Forum Moderators: Robert Charlton & goodroi
We need to keep this thread focused on the followings:
- Changes on your own site ranking on the serps (lost & gained positions or disappearance of the site).
- Changes you have noticed on the new serps (both google.com and your local google site) especially in regards to the nature of the top 10 or 20 ranking sites.
- Stability of the serps. I.e do you get the same serps when you run the same query within the same day or 2-3 successive days (both google.com and your local google site).
- Effective ethical measures to deal with the above mentioned changes.
Thanks.
Clint:>>>I'm getting too old for this .... < <<
Iīm not saying that its the case with your site, but allow me to elaborate in general terms. For example:
Suppose that all the BIG-3 have agreed on definition of SPAM and the criteria to identify spam sites and accordingly created a common databse for that. Just like the banks and bad credit reporting. Would that surprise anybody?
Suppose they have agreed on minimum requirements any webpage to meet in order to be indexed. Would that surprise anybody?
Suppose they have agreed on how to identify and treat hijackers. Would that surprise anybody?
etc...etc...
I don't recall the reason why I said that now, but what you said would actually be great, and YES it would be a surprise if they could agree on anything! ;) As it stands now and may be appearing to look, you may need at least THREE websites; one for G, one for Y and one for MSN! If they could get together and AGREE on many things, that would be far less of a headache for everyone. Then we could have one site to appease all of them....until the next time Google "throws a rod through their oil pan" <tranquilizers, anti-depressants and heart medications standing ready, as well as dental floss for bungee jumping>.
Hi I have just seen a directory listing results from another directory, I supose that eventually it will be:
A directory listing another directory that has the content from another directory, who listed another directory with the content of another directory and so on and on and on.And little Joe surfer who wants to buy something, will give up trying to find it on the net and he will go back to the corner store.
Great future for everyone!
Willie, I ditto that as well. That is EXACTLY what was happening with my search phrases. Where I was (for products sales), I was replaced with directories linking to other directories linking to other directories, etc., in some causality loop. Thankfully this is changing after I got my G SERP's back. I hope it will change for you as well.
The files mentioned in the robots.txt file are always files that are on the same domain as the robots.txt file itself, so you cannot remove files on other peoples sites that they did not actually want to be removed (unless they accidentally put something in their own robots.txt file that they didn't mean to do).
g1smd, thanks a bunch. ;)
myopia
600k hits.
9th on the first page - 404, page not found, cached on June 19th. This is not outdated link - googlebot visited the site and have found that it is empty.
About Google's results being poor, are they?
EFV:
The answer to that probably depends on what you're searching for.
True, and much good advice EFV. I can't comment on my serps pre bourbon, my site was a mess in the index and I've just started tracking specific searches.
re: Google's results being poor I don't know, but I'll post results for 4 searches which I feel are important to my site from the major 3 fwiw:
G M Y
1 333 8 3
2 304 2 7
3 237 1 9
4 1000+ 13 26
In a couple of cases, the results have my search term in the uri of the sites ahead of me which seems reasonable.
so, you decide. are the results poor?
I'm one of the many. How could it possibly be so? Didn't you read Katie_Venra's great post about building traffic without Google? Half of her ideas would be of use to ANYONE, no matter how small-scale their online business was.
Just about the only people who truly *could not* do anything to get traffic without Google are pure information sites (I mean really not selling ANYTHING at all, and also not on a topic of strong interest to schools and libraries). Well, and the scrapers and other content spammers, of course, but I know from your previous posts that this doesn't apply to you. If you have a real product or service, then you have something to market, and you can market it with or without Google.
Of course, Google can prove a windfall to good online businesses, and that's great, and I hope it gets all its problems sorted out and continues to do that. But standing there yelling "I can't do it, Google is my only hope!" is very defeatist. If you market your own business properly, it's not as if you're giving up on Google, after all--you'll just make that much more when Google does come around!
I'm one of the many. How could it possibly be so? Didn't you read Katie_Venra's great post about building traffic without Google? Half of her ideas would be of use to ANYONE, no matter how small-scale their online business was.
It could "possibly be so" because we are all in different lines of work, and what makes you think that what works for you is going to work for every other person!?!
I give up. I have had it. No more comments on it.
The only exceptions I can think of would be a complete Google-spawn venture, like a made-for-Adsense site of some sort (even a very good, informational one). Those people are dependent upon Google, it's true, and none of this is helpful to them. That doesn't apply to Clint though (who said he doesn't use Adsense).
Is it against the TOS here to mention an industry, in very generic terms? I'd be very curious to know what this exception is. Perhaps I'm not thinking of something... or perhaps you're not.
