Keyword or URL penalty, how to detect & resolve it?

[corepartner]

I have been trying to get rank for a keyword for about 3 months now, its a long tail keyword and has not got much competition.

I was ranking 3rd for that keyword within a week after adding that page into my site, but for almost 3 months my site is no where ranking for that keyword, however my root domain is ranking on the page 15.

I have read many posts on this forum to detect the issue and found that Google has penalized my URL because of the following reasons:

CRAWLING ISSUE (CACHE DATE IS NOT CHANGING)

Google has stopped crawling that page even after regularly building quality links.

(I have submitted 3 guest post on high PR blogs within last 3 weeks and got dofollow links to that page) even after doing that Google did not crawl my page :(

THIS IS THE MAIN ISSUE THAT MADE ME BELIEVE THAT GOOGLE HAS GIVEN PENALTY TO THAT URL AS GOOGLE IS NOT CRAWLING IT.

MISTAKES I HAVE DONE:

I have build a link wheel and got it indexed on the same day in Google
, did high PR blog commenting, GOT WIKI LINK FROM OTHER LAUNAGUGE USING THE EXACT ANCHOR TEXT.

I have done above things within the span of 2 days :(

I have also given this page internal sitewide link (removed few days ago already) BUT I DON'T SEE IT AS A PROBLEM BECAUSE I HAVE GIVEN THE LINK USING THE H1 TAG TEXT IN THE ANCHOR TEXT.

STILL LET ME KNOW YOUR THOUGHTS ABOUT IT

SOLUTION:

I have a feeling If I make Google to crawl my that page again then my penalty will be lifted, but don't know how can I do it.

Do let me know how can I resolve this issue

Thanks

[Planet13]

I have build a link wheel and got it indexed on the same day in Google...

what is a link wheel?

Thanks in advance.

[corepartner]

This picture will helps you to understand about the link wheel, Link wheels are build using the parasite hosting.

[linkwheel.co.uk...]

[aristotle]

Have you checked to make sure that you didn't accidentally put a noindex tag in the page code, or accidentally blocked Google from crawling the page? Also, If you have the site in Google Webmaster Tools, you should check the internal links section to see if it shows any links to or from the page. Another thing to check is possible hacking.

[corepartner]

@aristotle
Yeah, I have checked the on page factors and found no issue regarding it.

I forgot to mention this point as well that I am also not able to find any links to that page on WMT, any particular reason?

[aristotle]

Other things to check:

1. The sitemap you submitted to WMT

2. What happens when you search Google for the exact URL of the page?

3. Check "Fetch as Googlebot" for the possiblility that a hacker somehow put hidden links on the page.

[corepartner]

@aristotle

1. I have already submitted sitemap to WMT and has no issue regarding it.

2. When I search for the exact URL in Google then Google shows me the same URL in its serp but cache date is not changing (it is indexed)

3. I don't get this one, kindly explain this to me further.

[aristotle]

corepartner -

You can find "Fetch as Googlebot" in the Labs section of WMT. After you enter the URL, it will send a Googlebot to visit the page, then it will show you what it found. You can check to make sure that it sees the same code you uploaded for the page.

As for the cache date, I'm not sure that this is a reliable indicator of how often Googlebot crawls the page. Sometimes the cache appears to be slow to update.

If the page is indexed, but doesn't appear in the SERPs for its targeted keyword, then it could be penalized. It's possible that its only penalized for one keyword, as in the over-optimization penalty. In that case, it could still appear in the SERPs for other search terms.

Unfortunately, in these types of cases it often isn't possible to identify the basic problem. You could have built links too fast, or over-optimized, etc.

[tedster]

Sometimes the cache appears to be slow to update.

Sometimes it even goes backwards!

[corepartner]

@aristotle

I have done the test with "fetch as googlebot" and found no problem with it, I have also done the site page speed test which also not bad.

Is there any solution for this problem, should I stopped working on this site and shift my focus to other site?

I am confused, do share your experience and suggestion to resolve this issue.

Thanks

[aristotle]

corepartner --

Is the page getting any traffic at all from Google, such as from long-tail and other search terms?

[corepartner]

@aristotle

Nope the page is not getting any traffic from google :-( main cause of worry..

[aristotle]

It sounds like the page could have been penalized, but it's hard to know for sure, because we just don't have enough information about the various causes of Google penalties. Many sites have been penalized without their owners knowing why.

If it were my page, I probably wouldn't spend any more time on link building, at least for now. But I might try to add some more content to the page to see if that helps. Another thing I would do is to go through all the sections of WMT very thoroughly looking for clues.

[corepartner]

Now, Its clear that google has penalised my page, should I build a new site or continue working on this site and forget about that page or keyword?

Also, If possible then do provide me some links of helpful threads and and suggestion that I could use to resolve this penalty.

[aristotle]

If you don't know why the page was penalized, you probably won't be able to get it removed. If there were an easy or sure method, a lot of other people would like to know about it too.

Since I don't know much about your site, or what other projects you have in mind, I really can't tell you what to do next.

[tedster]

Agreed - this is a business decision that requires intimate knowledge of your affairs altogether. You're not going to get real value from crowdsourcing a decision like this.

There are a lot of threads that could help in the Hot Topics area [webmasterworld.com], which is always pinned to the top of this forum's index page.

But other than than, it's your call whether to take the blue pill or the purple pill.

