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A word of warning - I was an exception - other people have had very bad experiences with PR0 though cross-linking and many have never recovered.
In my view Web sites should rise or fall based on their own merits not on links from other sites, many of which have questionable value themselves.
I do not intend to add a lot of links to my pages and I pay the price for it under current algorithms. However I do quite well
by just adding more pages to make up for what I consider a penalty. Even with a low PR pages can still get a lot of hits.
Legitimate link popularity is a great way to determine the popularity of a site. It's far more accurate than any on page method, as it puts a lot of the sites ranking into the hands of others.
Your sites will never show up again as they shouldn't since you directly violated Googles TOS.
If the content is the same on your seventy sites, regardless of unique URL and unique title, you are spamming.
If the content is unique on all the sites then you can get away with cross-linking because you are trying to organically promote your other UNIQUE properties.
I would 1) consider a single HUB for all your site, using URL extentions.
or 2)starting all over again, this time by the rules.
Google states, that if you have trouble explaining what you are doing to a competitor then you are likely in violation.
This link crap hurts a lot of folk.In my view Web sites should rise or fall based on their own merits not on links from other sites, many of which have questionable value themselves.
I have read Googleguy say don't be afraid to cross-link your sites (or something to that effect) but yes, I am afraid and macneil (and others) experiences seem to indicate I'm not being overly-paranoid. Sorry, but this stuff makes me mad.
IMHO you've had it, start again, sorry I can't put over any other way, I picked up a penalty for cross linking but not to your extent
My PR was 7 now it's 0 and the site has been cleaned up and numerous emails have been sent to G asking if they would consider removing the penalty with no reply
Sorry not the news you wanted :(
You mean you changed the filenames? Then that's probably it.
Without doing a long analysis, it sounds like you've incurred a penalty. If you are lucky, the sites MIGHT simply have been dropped for duplicate content and not explicitly penalized. But even in that case, they won't recover until you replace them with new websites containing unique content
Ah well, I'm still scared of cross-linking anyway.
Just play by the rules and you will get lots of free traffic from Google.
my 2 cents
>Your sites will never show up again as they shouldn't since you directly violated Googles TOS.
Right. He cheated big time, and had a ton of sites get the Google Death Penalty. Thank you Google for being on the ball and squishing this spammer hard.
Spammers aside, will someone answer this hypothetical:
1) a business has multiple domains with UNIQUE content
2) for cross-selling/promotion purposes only (NOT PR), the business wants to provide exposure its other properties
a) can the business have a link to the others sites on each of it free standing URLs
b) what is a definition of UNIQUE content that we can all feel comfortable with?
[edited by: Chicago at 6:22 pm (utc) on Mar. 3, 2003]
posted by Chicago1) a business has multiple domains with UNIQUE content
2) for cross-selling/promotion purposes only (NOT PR), the business wants to provide exposure it other propertiesa) can the business have a link to the others sites on each of it free standing URLs
b) what is a definition of UNIQUE content that we can all feel comfortable with?
xerxes, it's impossible to give you a clear answer. But it's likely possible that you'll find the answer here at WebmasterWorld. Try a site search for "crosslinking" and read, read, read ...
"I duplicated the websites so that they could show up in different regions."
Umm...why did they have to be duplicated on over 70 crosslinked domains so they could show up in different regions? If you had put all of this on one domain, people in all these regions would have been able to access it on the Internet. I can see no need for 70 different sites on a related topic on 70 different crosslinked domains other than for search engine spamming reasons.
The fact of whether you were trying to cheat Google or not is irrelevant.
The fact that people use the same method to cheat Google and therefore the big G penalises is relevant.
You duplicated content throughout a lot of sites - Google saw that as spam and penalised you.
Personally, I would have created a seperate "how to" site and link the others back to it once only. That may be what you need to do in order to get back in Googles index.
At the end of the day Google's index is Google's index. They send us traffic and if we want that we have to play by their rules. If they say no duplicate content over multiple domains - then dont duplicate your content over multiple domains.
From our point of view this may seem unfair, but Im sure if we had to deal with the same amount of spam as Google does, we would also impose strict rules. That's just the way it is.
My 2 c's.
Scott
Thanks,
Chris
Google is the umpire here, and Google has ejected him from the ballgame for throwing spitballs. No choice but to discard all his domains and start over. Arguing with the ump ain't gonna work.
>xerxes, it's impossible to give you a clear answer. But it's likely possible that you'll find the answer here at WebmasterWorld. Try a site search for "crosslinking" and read, read, read ...
Right. Only Google knows the answer. However, it's gonna take more than crosslinking 2 domains to have any material effect on PageRank. Thus, while Google never reveals specifics, definitely just 2 domains having one link to each other isn't going to set of the spammer alarm bell at Google.
Pages like "first aid tips for travelers" should be the same in Texas as they are in Florida so I am DEEPLY offended when mrguy says my websites should be banned for life.
As harsh as it may sounds -- your suggested design doesn't add up.
You may not have known about Google, PR but you did vaguely know about link popularity, otherwise I doubt you would have added up 70 web sites and hosted them.
I also think 51 states (unless Canadian provinces became part of the US).
It is unfortunate macneil that the lessons learned were hard ones... but just the same, visitors have no need of 70 web sites when one will do. Only a company wishing to shortcut their way to the top need these.
I suspect the duplicate content was the major factor though.
Google can't tell good intent from bad intent.
Many people here, and many webbers I know, are all dependent on Google.
If you want to be Google's friend again, get a new domain name, re-post all your content there (one time), and set the website up without duplication. Kill everything else.
You could hold onto some penalised domains, so see if they recover. Just empty them, put a note on the front page, and keep an eye on them.
There is no life beyond Google. It's time to be re-born.
my two cents :)
I will give my professional opinion:
a) yes
b) if a site sets up a unique URL, by doing so, the publisher is saying - we have a unique site with unique information its own free standing URL. Contrary to popular believe, a single HUB is not always the answer to multiple URLs under one business umbrella. One reason is for branding. A company that has a new product called XYZ, who is attending a trade show, may be better off (for branding purposes)to tell users to go to XYZ.com to view product information, as opposed to going to makerofXYZ.com. Another example, a company has multiple domains because from a sales standpoint, it is much more advantageous to get someone in Chicago to understand the value of a service when they say go to ChicagoRestaurants.com as opposed go to Restuarant.com and choose the Chicago link. These are to examples as to why one would not have a hub. and There are more.
You could off course have re-directs to elevate the above, but this is a decision that business owners should be able to make themselves and the issue is prevelant.
The ideas of Unique can, in my opinion, be answered by asking Oneself this question.
If my target audience can go to any of my URLs to view the information they are in need of, IT IS NOT UNIQUE and CAN NOT BE CROSSLINKED. If my target audience needs to view a single independant URL to get the information they need because it is not contained on any of my other URLS it is unique and can be crosslinked.
[edited by: Chicago at 6:58 pm (utc) on Mar. 3, 2003]
You could acomplish everything in your travel info scenerio with one domain. When you set up dozens of domains with very similar content it is called DNS spam.
