September 2002 Google Update

It's Official

[nell]

7:15 est I see different results on WWW, WW2, and WW3 in Florida

[Dino_M]

I reckon slyolddog is correct and new PR has not been factored in..

[jackofalltrades]

if pagerank hasnt been filtered in, what affect will it have on the rankings?

[Dino_M]

that would depend on weather your PR has gone up or if your competitors PR has gone up!

[bobmark]

"I have reason to believe NEW pagerank has not yet been factored in.
Hold your pants people!"

From your lips to God's ear, SlyOldDog

[thunderpaste]

I am now showing 166 backlinks for my site on www3. Was 70. Sweet! I hope I get that PR6!

[David Steven]

My site is showing 1030 backwards links in www2 and www3 - but none in www1. Think this is a sign that our PR0 is being lifted...

[bobmark]

The only way the new pagereank not yet factoried in makes sense of what I see is if sites (hopefully mine) who have increased PR are, at this point in the update, showing 0 PR in www2/www3. Otherwise I have to believe that 100's of small sites suddenly surpassed me this month in PR while mine remained static (and at a level good enough to give me a #5 search result previously, dropped 100's of positions).
I sincerely hope this is true....am I clutching at straws?

[Terrier]

Very pleased with the results. However the page I have done well with and is cached is not the most recent - will the new page (which has been crawled ) be used later in the dance, or is are the results only from the page as shown in the new cache. I would be more than happy with the results as it looks like it might be.

[macd17]

I agree (and hope) that PR has not been factored in yet, and neither has link pop - I'm normally #2 and am now off the charts (gone), but the new high ranks have the same or lower pr and fewer links ....we shall see....

[David Steven]

Yes. We're back in favour. For most relevant search, we're at 5 on www3 against 420 or so on www...

The site's not active any more, but you can't have everything!

[weisinator]

Ahh, the dance has begun and I am extremely happy:

One site owns 3 of the top 10 results for the main keyword phrase. Can't crack the top 3, though.

The other site shot from the bowels of Google (page 10) to halfway through page one for the main keyphrase. Google saw the DMOZ listing this time around!

Both need link structure tweaks. I see my weaknesses.

*Rolls out the keg, hands out glasses*

[jtoddv]

yeah the results are way off yet, there are a few things not factored in yet. Results are totally different from previous and it still needs to mix up yet.

[infodigger]

There are strong signs that PR has not been counted yet. We have 2 PR7 websites which ranked #3-5 for very popular keywords for many months and now they are about 10-15 positions lower.

However, this is not the first time this happens. In the past we have experienced "adjustments" in the rankings a few days after the update.

Also, another strange thing we have seen in the past is that sites with PR6 disappear from google for one month, replaced by the URL of the DMOZ directory where they were listed, and then appear again next month at the same position. Has anyone else seen that?

[EAHunt]

If pr was greyed out, when do I see a change on that. We are still all over the place but it looks like we settled into #4 for keyword phrase.

YEAH, YOU GUYS HAVE BEEN MARVELOUS, YESSSSSSSSSS. I am back in google.

What a horrible month.

Now to work on the other sites.

Nothing like a little piece of success to make life right again.

So, in www I am #1, and www2 and www3 I am #4. Any chance I'll hit #1. Listen, I know quit looking at that horse's mouth.

[creative craig]

I am seeing the change in the cache in www1 as well as the other server's.

Just waiting for big change

[jtoddv]

i just did a 3 word keyphrase search and got no results in the top 10 with that exact keyphrase. And beleive me there are decent amount of sites with that phrase.

[bobmark]

A RAY OF HOPE FOR THOSE OF US PLUMETTING IN RANKINGS!
I did a variety of similar keyword searches in www, www2, www3 and found some results I can't explain other than "not yet settled"
The main keyphrase I search is "Canada keyword keyword" and on that I dropped off the map. HOWEVER, overall I have picked up and if I Search on "Canadian keyword keyword" I am way way up AND it shows a roughly 2 month old home page that used Canadian much more than Canada as a keyword.
What this suggests is for some reason my current home page is not in www2/www3 at the moment (hard to know why as it was freshened on Tuesday, 24th) and presumably (hopefully, please, please, please) things will change before www is updated (knock on wood, spit in the ocean, sign against the evil eye).

[webman]

I am also hoping the PR rank has not been factored in yet. ALL of my high ranking keywords are now off the charts. Had some very competitive keywords at #1 and #2 that don't show up in the first 200 results right now on www2 or www3.

I've never seen anything like this in any of the previous dances.

[bobmark]

Glad to hear it EAHunt!
Spare a little sympathy for those of us floating on the Google Sea of Despond at the moment.

