August 2nd Data Refresh?

[MrBlack]

I am seeing a lot of changes today in the Google.co.uk serps, one of my sites has been kicked to the kerb, along with some of the competition, while another site of mine which has been in the doldrums for around 6 months is back at the top!

Maybe they have started weekly data refreshes, as was written or said somewhere else.

[ClintFC]

Is it asking too much that search results actualy show relevant websites? I just searched using a popular term for a local location in Asia, after finding all kinds of sites nothing to do with this local location I find in the 400's to 500's suddenly whole bunches of good webistes, all of these 'local' hosted websites, sometimes in groups as many as 8 together, all good 'local' websites.

As I've said before, I think one of the June 27th bugs is related to Google's geographic and language partitioning (or "segmentation" as MC called it). Since June 27th, Google's SERPs are often polluted by sites in the wrong language and country for the searcher's IP location. Either their Geo-Targeting is broken, or the segmentation of their index is corrupted.

Not good in either case.

[Alex70]

Regarding over optimization, I've did a test on one of my websites.I have stuffed the index with keywords on headings including H1,H2,H3 hyperlinks, title, alt tags etc. After three weeks my website did not move at all. ..Just my 2 cents test...

[jetteroheller]

I just try everything to escape the June 27 horror.

I just thought yesterday to reduce the number of links in the navigation.

A large block in my navigation is

<a href=1990/index.htm>1990
<a href=1991/index.htm>1
<a href=1992/index.htm>2
<a href=1993/index.htm>3
<a href=1994/index.htm>4

to lead to all the articles written in this year.

I just thought yesterday about replacing all this links with

<select name=index_select OnChange="if (this.options[this.selectedIndex].value!= 'null') {window.open(this.options[this.selectedIndex].value,'_top') }">
<option value=1990/index.htm>1990
<option value=1991/index.htm>1991
<option value=1992/index.htm>1992
<option value=1993/index.htm>1993
<option value=1994/index.htm>1994
</select>

Now I just studied

[video.google.com...]

about 4:15 after start, Matt Cutt talks about links in option boxes.

Does he mean this sort of code, or does he mean some sort of trick with the option box?

[followgreg]

I find a new slight refresh on 72.14.209.104 tonight - Looks like spammers still are gaining better positions in certain industries (amazes and depresses me!)

[Just Guessing]

After three weeks my website did not move at all.

With a monthly partial data refresh of that algo, you might have to wait quite a while.

Then of course the algo which detects sites testing the over-optimisation algo after an announcement will probably boost your rankings anyway.

[pechspilz]

I just wanted to add that we recovered from the August 2nd drop yesterday. At least that's what the site: query says (I'm always using a saturation checker URL that checks on 50 different Google-IPs). The 27th of this month is going to be interesting :-) We usually loose 90% of all pages on that day.

[fishfinger]

I've seen some real changes on Google UK (but only if you use the UK results only modifier). I run about 60 sites. Yesterday the first two I looked at had pages de-indexed. Eek. I'm now checking all the rest.

The wierd thing is that the pages are targeting regional search terms (city or county names); they're still ranking fine in the world index or using Google.com

My initial guess is that not enough of the links to my sites are from UK sites. Matt Cutts has said that link popularity will affect numbers of pages that are indexed, so my opinion is that (as most of my links are from US sites) I don't have enough UK links to rank in UK results.

[sandpetra]

Over-optimisation? So you follow the rules for 5 years and then get slapped. it would make sense though.

I take it almost everyone on this site with 15 posts and over know how to "kind of" optimise their site.

You dont see posts like: Wow - found this great technique - do this and get top rankings!

It's webmastermoanworld here!