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Thinking about new sites. Will high quality content sites get indexed quickly? Is anyone doing anything to get indexed quickly?
If you have to wait 3 to 6 months before the effects of any new links, or changes to links (including both anchor text effects and PR effects) show up, it will discourage all the SEO people.
I thought the sandbox was for new sites not for new links, or changed anchor text, on sites not sandboxed? Anyone else seeing new links/changed anchor text on older sites being sandboxed?
Are any of the pages of these sites still indexed, but not ranking anymore, or is it just the Index page, or are all the pages from the sites now gone from the index? Is a new site, or an old site? Are both the sites heavily interlinked? When did this happen? Have you checked the sites you link out to?
Lotsa questions, No answers possible other than PURE Speculation, without more details.
Thumpcyc
Edited to Add,
"Not That I Could Help Much Anyway (back to lurking)"
More Questions,
Large Site, Small Site?
PPC Spam Site?
Rumors And Speculation Are Rampant, There Are Posts in Forums about every one of these questions, blaming each of them for problems with indexing, SERPs, and Penalties.
[edited by: thumpcyc at 7:34 pm (utc) on Sep. 13, 2004]
By new I mean brand-spanking-new-just-purchased-very recently-domain with new content, or new rehashed perhaps ;).
I'm seeing what others are seeing. Old established domains that Ive added new content to, for both competitive and non competetive phrases, are ranking well, within fairly short timescales. Whereas new domains, or domains that Ive worked on that hadn't had a lot of external or internal work done on them, prior to my intervention, are still lagging way behind, some 4 months after my touch.
Maybe this is just the new face of a post IPO G?
The message:Site owners/Advertising managers, don't buy SEO services for any short term success, cos it will not work. Buy adwords.
Makes a lot of sense from their bottom line POV.
However they are both quite localised, one mainly getting traffic from google.ie and the other from .co.uk. Is the penalty effect restricted to the .com SERPs?
I've not had any problems with the local engines but can't say for sure about the .com SERPs as I'm competing with a lot of others.
I thought the sandbox was for new sites not for new links, or changed anchor text, on sites not sandboxed? Anyone else seeing new links/changed anchor text on older sites being sandboxed?
That was the impression I got from reading a lot of messages here at Webmaster World. New sites aren't being penalize for their newness, the inbound links are being penalized for their newness. This would mean that you can't avoid the Sandbox Effect by buying an existing domain.
It would explain why PR hasn't been updated. New links aren't being counted, therefore there is no change in PR.
Just my theory. It makes sense from Google's perspective. They want to make it hard for SEO. If you have to wait half a year to see the results of new links you created, then SEO becomes that much harder because you don't get any feedback on whether you are doing things right or not.
Maybe I'm totally wrong on this one, so don't take this as the gospel.
It would explain why PR hasn't been updated. New links aren't being counted, therefore there is no change in PR.
PR has been updated many times. The number of backlinks that google shows has been just recently updated. It is simply the toolbar PR indicator that has not been updated.
My own site is listed top in Yahoo (appeared out of nowhere last month) for my localised "blue widgets Town" keywords but is nowhere at all in google (uk)
Other sites i've launched are having similar problems although i'm not overly fussed as i have time on my side and my clients understand the nature of things.
my second most recent site which has the most content of all my sites so far is bringing in results from google about a series of odd searches but nothing for it's targeted search. That’s only 3 weeks old.
One of my sites now has over 30 links but 9 of them appear above my site when i type in "company name" The site has been on google for over two months and it's very annoying.
My crackpot theory is that G decided to shut out new sites after that guy got his “ 404 the weapons of mass destruction could not be found” site to the top of the rankings overnight by an organised Blogging approach.
Hardly. Many people have posted their new domains are doing fine. Don't draw massive conclusions from one trivial bit of data.
The lag time effect seems to effect new sites and new pages on domains in basically the same way. That is, it is either inconsistent, or the secret sauce of success is not obviously apparent yet.
The lag time effect seems to effect new sites and new pages on domains in basically the same way. That is, it is either inconsistent, or the secret sauce of success is not obviously apparent yet.
NO! No! No! I have added several new pages to established sites during the last few months and ALL are indexed. The problem is with new sites! Google doesn't want NEW sites - PERIOD!