[bobmark]

I am wondering if the new "minty fresh" policy somehow has altered the update process. Of course we are all looking at "not ready for primetime" results on www2/3 so Google may be well aware of the interaction and all will be as normal by the time www3 migrates to www (please!)

[tmott]

Looking at some key searchwords in my industry and the top ten has totally changed to some really off the wall, some not related sites, sooooo . . . . definitely a work in process at the moment, no need for total despondence.

[EAHunt]

Yo, Bobmark

Oh, I know that feeling, cause now I am absolutely buried on another site that I am responsible for in this office. Very competitive, but last march we were #1. Then #26, then 31 etc. Now I have absolutely no idea where we are after 200.

Sooooooo, back to the grind. However, I think I am beginning to feel a little bit better about my skills thanks to all of your patience and understanding. GREAT GROUP OF PEOPLE. BEST PLACE ON THE NET. Change your name to University of WWW and offer the doctorate cause you guys do it!

I love it. Now, if I could balance this and my family and married life et. al.

I don't know if I can keep up the pace

[born2drv]

Woooo Hoooo!

I hope they leave everything as is! I have shot up from no where (70+) to grab many top tens!

Can't wait till this rolls out, yeah baby! I think I'll take my girlfriend out tonight to a nice restaraunt :)

[nutsandbolts]

One site has gone from the WWW3 index - which is a shame but it did the same thing last month and it popped back once the index moved to WWW. So, it's well worth waiting until the new index is settled on WWW before going crazy!

Still, lovely to see my old site back in. Phew. Man, it was pure hell the past year.... Thanks again Googleguy and everyone here at Webmasterworld (Especially Ciml, Brett and NFFC) for the advice and fun since January!

[rfgdxm1]

My main site happens to be targeting some keywords that are not at all that competitive. In fact so non-competitive I've in fact been able to actually check all the backlinks from the other notable sites that come up high and check for the anchor text these sites are using to link to them. For the one keyword that I have shot from #5 to #1 on early in the dance, I've analyzed the pages that were higher than me carefully, including inbound links.

What I found was that it wasn't their PR that was beating me (one in fact has a PR3 to my main home pages PR5), or that they had better keyword density. It is that text in *anchor links* from other sites that they are cleaning my clock on. Only one site that links to this site of mine uses that keyword in the anchor text; all the rest are using the other main keyword. Thus it seems to me a reasonable theory that it may be at this point in the dance anchor text hasn't been factored in. The only other theory that makes sense to me is that Google has upped the importance of keyword in domain name. My domain name is in the form of keyword.TLD for this critical keyword, and is the only site in the top 10 to have this keyword in the domain name. 2 of the other sites in the bottom of the top 10 have that keyword somewhere in the URL. And, while both of these also have this keyword in the page title, these both have very poor keyword density for this keyword (and, an unimpressive PR of 3 to boot).

As such, those who have seen a sharp drop early in the dance might want to consider if it is because anchor text of links isn't factored in yet.

[Dino_M]

congrats nutsandbolts

I have one page that used to rank #283 for it's main keyword "widget world" all I have done to change the site was to increase the keyword density from nxt to zero to about 7% and take out one image of text saying "widget world" and replace with large font text "saying widget world"

the site has vanished from www2 and www3

rest of the 3000 odd pages seem to be doing ok

any ideas as to why that may of happened?

Anyhow enough stress I'm off to bar Rumba for a pint or ten :)

[creative craig]

Seeing all of this now happening before my eyes has made me reconsider my plans for one of my sites. It was going to be a new layout and slightly different content... but now its going to be a new doamin name for the new content :)

[Marcia]

Interesting observation rfg, someone was asking a few days ago about different link text to the same site and I've been worried for weeks. Someone decided they "love me" and put a link to me on ALL the pages of their site - with keywords I really don't need. I emailed this morning to take them down. I've not been out of top 10 for the right phrase except for one month for well over a year and now I'm outta the ball park. Either that did it or there's a penalty or the algo changed enough so that even the roller derby is more relevant than me. :(

[infodigger]

well, our keyword.TLD domains are exactly at the same position on www2/3 as they were the past months.

I am 99.9% sure that there is a great future for this update before it settles down...

[rmjvol]

So far so good.

The best:
Brand new osCommerce site shows 1000+ pages. Only had a single PR3 link to it when spidered so I'm optimistic for the future.

The Good:
Looks like I held my ranks for my own site & the main client sites. Nice small improvements on my client with the most comeptitive kw's.

The bad:
OK, which one of you crack heads knocked off my old company's site that was sitting at #1 for a very impressive sounding (1,000,000 results) keyword? Been sitting at #1 for like 18 months with almost no work & along comes this tricked out affiliate site.

Nice closed loop of a dozen affilate sites with heavy cross linking you got there ;)

rmjvol