[jimbeetle]

Its clear that google has penalised my page

No, it really isn't quite clear that the page is penalized. Unless you've done something truly egregious, it's not really easy to get an actual "penalty."

I see a couple of telling things.

its a long tail keyword

The Mayday update knocked the heck out of many sites that used to rank for long tails. It appears, to me, that Google stopped delving into the supplementary index (lower PR pages) for those results.

I was ranking 3rd for that keyword within a week after adding that page into my site, but for almost 3 months my site is no where ranking for that keyword

Normal Google behaviour, give a new page/site a bit of a "fresh boost" to see if there's any user interest. If not, return it to where it belongs in the rankings, if any.

I have submitted 3 guest post on high PR blogs within last 3 weeks and got dofollow links to that page

No matter that the blogs are high (toolbar) PR and/or dofollow links, there is really no way to know if links from these blogs are actuall passing PR. Many forums and guest post blogs do not.

THIS IS THE MAIN ISSUE THAT MADE ME BELIEVE THAT GOOGLE HAS GIVEN PENALTY TO THAT URL AS GOOGLE IS NOT CRAWLING IT.

Google usually doesn't give up crawling pages that are "penalized" (God, I hate that word). I've seen a site that had a true, hard, year and a half ban that was regularly crawled. A likely possibility here is that the site's PR isn't high enough for Google's crawl budget.

The surest remedy for any perceived problem when it comes to Google is links, true quality links. See if you can beg, borrow or steal a couple and see what happens.

[corepartner]

If you don't know why the page was penalised, you probably won't be able to get it removed. If there were an easy or sure method, a lot of other people would like to know about it too.

Thanks for your help aristotle, I got know few things from you that I was completely unaware and I also understand that there is no sure or easy method to solve this issue.

I just meant, what's should be the next best possible thing that I could do to resolve this issue or detect what is the issue? forget about business decision just stick to the problem and lets figure out how to detect the issue and how to get it solved.

There are a lot of threads that could help in the Hot Topics area [webmasterworld.com], which is always pinned to the top of this forum's index page.

But other than than, it's your call whether to take the blue pill or the purple pill

Thanks for the link tedseter, I have had that link already and try to keep myself updated.

I also agree with you that the end decision would be mine but lets forget the business perspective for a moment and on the basis of the things that I have mentioned and discussed with you guys what would be the best practice to detect the issue and to resolve it?

I know you don't know the answer of this questions, just wanted to know your thoughts & other people thoughts abut this situation.

What would you do like build more link, wait, forget that page etc?

its a long tail keyword

The Mayday update knocked the heck out of many sites that used to rank for long tails. It appears, to me, that Google stopped delving into the supplementary index (lower PR pages) for those results.

First of all I want to thank you for taking your time out and replying to my queries, My page got link from wiki and has better links then any other page on the top 10 for that keywords.

SEOmoz toolbar showing the page authority 35 for a very long tail keyword

I have submitted 3 guest post on high PR blogs within last 3 weeks and got dofollow links to that page

No matter that the blogs are high (toolbar) PR and/or dofollow links, there is really no way to know if links from these blogs are actuall passing PR. Many forums and guest post blogs do not.

I have heard about it and try to find out how to know if a webpage is passing link juice or authority or not, kindly let me know more about this topic or share any link that would help me to learn about this topic.

THIS IS THE MAIN ISSUE THAT MADE ME BELIEVE THAT GOOGLE HAS GIVEN PENALTY TO THAT URL AS GOOGLE IS NOT CRAWLING IT.

Google usually doesn't give up crawling pages that are "penalized" (God, I hate that word). I've seen a site that had a true, hard, year and a half ban that was regularly crawled. A likely possibility here is that the site's PR isn't high enough for Google's crawl budget.

The surest remedy for any perceived problem when it comes to Google is links, true quality links. See if you can beg, borrow or steal a couple and see what happens.

Thanks for sharing your opinion and showing a way to solve this problem, kindly do let me know how to know if a webpage is passing link juice?

I also want other people to share their opinions about detecting and resolving this issue.

[corepartner]

I have just checked WMT and in search queries section I have noticed that Google is showing 83% of increase for that particular keyword.

But, I cant see any changes in SERPs yet, any particular reason?

[tedster]

Your site may have started ranking higher for segments of users who were not seeing the same rankings you were, due to geo-location or other segmentation Google places across their user base.

[indyank]

How are you determining whether that page is ranking or not? Are you doing it manually or are you using any tool? If you are using a tool what is it?

however my root domain is ranking on the page 15

Is you root domain ranking on page 15 for the keyword?
Is the page that you are trying to rank linked from the root domain?
Is this keyword within the overall theme of the site?

[corepartner]

Guys, This problem is getting worst now. Google used to index my latest content within the few minutes after publishing it.

But, its been 24 hours and after publishing 10 pages of fresh content google is not indexing them.

I can see 2 crawling errors in WMT:

1. In Sitemap >> for a particular URL or page like http://example.com/page/ 500 error

2. Unreachable same URL, 500 error.

I have contacted my hosting providers and they told me that apache server was died and they have corrected that now.

I have also checked the "Fetch as googlebot" option for that URL and it is working fine for it now.

But, still google is not indexing my new pages, any reason?

I am also going to show my .htaccess file to some expert now.

Thanks for all your help guys :-)