This is a fact. Tell the press - tell the World - you can even tell Google Guy!
(who?)
Hardly. Many people have posted their new domains are doing fine. Don't draw massive conclusions from one trivial bit of data.Yes, one in google.ie that is very localized, and one for fuzzy pink whatchamacallits.
Many people have posted their new domains are doing fine.
Either those same people are not reading this post and providing feed back or they are not divulging any information about new domains ‘doing fine’. If you have something to back up this claim please share it, or any one else who shares this point of view. I personally would like to hear another angle but so far its pretty one sided.
NO! No! No! I have added several new pages to established sites during the last few months and ALL are indexed.
I must agree. Although newly indexed pages have no PR indicated by Google (who cares) new pages on existing sites seem to rocket to the top of the SERPS and it has been this way since the Sandbox filter was introduced.
As mentioned in quite a few previous posts in this thread, new pages on existing established sites seem to be not subject to the so called sandbox effect or the initial probation period that new sites are being subjected to.
Love it or hate it.
Of course, whether a deliberate aging of authority - or a by product of intensive analysis - the perceived result is the same. New domains take some time before they register in the results.
Accept it - in the meantime concentrate efforts on building a website worth coming back to.
Nonsense. Complete crap.
There have been a zillion threads on this topic, and people with new sites doing just fine post that and then get howled down.
And then the shrill posts about "I can get new pages to rank fine" start.
I get a new domain indexed in under eight hours. Indexing isn't a problem.
I had an old page that ranked #1 for one thing, and #12 for another. I decide to experiment and redo the page, move it to another section more sensible in my domain structure. Three months later this new page is nowhere at all for the first term and #265 for the second term. The old page is gone from the index. The new page has the same linking, and for all practical purposes the same on page elements (though the words are somewhat different so it is not being seen as copy of the old one). These are not very high $$$$ terms (or I wouldn't have made the change), but they aren't walks in the park either.
At the same time I make a page on an old domain focused on "specific widgeting with specific widgeting title". Throw hundreds of internal links at it, get it to PR6 in June... see it rank nowhere for specific widgeting. Instead, two of this domains older pages that mention specific widgeting continue to be the two that rank in the top 1000 for the search.
Lag time exists on old domains just like it does on new domains, but it is much more complicated than the armwaving "understanding" that some people try to oversimplify the issue to.
Lag time exists on old domains just like it does on new domains, but it is much more complicated than the armwaving "understanding" that some people try to oversimplify the issue to.
Hmm. I never saw this problem on my main site, I don't think it's safe to generalize about this stuff either for or against lag time on old domains, I certainly never saw any lagtime on mine, in fact it was starting to get ridiculous, anything I put in there was getting top 10's in a week or two. That's my experience, yours is different, obviously the premises can't be right if they lead to two different experiences and conclusions, and I don't think the premises are right.
Just recently, I made one change to a older site by adding a word to my title and two days later the site was #3 for a competitive phrase that I had not ranked on before.
No lag time at all.
I am the webmaster for 3 sites total and am able to make changes to any page, add pages and get them ranked within 2 or 3 days. For one site, I've got over 1000 keyword combinations and phrases that all fall in the top 10.
Granted, these are established sites that have been around for at least the last 4 years. So I don't think that the new pages rocketing to the top thing on existing sites is complete crap. It very much has to do with the site in question and the industry the site is in.
It would not surprise me if some type of industry specific filter was being used as part of the algo.
Of course some people wear blinders and only see what they have concluded to be the their truth.
The problem with creating tons of sites under one domain for some people is that with all the penalties going around some are afraid to jeopordize their money older sites knowing how long it can take to get a new site ranking. (not saying that says anything good about them or their sites :-)
SteveB,
I have some experience with new pages on old domains doing well and others doing poorly; meaning 1 old domain gets good results with new pages, another doesn't.
I would say it's an anomaly to get tons of top 10 listings on established sites in very competitive areas by just adding a new page and some internal linking. But getting reasonable rankings on established sites that MEET CERTAIN CRITERIA is happening. I keep seeing "established sites" can rank new pages with no problem but that's not true. There are some certain criterias that are making this possible and not all established sites meet them.
