Stay Where We Put You On Page 1 Penalty

Has anyone ever heard of anything like this?

[Arctrust]

Hey Guys:

I have a question which seems to be bothering me...

We have always (for 5 years) ranked high - pos 2 or 3 for one KW search term.

As everyone else... we got bumped in May and for all the tweaks that I have done.... the site stays at position 8/9/10

Can it possibly be that there is a manual filter being applied?

Thanks
ARC

[Arctrust]

CORRECTION

I have adjusted KW on page and several other small items...

I have seen... the home page move from bottom of 1st SERP page only to return within minutes to bottom....

Almost seems like an invisible anchor....

[JohnRoy]

> Can it possibly be that there is a manual filter being applied?

It can.
But I assume it's the algorithm that moved the other sites up.

[piatkow]

If you fix something the SERPS will bounce around until all data centres are in line.

My SERPS looked like a yo-yo for about a month after I fixed some issues on my site last year.

[HuskyPup]

As everyone else... we got bumped in May

What do you mean by this?

I certainly didn't get bumped anywhere and neither did many others!

What lead you to this conclusion?

I have adjusted KW on page and several other small items

Tinkering and tweaking will have an effect, in your case a demotion. Maybe you rank higher for other longtail KW's now?

[trinorthlighting]

See if you can find some very relevant and very good links in. Also, do not be afraid to link out to topics that are similar but very relevant as well.

[Arctrust]

Thanks guys...

All good suggestions for off-page factors...

Sometimes when you are in the thick of it, it's hard to see over the grass.

My single KW always ranked high as well as the long tail searches, the only change now is the single KW.

I will need to explore some more....

Thanks again!
ARC