It's a nice weekend project.

johnnydequino

12:46 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



Datacenters are bouncing around like crazy. Starting to see some old competitors pages pop up. Would be nice to see mine!

needhelp

12:49 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



Something to chew on...there's a site in a fairly competitive search that has been and has held the #1 spot even through this update. This site contradicts alot of the theories presented so far - it's very optimized: h1 tags abused, heavy keyword density in text, title, anchor text, and url. Even spammy mouseouver text! It has weathered florida without a scratch (the rest of the sites that used to be there got destroyed). Also, if you do the -cvkjadkjf trick, the search results return to "normal", and yep...that site is still #1. They must be luvin life!

Dave35London

12:51 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



Can you explain the -cvkjadkjf trick

tantalus

12:52 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



"De-optimization won't work. How is Google supposed to find your site if you only have the keyword once? It dosen't make sense. ---- "

Try this [google.com...] and look for 'o rah bra ras'.

All you need do is put the keyword in the title and use javascript document.write for all you content.

markis00

12:52 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



I know a site much like that one too
sticky me and I'll tell you it

needhelp

12:53 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



search for: keyword -dfidfldjf (nonsense) - i found out about this from a post a few pages back.

rfgdxm1

12:54 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



>just a note to all concerned about the real estate site returned for jewelry SERPs - it has been there (almost always on the first page - around #4) for more than a year!

And, I explained way back in the thread why it is there. The page content changed from what it was some time back. This is a shining example of the power of inbound anchor text influencing SERPs.

markis00

12:55 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



someone said the datacentres are bouncing and old pages
are coming back
is this true?

Dave35London

12:56 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



er Nancy, that's not accurate

I've been optimizing for jewelry for nine months, I have number one position (still) for keyword jewelry worth 400 a day and I never saw that crap there before.

Search for jewelry -cvkjadkjf those are the pre-Florida results.

[edited by: Dave35London at 1:14 am (utc) on Nov. 24, 2003]

troels nybo nielsen

12:57 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



> Do you have a subtle legal point to make, rather than an obvious one?

My point is, as you say, obvious. Google are listing my sites for free. We have had this dicussion many times at WebmasterWorld. I can see that you are are a new member. (Welcome. I hope that I am not the first to sy that?) I do not know if you were a lurker before being a member, but if you have got the time I would suggest that you take a dive into the archives.

Sorry about your being hit hard by this update, but I can only repeat stevew's suggestion.

steveb

12:58 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



"Nice real estate listing at #6 in that jewelry SERP."

I can't imagine a sane person saying the results for jewelry are not dramatically better now, even with that real estate site (that used to be a jewlery site) being in the top ten. The old results show multiple subdomain spam.

Major improvment now.

lgn1

1:00 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



Which datacenter is seeing the changes? I don't see anything .

Dave35London

1:01 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



I work 4 hours a day on google/jewelry the results *are* degraded.

[edited by: Dave35London at 1:18 am (utc) on Nov. 24, 2003]

Dave35London

1:01 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



that subdomain spam was nowhere on the radar pre this update

merlin30

1:03 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



So steveb, did you try the -dfdf thing (to get old results)?

nancyb

1:09 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



rfgdxm1, I don't believe that page ever had anything to do with jewelry. As far as I can remember it has always been about real estate. My guess is that it is because of the links from a custom jewelry webring (mentioned somewhere in this thread) that are helping it - and possibly that was always the reason.

Dave35London, don't want to get in a big hassle about that site but it was there for many months. I haven't been watching the singular kw for jewelry for a while so maybe it hasn't been there since you started, but it was there for many many months.

I mentioned this only because there have been so many posts about that site - thought maybe y'all didn't know it's been around for some time and perhaps, for those interested in discovering why, that info might be useful.

plasma

1:10 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



@Dave35London

pls edit your post and remove the url and read the TOS.
thx

Dave_Hawley

1:12 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)



And for the first time in a year, from a strictly seo point of view, the thing to do now is not get more and more links links links, the thing to do is to get more and more content on pages.

Nothing new in my book. Content is, and always will be king. Optimize for humans and you will get LOTS of Google traffic.

James_Dale

1:12 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



Hooot!

Thank you for sending this information. We will pass it on to our quality team for investigation. As you know, results in our index change regularly based on ongoing, automated processes aimed at improving the quality and
content of our search results. Changes you observe may include, but are not limited to, addition of new sites, changes in the ranking of existing sites, sites falling out of the index or getting dropped and sites' content fluctuating between old and new content.

We realize these changes can be confusing. However, these processes are completely automated and not indicative of wrong-doing or penalization of individual sites. We often adjust our ranking algorithm in an attempt to improve overall search quality. However, we will use your examples to help us test the quality of our newest index.

Dave35London

1:13 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



We have had 100% relevant top ten serps for jewelry for ages before florida update. (sub domain spam as described here) is now again as I write top ten in these wildly fluctuating results.

[edited by: Dave35London at 1:22 am (utc) on Nov. 24, 2003]

jtoddv

1:14 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



If you think Google's results are not on par, promote another search engine to your friends. This is how Google got its fame, you change that.

Johnny Foreigner

1:16 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)



We updated our front page yesterday, just some of the content, the site now has a Nov 23 tag, but old content not the new stuff.

Thats why its not helping the ranks, they are spidering the sites & tagging them, but not updating the content!

lgn1

1:16 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



Are the moderators asleep. How many TOS violations can you spot in the past 50 posts?

Dave35London

1:17 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



nancy I started working for a jewelry site in Sep 2002 and I never saw that site before. It's return is a degardtion of the results if indeed it has been away that long.

Johnny Foreigner

1:17 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)



wouldn't like to work with you!

Dave35London

1:20 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



Agree with you Johnny new page content is not getting indexed.

steveb

1:23 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



The subdomain spam is NOT now in the jewelry results. The serps across all the datacenters are free of it -- except for one instance on the -gv datacenter. The *old* results still show the subdomains.

There is no other way to put it than it is a drastic improvement... or if you are a conspiracyite, the regular serps are better than the -tsrses ones.

James_Dale

1:23 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



Altavista rocks!

Small Website Guy

1:25 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



The top sites in the results are there for a REASON. The reason is that there is an algorithm behind it.

I have no doubt that the bright minds here will eventually figure out how the new algorithm ticks and game it just as well as they did the old one.

I suspect that the de-optimization people are on the right track, they just have to figure out exactly what part of the optimization is triggering the filter. TOO MUCH de-optimization will stop you from triggering the filter but at the same time demote you too far down in the SERPs such that no one will find you anyway.

Webmasters may now have to create two sites now: one for MSN/Yahoo and one for Google.

rfgdxm1

1:28 am on Nov 24, 2003 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



>rfgdxm1, I don't believe that page ever had anything to do with jewelry. As far as I can remember it has always been about real estate. My guess is that it is because of the links from a custom jewelry webring (mentioned somewhere in this thread) that are helping it - and possibly that was always the reason.

>Dave35London, don't want to get in a big hassle about that site but it was there for many months. I haven't been watching the singular kw for jewelry for a while so maybe it hasn't been there since you started, but it was there for many many months.

If so, this resulted in them getting jewelry links. The notable point here is this site in the SERP isn't an example of Google suddenly being "broken" during the Florida update. To the extent this is a flaw in the algo, it is a very old flaw.

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