Google Sandbox 2.0? Help!

[MartiKatFish]

I launched an ecommerce site at the end of last month and it was indexed pretty quickly. Been linked to a few times by decent sources and social activity looking good.

However, it doesn't rank for anything... even it's own brand name. It's not a keyword domain, it's just a 2 normal word but preety unique branding. It's absolutely nowhere.

It is indexed so no blocking issues or anything.

I saw recently on SEO Roundtable that Google may have started Sandbox 2.0 and also read somewhere that this lasts 30 days. It's now been over 30 days and we have a big promotion coming up in the next day or 2 and also an expensive print ad with a magazine that goes on sale next week. People searching for our brand can't find us.

We've had a lot of comments about this and it's going to kill us before we've started.

Anyone experienced this sandbox issue and anyone know how I can get it out of there?

[MartiKatFish]

Robert... I haven't built any links on voucher or comp sites so I can't really help if people share what we're doing. And I'm not doing "multiple" sites. Just 2. Completely separate projects and setup as UK limited companies so not just crap hobby sites. Content decent and all unique. And not affiliate or advertising... Ecommerce. We haven't done linkbuilding. The one we got from source I mentioned was a magazine that took article and then they linked to us.

Kelowna... Its hard to know what to listen to when no one can really know but in your opinion is it best to get some decent links into a new site?

[JAB Creations]

Two questions for those not ranking like they expect...

1. Have you lost your domain or setup domain redirects at all for any reason in the past?

2. Do you use all the words in the domain name across the site? e.g. greatexample.com and not directly next to each other though still natural?

I maintain a site for someone and their site is on page two for a fairly low priority set of words that completely unrelated video game, forum and highly miscellaneous results show up first. The major difference is that this person hasn't really committed to adding content any where near the levels people here have though their site as a whole should rank higher than miscellaneous forum threads.

- John

[Sgt_Kickaxe]

In society one's social and financial stature(as measured by others) dictates what you can and cannot do, where you can and cannot go and what you can and cannot afford.

I have a sneaking suspicion that Google has a version of this social dynamic playing out in rankings and that the credibility of the site builder/owner plays a role in how long, or even if, a site gains traction. New sites have no other signals to go by. My advice is to avoid the dark side and don't give in to temptation when presented with "rank quick and easy" information. Like your credit score it's hard to build a good rep, and easy to destroy one too.

[MartiKatFish]

Robert... The site is a decent authority and a respected magazine in the niche. Yeas, they wanted the content so we gave that to them and they credited us.

The voucher/comp sites are links other people have posted so not much I can do about that. If people want to share a promotion or competition then that's just natural linking you have to deal with. I think most are nofollow anyway.

Not spreading self too thin. I maybe didn't explain that bit well... I don't have multiple sites, I have 2. Completely different niches, completely unrelated. Not hobby sites, bith set up as UK ltd companies.

And not affiliate, ecommerce.

All the content is unique and fairly thorough. We need to work on the blog side of things more though.

Kelowna... in your opinion is it a good idea to make sure you get some good links flowing into a new site (not too many of course).

[EditorialGuy]

We haven't done linkbuilding. The one we got from source I mentioned was a magazine that took article and then they linked to us.

That's a paid link, from Google's perspective. You supplied the article, and the magazine gave you a link in lieu of a cash payment.

Mind you, that isn't necessarily related to a "Sandbox," but it could be why the link hasn't done you any good.

[MartiKatFish]

Eh, who said anything about cash?

[Planet13]

I know you probably checked, but didn't see you mention it, so I'll ask here;

Are you sure that the domain name doesn't have any "history" that might be acting against it?

You said that you don't rank for the domain name, but what happens when you do a search for "a particular unique string of text that appears on your site and use quotation marks"? Do you rank for those unique strings of text?

[EditorialGuy]

Eh, who said anything about cash?

I said "in lieu of cash payment." You gave the magazine reprint rights to your article, and the magazine gave you a link. That's a barter arrangement (an "exchange of goods or services," to borrow a phrase from Google's page on link schemes).

[MartiKatFish]

Sometimes Planet13 but it's a bit inconsistent. Sometimes hard to find things. No history.

EditorialGuy... That's one of those topics that could have a very long thread of its own. They wanted an article written by my business partner who's a known name in the field. They decided to credit us with a link as he was the author. Not really anything wrong with that and I think even Google would agree.

[Planet13]

Not really anything wrong with that and I think even Google would agree.

The issue is that google looks at the link DIFFERENTLY then you do.

They aren't about to analyze individual links from the owner's point of view.

Instead, they say, "Does the linking out site have a spammy looking link profile? Does the target site have a spammy looking link profile?"

