A Flood of Incorrect Readings in Google Webmaster Tools

[triggerfinger]

I'm seeing strange readings on my Webmaster Tools, with regard to my Sitemaps.

To give you an example, my regional pages are, in general, only getting about 1/3rd of their URLs indexed, according to WMT. These readings are approximately mirrored by Google's Site: command operator.

My national pages, numbering close to 36k, are showing 0 URLs indexed via the Sitemap. The Site: command operator shows 33k indexed, however. My traffic has remained stable, so I don't believe many or any national pages are actually de-indexed. I'm waiting on traffic reports for my locals.

What should I make of this? How does Google determine which of the URL's submitted to include in the index? Is the reading on GWMT accurate? Has anyone had similar issues?

Thanks in Advance.

[gethan]

< moved from another location >

Google WMT sitemaps - lists 0 pages. Is any one else seeing this?

Looks like it happened back in December 09 - WebmasterWorld [webmasterworld.com]

And there are at least a few comments on SEO Roundtable from today SEO RT [seroundtable.com]

Can anyone affected last time share what happened with the pages and if there were any further repercussions?

[edited by: tedster at 2:44 am (utc) on Apr 28, 2010]

[gethan]

Just to note: Dec 2009 should have read Oct 2009

The replies to the previous discussions seem to indicate that there were no immediate impacts - sites still stayed listed despite 0 pages reported as indexed.

I'd like to know if any corresponding loss of traffic - or deindexing occured during the weeks and months that followed. And how long it took for correct page counts to reappear.

[AnkitMaheshwari]

My WMT is also showing 0 indexed pages for a number of sitemaps today. I hope this is a bug as everything was fine until yesterday.

[1script]

Same here - most sites in WMT show 0 indexed URLs. In many cases I have multiple sitemaps and one index sitemap per site. Some individual sitemaps show 0 and some show a few dozen (150 I think is max), all on the same site.
Traffic is not affected as far as I can tell, so this much have been a reporting fluke.

[suratmedia]

@Oct 2009

Now it's April 2010.

Every six months, this eclipse is happening! ;-)

[Freedom]

< moved from another location >]

Well, I've been waiting for 3 months now, litteraly, for google to crawl and index about 6,000 new image gallery pages we created. After 3 months of an unusually long wait, we got 1400 pages indexed.

Today I checked and now all of them are gone.

Is anyone else missing pages from their webmaster tools? In the SERPS, our site: operator does show major drops in the numbers of our pages.

This is a PR6 site with 15,000 backlinks, been around for 6 years.

Any thoughts/opinions on this is appreciated.

Google seems to have been in chaos since December, and I've patiently waited for them to get their crawling/indexing together as it's been chaotic up through April. But here were are almost May, and the smoke hasn't seemed to have cleared from the caffeine update.

[edited by: tedster at 7:10 am (utc) on Apr 28, 2010]

[gn_wendy]

GWT submitted: 20,510
GWT indexed: 144

-- -- -- -- --

site:example.com (est. results 18,000 - probably wrong)
page 100 shows 10 results
i.e. at least 1000 pages indexed and cached - checked multiple datacenters.

My conclusion: GWT is broken or I'm about to have a lot of problems...

[johnmoose]

@Oct 2009

Now it's April 2010.

Every six months, this eclipse is happening! ;-)

as is the Ubuntu cycle.. coincidence?

[AnkitMaheshwari]

The indexed pages number is falling for my site in GWT.

Yesterday - 195K+ pages indexed
Today Morning - 115K+ pages indexed
Now - 65K+ pages indexed

[johnmoose]

Google WMT sitemaps - lists 0 pages. Is any one else seeing this?

Yep, me too...and resubmitting the sitemap doesn't seem to help...

[gethan]

Ok - found something official from Google (Wednesday, April 28, 2010 | 2:11 AM): Known issue: Sitemaps indexed URL count showing zero indexed URLs [webmaster-forum-announcements.blogspot.com]

The indexed URL counts for Sitemaps that you have submitted in Webmaster Tools may be showing zero (0) indexed URLs for some sites. We are aware of this issue and are looking into it; you do not need to take any action. This will have no effect on your site's performance in search results.

Combine this with The Google site: operator seems broken - is this intentional? [webmasterworld.com] - and there are probably some very nervous webmasters at the moment... I'm trying my best not to be one of them ;)

[levo]

Yes, all zeroed...

[suratmedia]

Google Webmaster Help Forum Announcements: Known issue

[webmaster-forum-announcements.blogspot.com...]

[Whitey]

Maybe a bulk announcement by G on what works, what doesn't would be good across the whole tool set would be good. Wishful thinking maybe.

[edited by: tedster at 12:39 pm (utc) on Apr 28, 2010]

[g1smd]

I don't use XML sitemaps, ever. However, I have noticed something odd in WMT reports over the last month or so.

At the beginning of the year, I blocked using

robots.txt

one type of page (i.e. one parameter name with any value), on a dynamic site, with something like

Disallow: /*something=

or similar.

Within days WMT reports listed many thousands of these URLs as being blocked by robots.txt. However, in the last month the number has declined, and is now down to only a few hundred. The URLs are still disallowed in robots.txt and no internal linking on the site has been changed in recent months.

[meelosh]

also have 0 indexed...over the last few months starting in january on a site that is about 650 pages of wich about 550 were indexed it started to drop slightly by the day...this went on for a few months..then all of a sudden it jumped up to more than it had ever been (close to the full amount)..held steady for a week or two and then the same pattern started..the pages started dropping down again. then on April 27th i see "0". while the fluctuations were taking place i suffered a gradual traffic loss (organic) of about 10% which is pretty big for me......my head is exploding i dont know what to do anymore? i think im gonna start drinking this morning.

[maximus12]

Same for me everyone. I have 4 sitemaps in GWT and only my blogs are ok, the rest say 0

[cybergal]

Yes number of indexed pages zeroed

[TheSpeshulK]

I have a number of sites in GWT on different accounts. A couple show zero pages indexed and some show a loss of about 90% in the number of pages indexed. Seems inconsistent but the site: operator appears to be on track with our daily logs.

[gameon]

Did any of you checked the "Internal Links" section of your WMT? No big variations on mine. Today it shows 1-100 of 75,024 and on March 24th the count was 1-100 of 80934 = 7.3% drop. How about yours?

[g1smd]

The internal links count has been going up ever since the site went live, but at the last update it dropped by about 1%, even though the number of URLs listed and that have incoming internal links went up by 4%.

That is, Google says they have found a few more pages on the site, but there's less total internal linking between them all than there was before.

[MrHard]

Not indexing any of our images for some time now.

[tedster]

There's now an official announcement from Google that the Webmaster Tools "zero pages indexed" problem with Sitemaps is resolved.

Webmaster Help Forums - Official Announcements Blog [webmaster-forum-announcements.blogspot.com]

[suratmedia]

It's getting normal for some sites and even better!

Current status:-
==============
Indexed URLs: 94% (before it was 74%)

[keyplyr]

Dropped to 0 for 2 days then back to correct number. This has happened a couple times before. Doesn't phase me any more.

[gethan]

Dropping ~5% daily starting on 15th - anyone else? is there a monthly cycle?

Could be nothing...

[fade001]

i usllay the same. i don't know anything ,who tell me?