Even those sites can have other marketing avenues in which to tap into. Most people will choose the avenue that they can capture the most traffic/revenue with the least work and time as possible (search engine market). This is fine to do but it is just pure laziness if you limit yourself to using ONLY this strategy. It all comes down to wanting it bad enough that you will go out door to door handing our fliers to attract business. It will aslo come down to the value of your information/service/product that will also help determine how much market share you can capture.
I also don't believe in a marketing strategy "independent of Google". That is plain stupid if you think about it. Diversification, when done properly, is inclusive not exclusive! The whole point of diversification is to manage risk. No matter where you throw your dime! Rather than developing a strategy that is independent of google develop one that is inclusive of google. Proper diversification will eliminate the risk involved if this market should cease to exist. Create a strategy with each element working in harmony with each other and supporting each other.
Or giving away something for free like free coupons. If you're making no income from it already, pooring more money into it just costs more on top of that.
Basically ANY website not designed to generate income.
Missing person sites, free social assistance sites, etc. Everyone in here seems to assume people ONLY run websites with the express purpose to make money.
In addition, many online businesses have such a narrow profit margin that they rely on quantity. For instance one site we manage averages less than 3 cents per visitor. Paying 5 cents each through a PPC just doesn't make sense.
[edited by: MikeNoLastName at 6:48 pm (utc) on June 21, 2005]
Have a fund raiser! PR my friend. Look to the local news and even businesses to help fund and give the non-profit org some exposure.
(Wal-mart has a place in their stores that displays missing children.)
"Or giving away something for free like free coupons. If you're making no income from it already, pooring more money into it just costs more on top of that."
If it is non profit then give your service away for free for other people to use giving you added exposure. A free cupon site can offer their content and cupons to other sites who do make money. Kinda like open source non profit programs. Many of those manage to get exposure without SE traffic.
Basically ANY website not designed to generate income.
Missing person sites, free social assistance sites, etc. Everyone in here seems to assume people ONLY run websites with the express purpose to make money.
These are excellent examples. I think the posts were aimed at those who are claiming that G is destroying their lives and the lives of their families, by limiting their livlihood, since they no longer enjoy the 'top spot.'
I guess my question to these people would be, what makes you more worthy to enjoy top rankings than myself or anyone else? What makes your site better than mine?
Justin
"Paying 5 cents each through a PPC just doesn't make sense."
If you look at it as cut and dry as "I make 3 cents per visitor and if I spend 5 cents to aquire a visitor thus I will loose money" then you are not opening your mind to creative possibilities.
What if the 5 cents per visitor can be used in a way to aquire 3 more visitors free. Hmmm 3 cents per visitor so that would be 12 cents income(3 free visitors and the visitor you paid for) and 5 cents spent. You just made a 7 cent profit. What if you take the 3 free visitors and do it again?
Very good questions. We all should ask ourselves this question when looking at top rankings and compeditors. Your answers can provide some very useful insight and direction.
It's extremely feasible for a non-profit organization to promote its mission without ever using the Internet at all--many of them do. It's certainly reaonable to promote it through a mix of on- and offline activities, and probably smarter in the long run than staying online-only. A lot of donors and people whose awareness needs raising and people who need help don't spend much time on the computer.
In the last two weeks, two people at work, two who are "intermediate" computer users, asked me if there was a problem with Google as they were no longer able to find anything with it. All the results were full of rubbish, they said. People are noticing.
If I wanted to bust my butt to make a living then I'd be doing what I did for the prior 30 years.
I'm going back down to the beach now to make sure no jetski's go too fast by my dock.
Finally, it's just a waste of bandwidth to spew out nonsense about how Google is intentionally corrupting its search results to sell more AdWords and delight the analysts on Wall Street. If you're mad at Google, lay off the silliness and libel: You'll feel a lot better (and you'll burn up some calories) by taking out your frustrations on a punching bag.
The sage has spoken. Everybody back to your cubicles. NOW!
I'm already taking the adsense ads off my pages. Basically, I never made more than $300 a month (a lot less now), starting in December 2004. So, my thinking is that if I sell ONE ad per day, every day of the month at $10/month (and who wouldn't pay that for targeted traffic?) I've already got Google beat. Plus, I'll have established contact with many good indy web sites and people and I can work on doing what I do best - developing and expanding my site.
Now, I've heard all the whining and moaning (some from me) that I can stand. Those of you who can't figure out how to set up your own ad system (hint: you don't need to know perl, just know how to implement it and fiddle with it), you can gently ask for my assistance. I work cheap (thanks to goooooooooooooogle).
[edited by: ciml at 11:38 pm (utc) on June 21, 2005]
[edit reason] Leave the insults at the door please. [/edit]
However, when that phase of the crisis is over, we need to look at solutions and ways to go on with our lives and business. And this thread provide you with knowledge and suggestions to move on.
