Domain Reinclusion Requests - what more can I do?

What can I do if my reinclusion request have been ignored?

[profitpuppy]

I've got 2 domains that we used to host with a particular company. Their servers were set up in such a way that you could easily exploit the SMTP hosts for each domain. Thousands of SPAM emails were sent out from each domain. As soon as we realized what was happening we moved the domains to a new server. Shortly afterwards we were dropped from the Google Index (both were PR3-PR4 sites) that were more then a couple of years old. I can only presume it had something to do with the spam and that we've been blacklisted somewhere?

Anyway, we've done everything we can to make sure the sites fall into line with Google's Webmaster Guidelines. We've also submitted Google Site maps and we've processed 2 reinclusion requests for each domain. I've waited for more than 2 months and we've not heard back from Google. My question is now... what am I meant to do now? Do I just keep posting reinclusion requests? Is there anyone else I can contact? Is there someway if I can find out if my domains have been blacklisted?

[tedster]

Well, you don't have to guess about the spam blackists - there are several sites online that will search over 100 such lists so you can see if your domains have been hit.

With regards to Google Search, all I can say is that once your site has been dropped you need to be SQUEAKY clean to be re-included. And your request needs to be specific about what you've fixed and what guarantess you can give that it won't happen again. So be sure that you've found all the problems. If the hosting was slack, there may be some parasite hosting of links, exploits, etc that you need to catch.

Also, you might want to check archive.org to see if these domains had a shady past of some kind, before you acquired them.

I've never seen an explicit Google mention of a ban because the domain was used in email spamming, but it certainly could be. I know Google hates email spam.

[glengara]

"..you need to be SQUEAKY clean to be re-included."

I'd echo that, have you had a cynic look them over?

[Marcia]

we've done everything we can to make sure the sites fall into line with Google's Webmaster Guidelines. We've also submitted Google Site maps and we've processed 2 reinclusion requests for each domain. I've waited for more than 2 months and we've not heard back from Google.

Keep in mind that certain penalties are like "timed-release capsules" that expire after a certain amount of time.

My question is now... what am I meant to do now? Do I just keep posting reinclusion requests? Is there anyone else I can contact? Is there someway if I can find out if my domains have been blacklisted?

It may be a matter of a waiting game, if the sites are fixed so they're now squeaky clean. You might consider subscribing and posting for a site review in the WebmasterWorld subscribers area. What's squeaky clean in your eyes may not be so spotless from someone else's viewpoint, so it can't ever hurt to get unbiased, alternate opinions.