Really, I guess the thing to do is look at the inbound link profile of that magazine and look at the outbound link profile of it as well and see if it raises any red flags.

If it is a high quality magazine, then they probably haven't done a lot of in-kind linking. but maybe they have?

[MartiKatFish]

No pretty sure they're fine. And that link only went up just before I started this thread. Wasn't ranking for brand before, not ranking now :(

[Planet13]

Hmm...

Well, I remember one site I looked at and they had a new product called proprietary-name widget that they were trying to rank for.

Turns out they had links to the product page for proprietary-name widget from EVERY page on their site - usually two or three links from EVERY page; one in the header, one in the nav bar, one in the footer, a couple in the content area.

they couldn't rank for proprietary-name widget at all. If memory serves, they couldn't rank for "proprietary-name" or even "widget" after that (but they COULD rank for "something-else widget").

Obviously, I haven't seen your site, but is it possible that your INTERNAL linking is making it look like you are trying to hard to rank?

(sorry that the only example I have is an OBVIOUS spammy example and that you are probably much more more sophisticated than that.)

[MartiKatFish]

No, I have a lot of experience with onsite and technical SEO and have helped people avoid those kind of issues. The onsite is fine.

Although the brand is unique, the first word could be used with many other terms... I think it may be just a case of Google getting confused and maybe needing to see (via links perhaps) that this brand (as 2 words) is in fact the brand related to this site.

I know people talk about Sandbox 2.0 and some people say it doesn't exist but something has definitely changed as I'm sure this would normally rank fairly quickly for at least the 2 word brand. Even with quotes it's not showing. Frustrating!

[Robert Charlton]

MartiKatFish, since you're reporting problems, I'm trying to look at this from that perspective... and examine the worst case possibilities. I don't mean to be grilling you.

Generally, your answers are reassuring, except for that magazine article. I see it the same way EditorialGuy does. I have no idea whether on the basis of one magazine article for a link, which is in fact what you essentially did, Google would downrank you... but it is now a link that they may choose not to trust, and content that they may choose not to rank. It's not helping your quality score.

I've always thought that swapping one's content for a link is a giant mistake. Many years ago, at an SES conference in San Jose, Matt Cutts suggested that Google was not only discounting links for excessive repetition in anchor text, but also for duplicated descriptions. What could be a bigger duplicate description than an entire article with a link to you?

Now, with Google looking much harder at quid pro quo aspects of a link, you've got all the downsides of dupe content plus perhaps the negative aspect of the exchange for the link. I've seen blog articles that were good enough that I bookmarked them and took notes, only to discover later that they were ranking below dupes of themselves because they'd dropped a link to a client in the article. Google is playing hardball here, to do what it feels is necessary to protect the integrity of its system.

Again, this is looking at it from a worst case perspective. It may simply be insufficient time. If not that, though, I'd focus on building traffic for a while, and nofollow all links that you originate.

But I caution you against taking what seems to be the expedient route in building links, particularly if you're feeling you already have problems. Google looks for patterns in link building, and it has the world's best statistical analysis. If the New York Times gives you a link, you of course wouldn't nofollow it... but then the New York Times is probably not going to come asking for your content.

[MartiKatFish]

Few issues withe the above...

"I have no idea whether on the basis of one magazine article for a link, which is in fact what you essentially did, Google would downrank you"
... like I mentioned, we haven't been down ranked. They linked to us just before I posted this thread. We never got off the mark.

"I've always thought that swapping one's content for a link is a giant mistake"
... I don't see it like that. This is a respected magazine that my business partner would like to continue writing for if they are interested. It was a good piece and they liked it. If they then choose to credit us as the source/writers then that's up to them. And I doubt Google are going to "downrank" because of one decent link"... if that was the case, negative SEOs would have a field day.

"but also for duplicated descriptions. What could be a bigger duplicate description than an entire article with a link to you"
... How is it duplicate? There's only 1 on the entire web.

"Now, with Google looking much harder at quid pro quo aspects of a link, you've got all the downsides of dupe content plus perhaps the negative aspect of the exchange for the link. I've seen blog articles that were good enough that I bookmarked them and took notes, only to discover later that they were ranking below dupes of themselves because they'd dropped a link to a client in the article"
... Like I said, not dupe and not link exchange; if someone wants to credit you that's up to them.

"It may simply be insufficient time. If not that, though, I'd focus on building traffic for a while"
... I think that's all we can do. It's just frustrating when people see an ad in a magazine or hear about you, then Google you and you're nowhere! Relying on PPC now for the moment but not ideal.

I can't help but wonder though, if we were to do something newsworthy and suddenly have a lot of chatter/mentions online, would Google then recognise our brand. Probably.