It may be industry specific but our examples don't really point to that but instead some other factors that may be tuned slightly more for commercial or other certain types of searches.
I have also seen inbounds having pretty quick effects on new pages of these qualified established sites I spoke of. Thus I have a hard time making solid conclusions about the lag penalty being in fact applied to the links. I once found that highly likely but this either places another dimension on that theory or it's just not correct.
1. Does it affect new websites?
2. Does it affect new links?
3. Does it affect both?
4. How long does it last?
5. Does it affect new pages on an old site?
6. Does a DMOZ/Yahoo listing factor in to help pull a site out of the sand box?
I've got my own examples to illustrate any of the above where even they (the examples) contradict each other.
- I've got new sites doing just find and untouched by the whole problem.
- I've hired theme link campaigners that have helped drive 2 out of 3 sites back up in the SERPs. The third hasn't moved at all. The links are new, but the 2 sites are 3 years old and have DMOZ/Yahoo listings. The third is 2 years old without DMOZ/Yahoo listing. Why did the link campaign work wonders on the first 2, but not the 3rd website? Did DMOZ/Yahoo listings have something to do with it?
- I've got new pages on old sites that rank great. And I've got new pages on old sites that don't rank so great.
As steveb said, it's unwise to come to any conclusion on so little evidence. That's done here at WebmasterWorld all the time and it's a mistake, no doubt.
But with my own experience, I've drawn some correlations:
1. I think "money terms" are a factor in what get's sandboxed. Read Gupta's "Analysis and Implications of the Hilltop Algorthym" for more information on this.
2. City + State + Widget terms are targeted by the sandbox affect. Especially for USA cities and states.
3. DMOZ/Yahoo listing has helped my old sites undergoing link campaigns to see a MORE immediate affect of those new inbound links. But a newer site (2 years old), without those listings hasn't budged at all.
The sandbox affect for me is an interesting algo application that I try to figure out just for the challenge of it - but I really don't care how it affects me or others.
As I stated earlier, I am glad the sandbox affect came along and would prefer Google have it, then not have it. I am in this for the long term. I only have 2 new sites out of 10 -- and it really hasn't hit me hard. Even if it did, I wouldn't care because I plan to still be here 3-5 years from now and a 3 or 6 or 12 month sandboxing of my sites is just a small piece of that time.
New brick and mortar businesses don't plan on making money for 2+ years - so why do people whine and complain about the sandbox?
It's immature to want what you want and want it now. And it's just stupid to expect that Google has to give you what you want and give it to you now.
Those two negative qualities in a webmaster show that someone just doesn't have good business sense, and will most likely fail at this business over the long term.
I'm sorry if that sounds harsh but I'm not a young rooster anymore. I've been kicked down too many times and failed at too many other ventures. Experience, bad experience, has taught me to be a better businessman and webmaster for which I am finally realizing business success that I never dreamed possible before.
I had to fail, get my butt kicked a lot and fight for over 10 years to become successful - so I just don't see what the big deal is about a temporary sandbox affect.
My advice to others who are in the sandbox right now is to "soldier on." Just keep marching forward and be patient. When your site comes out of it, you'll be glad the sandbox is there to help keep others from bringing down what you have worked so long and hard to build.
The sandbox is not the end all, be all solution to spam, but it goes along way towards discouraging spammy webmasters from trying to make a fast buck. And when the sandbox is on your side (or at the very least, not working against you) you'll be glad it's there.
this is the Gospel, according to Powdork. (which means nothing);)
[edited by: Powdork at 8:29 am (utc) on Sep. 14, 2004]
Semi-off topic:
It seems like the lag time went into play at a good time for making Google's profits high. Not days before the IPO but around 6 months. And now, it's surely helping share prices stay stable if not rise. With all the media attention around the IPO I imagine their daily searches increased which even drove more money to them through people buying AdWords because they were/are unable to rank well.
The sandbox is the term that refers to the inability to get pages on new domains to rank well. That is all it is.
Let me add to this or tweak that definition to say that the sandbox is the inability to get pages on new domains to rank well FOR WHAT YOU WANT THEM to rank well on.
I still get lots of traffic on new pages/domains, but it's not always the kind of traffic I want.