It isnīt going to be an easy task to rebuild your new site (s) and hopefully many of you will take the advantage of the strategy of moving the contents of your site which was dumped to new shining site. Hopefully will some or many of you consider the "OUTLET SITES" strategy. Hard work is waiting ahead.
Best wishes of success and God bless to all.
Been reading posts like this for 3 years after updates. Know what? Google's still everyone's favourite.
Learn, adapt, progress, but don't wait for Google to drop dead.
Good Luck on that Rick, Really I mean it.
We've done it for 10 years and it's not as easy as it sounds. Sure the first few may be easy, SEOs looking for pass through rank, but 1-2 month is more likely even with a full time sales person on staff. Most of them just figure they can do it themselves cheaper and try harder to beat your SERPs or stupidly hire an SEO who thinks he knows everything until 2 years later they're worse off than they were and far poorer and disillusioned entirely about all things to do with the net. Better to keep adsense on there until you've surpassed them in earnings with your own ads. You're allowed to have both.
It's hard enough when you're in the top 10. The first thing they ask is "what's your monthly traffic like". But it gets WAY harder when your site starts disappearing from the major search engines, your traffic starts to drop, and your existing advertisers start asking, "hey, what happened to your rank on my keyword" and cancelling their contracts.
Been there, done that, seems like, just yesterday...
Oh that's right, it was.
That, I found out experimentally, represents only 25% of my traffic.
I'm in the 'business' of distributing 'free electronic goods' that are sponsored by AdSense. My site needs traffic to live. A lot of it.
It is, or perhaps was, a fine business model where everybody benefits.
If I notice Google-driven waves and cycles of traffic crashes, I'll have to re-think my model. Such as selling instead to distributing for free.
But in changing this model, something that is good would be lost on the web. I get letters every single day, one, two or rarely three from visitors expressing their gratefulness for what I provide. That's a rate of maybe 1.5 / 1000 daily visitors that take the time to send me an email.
So you see... forget about the money for an instant... what is lost when good sites bob up and down the SERPs wildly, is not measured in dollars, but in good will.
And that, my friends, is what I missed most when my site was in the sewers.
>Learn, adapt, progress, but don't wait for Google to drop dead.<
And honesly it isnīt for our (publishers) benefit that Google drop dead. Otherwise we shall end with 2 majors; Yahoo and MSN and it isnīt to the publishers advantage to depend on only two majors.
What we need is more Googles, more Yahoos and more MSNs. Competition is a healthy sign of doing business, especially for publishers.
Several fellow members who run business sites would had never ended in the current sad situation if there were say 6 majors, instead of only 3 .
I have every sympathy in the world for people whose quality content sites suddenly and inexplicably dropped for two weeks or longer. It's just the people whose attitude about it all is "If I wanted to bust my butt to make a living then I'd be doing what I did for the prior 30 years!" that make me laugh. There ain't no such thing as a free lunch--making a living takes either hard work or great risk no matter WHAT it is you're doing. Most of my sympathy is for webmasters who were putting in the hard work and now are surprised to find that they were also, unbeknownst to them, in a "great risk" profession. The ones who are just skimming off Google traffic and lying around on the beach MUST have known that this wasn't going to be a permanent lifestyle. You don't just get money for free forever.
Got more pages back today via sitemap submittal.
[edited by: ciml at 11:44 pm (utc) on June 21, 2005]
[edit reason] Be respectful to other members. [/edit]
"My theory is it will last as long as it lasts and I'll suck every nickle out of it while it does - excluding becoming a real scraper site. "
_________________
Why not the scraper sites also? You don't owe Googgle a thing. None of us do. I mean, really.!
Many people, myself included, were making money on the net when Serge and his buddy were still in college. Made it then with the other engines and will continue to make it long after Google fades into oblivion. Which they will.
I have done the scraper route. It pays, bigtime. PERIOD
Look around, Google loves them, in fact,rewards them, as long as they carry the adds. Easy to get top serps also.
Need more traffic than you can handle? Can you spell scraper?
I OWE THEM ZIP. PERIOD
In fact, as I see it, they owe me and the many thousands of others like me for being there (1995-1997) when they went begging on their knees for content and traffic.
I gave them mine then, now I'll take their traffic. No big deal.
It's just business!
Some day, a method will enable sites to achieve good rankings, based on content and competence, not links, techniques or outrightly underhanded methods. That day may come, may not. May be soon, may be later.
Google is a search engine that searches for content. Consider the following:
A mafia company set up a webpage. Their design is excellent, and the contact information is professional. It takes human beings years to find out that it is a mafia site.
The search engines give the site high rank.
You do not expect the search engines to figure out that?
Conclusion: What do you expect of the search engine? I mean search engine.
