Forum Moderators: Robert Charlton & goodroi
The last straw was that I tried looking for specific phrases that could have only been written by me and lo and behold I see dozens of scraped sites and those who simply copied my text ranking ABOVE me!
What can I do? Because the site is not completely excluded (it will appear for 1-2 keywords and also if you type in the exact name of the site.. that's about it), I can not send a reinclusion request. Is there a form to request a review? I makes me mad thinking that somebody did something to me, I have no way of verifying it or asking Google to review it.
P.S. Obviously, I've never done anything black-hat myself - simply didn't need to: the site has been around for a very long time and enjoyed natural links.
You may want to check out these threads:
Stolen Content: What To Do First [webmasterworld.com]
Proxy Server URLs Can Hijack Your Google Ranking - how to defend? [webmasterworld.com]
The websites that have taken your previous rankings may be proxies, or they may be pure scrapers, or a mix. But it's good to know exactly what you are dealing with so you can be precise in your response to the situation.
Thank you very much for the thread references - I'll read them and see if I can make sense of it.
As far as the reconsideration request option, it seems that Google specifically denies people like me a chance to appeal. This is what they require that I "sign":
By submitting this form, I acknowledge that:* I believe this site has violated Google's quality guidelines in the past.
* This site no longer violates Google's quality guidelines.
* I have read and agree to abide by Google's quality guidelines.
I don't believe I violated anything - I believe somebody else did something that caused my site to drop off, that's all. But I have no idea what. So, I am out of luck?
My question is - could THEIR behavior have affected MY rankings?
often its when sections of pages are used rather than complete pages....i recall a secondhand quote here from a google engineer along the lines of similar copy being more of a problem than identical copy...
My question is - could THEIR behavior have affected MY rankings?
Well, no one knows for sure, but my opinion is that what you're seeing is the RESULT of some other penalty/filter, not the cause of it. The site I monitor that has been nailed by the -950 penalty/filter exhibits this same behavior --i.e. you do a search for a text snippet and you rank below the worst scraper garbage on the net.
I did a test last month where I closely monitored the progress of a specific article I wrote on a big name celeb. The article was picked-up off my site by Google News less than 2 minutes after I published it and then became searchable in Google Search a few minutes later. The article was then scraped by every fan site on Earth, and now for a text-snippet search it is filtered behind the "more results" link.
It looks to me like Google has given up trying to determine content ownership.
1000+ pages.
On the net for 10 years.
Google News source site.
No recips.
No purchased links.
No guestbook spam links.
No forum spam links.
Thousands of backlinks.
This site ranks below all scrapers for ANY text snippet search done, even snippets that don't contain commercial keywords or phrases which could possibly be a basis to penalize/filter off of.
Yet this site still ranks #1 for the most competitively spammed-out travel terms in its region AND all variations of those terms. (thank goodness)
For sites hit with this [whatever it is], Google is actively placing the content originator page below all scraper pages for no apparent reason. They aren't even using a basic "first found" ranking method.
Very strange.
For sites hit with this [whatever it is], Google is actively placing the content originator page below all scraper pages for no apparent reason. They aren't even using a basic "first found" ranking method.
Exactly! This is what's killing me - some of the articles I wrote were written in the early 2000's. The scraper sites ranking above me were all registered after 2005. How hard is it for Google to see that I am the original source? Not to mention the fact that I actually (still!) have a much higher PR rank in the tool bar. Yet they show me below most of them and practically always below the "more results" cutoff link.
A follow-up question to the original question: is it worth trying to revive the good name of the domain (it's been around for 7+ years) or should I just give up and start a new site? It almost feels like a completely new site will rank higher than the old one...
Thousands of backlinks.
Incoming links are not directly your responsibility, but they may become yours if they are part of a link exchange or similar behavior.
If you have been 'generous' in exchanging links, and some of your 'link partners' have been sloppy, stupid or downright moronic, your choice to link to them could have caused the damage.
It is hard to control incoming links, but Google (and common sense) require you to be very, very careful about your outgoing links.
Check them all.
Remove any inappropriate links
Remove any reciprocal links where you cannot 100% recommend the partner site.
Remove all deadlinks, sadlinks, paidlinks.
Check again. If there are any suspect reciprocal links, remove them.
Check again. If any third party has access to any part of your site (eg forum,guest book), check all those links; add nofollow or seal the pages.
Check again.
Why all these checks? Because in addition to the 'confession and remorse' statement, it is pointless to ask Google to readmit unless the site really is 100% clean.
Bad Linking, even if done in Good Faith, is the ONLY way outsiders can damage your rankings. If you have checked Google's guidelines and have found nothing you've done, then it's time to consider what others have done. They can only hurt you if you let them.
I think what you're saying applies to people who actively GIVE links. In my situation, I am barely linking at all (BTW, could *that* be the problem? A site that's not linking much - can it be suddenly and severely penalized as a rank hoarder? Seems idiotic, but you never know...).
Anyway, are you suggesting that external links (pointing towards one's site) can hurt? If so:
a) How can I figure out who's hurting me (Google WT shows several hundred links to my site. Many of them are surely garbage, but how would I know?).
b) Even if I knew whose links are causing the problem, what can I do? It's not like I can demand their removal.
I thought Google was committed to the basic principle "there's next to nothing a competitor can do to hurt you". Now I am not so convinced any more.
If there's link farm out there, you don't need many links to it to be seen as "part of it" - it's always the quality of links, these days, rarely the quantity.
If you EVER exchanged links, then you are at risk - it's a small risk - but you could have been unlucky. As an aside, yes, I'd do more linking than you have been - but that's not the current problem.
So far as I'm aware, there's no other way that people can hurt your site - unless you believe an enemy is employing cloaking techniques to undermine you. It has happened, but it's pretty rare, by all accounts.
You seem clear that's it's nothing you've done on page - and with an almost total wipeout, we're not talking about a minor error. And after months, it isn't likely to be a server/host problem either.
So we're back to links. Go check 'em all - let xenu be your friend. And take a look at Google's webmaster tools, too.
Good Luck! :)
A new client has recently removed their very old school tricks from their website. (links in the collor of the background)
is it worth trying to revive the good name of the domain (it's been around for 7+ years) or should I just give up and start a new site?
I would certainly not advise such a drastic step until you tried a few other things. 7+ years of authority is not to be sneezed at. Try to find one or two other people to take an objective look at your site and see if there's possibly something there that you're missing.
Regards,