[turbocharged]

Generally, your answers are reassuring, except for that magazine article.

From what I read, the OP has one link from a magazine article mixed in with some social mentions. This follows in step with trying to build traffic from an audience that may have some general interest in the OP's website. Now if one link is going to penalize a new website, garnered in an effort to get seen, we have much bigger issues to worry about.

IMO the link the OP obtained is not the reason for his issues. It's a sole link without any supporting links to establish a pattern. Focusing on that sole link as being the problem is a dead end. Google has some serious problems right now, many of which exclude new and well established small businesses from the search results, and deleting or nofollowing that one link is not going to make up for Google's shortcomings.

[Planet13]

Question:

does that magazine article rank well when you search for your domain name?

Also, how well do the social pages that mention your site rank?

And finally, how similar is the content on your site to the content on social media that ranks for your domain name?

I am just trying to get an idea whether publicity can actually HURT your rankings if the pages upon which you publcize YOUR site have so much better authority.

~~~~

I bring this up because I was looking for a particular study conducted by a medical center at a university, and the top ranking pages were mainstream media companies that mentioned / linked to a niche media company that mentioned / linked to the original study. So the original study was nowhere in the SERPs, while a bunch of online magazines that were separated by two or three degrees from the original study were raking fine for the topic.

[MartiKatFish]

I agree turbocharged

Planet13... When I say social I mainly mean twitter and Facebook. Site content is unique.

[Planet13]

Right.

So when you search on your brand name, are facebook and twitter pages ranking well?

[MartiKatFish]

Nope. Nothing is. People use the 2 words but separately and that's the sort of stuff ranking. Even if I google 'brand name keyword keyword' related to what I do... still not showing up.

I really think I need some links into the site before Google will recognise this as a brand. Remember when Google testing turning off linking signals recently and the results were terrible... I think that's what lacking here.

You think I'd at least show up for 'brand name keyword keyword'

[netmeg]

All these responses, and it doesn't occur to anyone that maybe user engagement might be a factor in ranking a new site in 2014?

As sugarrae says, Google doesn't want to make sites popular, they want to rank popular sites

So maybe your site isn't popular enough yet.

[MartiKatFish]

Fair point Nutmeg but you'd think Google would at least rank our brand so people can at least find us.

[netmeg]

(NETmeg)

If they don't know you yet, why would they?

Look at what other companies do when they're going to launch a product or a website - they start building awareness before it even launches - using non-search methods, like social media, mailing lists, direct mail, advertising (online and offline) and so on. So that when they do launch, they have someone to launch *to* - the interest and awareness are already there, even if they're small.

Nowadays, very rarely do you get to jump to the head of the line - there's just no benefit of the doubt anymore. The amount of spam ruined it for everyone.

If I were in your situation, I would be busting my ass to find non-Google ways to promote my site, and making sure that the users love the heck out of it. And hopefully, managing my expectations.

[MartiKatFish]

That's been my point. And how do Google become aware of you... Links etc.

But my really problem is not wanting to jump to the from of the queue... There is no queue. No one else is trying to task for our brand.

[netmeg]

Doesn't matter. They don't just trust new sites anymore like they used to.

If your site is engaging your users, Google will know - if you run Google Analytics, they'll know from that, and if your users use Chrome or Android browsers, they will know from that.

[Planet13]

If I remember correctly, google also buys a lot of usage data from internet providers, so they might glean something from that, too.

[RedBar]

I can't help but think that you've got something basic wrong.

I launched a brand new site on a brand new domain on Monday of this week. Google's already visited and indexed the home and contact pages and all the images on those two pages. When I search for the unique company name it appears immediately at #1.

It has three links to it from three of my associated sites. It'll be interesting to see how long all the pages and images take to index and rank ... remind me:-)

[MartiKatFish]

Nothing basic wrong. Pages indexed. Maybe just lacking links. Enough for Google to 'know' the brand.

[Planet13]

Regarding a new "sandbox" effect, google's John Mueller does allude to something along those lines in response to Barry Scwartz (aka RustyBrick on the webmaster wordl forums):

[youtube.com...]

It sounds like there might have been tweaks to the algorithim that further scrutinize websites in their early stages.

It was for me (and probably most people) difficult to decipher if this only affects sites that see "rapid rankings" for certain keywords, or newer sites in general.

However, the fact that he wasn't sure on when they might have rolled out makes is sound like it was NOT part of a single significant / major update (like Panda, Penguin, Hummingbird, Pigeon, etc.,)

[MartiKatFish]

Yeah I heard that too Planet13. Shame they don't give an idea of how long it lasts. Does seem to be different for different sites too.