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Having monitored this update closely I have seen myself not listed in the top 100, 94th, 8th and now 56th for my main two key word search term.
checking for allinanchor: for the search term lists me 9th on the SERPS.
Keyword density is no more nor less than other pages on the first page.
PR is similar to other sites listed on the 1st couple of pages of the SERPS.
Links are obtained from almost the same sites.
Title Tag contains the search term
H1 Tag with the search term.
Good quality content
No cloaking, hidden text used
As I am quite lost as to where I am losing out I am hoping someone with a clue as to how the algo works would be able to shed some light.
I've never seen Googlebot download a CSS file, so unless the CSS was in the <head> or inline, how would it know the <H1>'s were CSS modified?
In my html code, the modification appears as <H1><size=2> ....so...Google can see that the original H1 font was modified to size=2
Not sure why it appears that way though since I use CSS for this. I never noticed it before and may have caused me a penalty. UGH. ;)
[edited by: crobb305 at 6:19 pm (utc) on June 29, 2003]
[edited by: Marcia at 9:13 pm (utc) on June 29, 2003]
<body>
<table width="100%">
<tr>
<td><img src="image.jpg" height="90" width="90" alt="Blah Blah Blah"></td>
<td><center><h1><font color="#000066" size="+4"><b>Blah Blah Blah Blah</b></font></h1></center></td>
</tr>
</table>
Yeah, this is going to be converted to CSS quite soon.
Problem? Penalty? What problem? None seen here.
The second site, only 3 months old, representing a different region but the exact same design, H1 as the title and company name which are also keywords, was #2 out of 975,000 results pre Esmerelda. Now the index page cannot be found and the weakest page in the site holds a page 3 position.
No explanation at all. Two sites with identical designs (different content all together).
Only difference is site age. BTW site #1 PR4-very stable. Site #2 PR5-Lost.?
Age is the only difference I see with my sites.
My algorithmic analysis: don't be surprised if Google decides inline-modified <Hx> tags shouldn't be given the full weight.
[edited by: Marcia at 9:16 pm (utc) on June 29, 2003]
[edited by: Marcia at 9:18 pm (utc) on June 29, 2003]
i) I have 54 backlinks showing, and none are PR4+ Some are PR0-1.
ii) If I check "sites that contain the term 'domain.com'" there are hundreds more sites, some of which are definitely HTML links, but these are NOT showing as backlinks. What the hell?!
? If Google has found these, why are they not showing as backlinks? Is this totally inconsistent and completely insane or what!?
allinanchor:domain.com I am number 1. Under every datacentre and www I am positioned 470. I think this side of things is to do with PR. I might have more actual links containing relevant text, but my PR remains low.
Still, what about that backlinks thing? That is absolutely crazy stuff. More annoying than I can express. When this update started, I was ranked #2. Now I am nowhere. All my other sites have followed suit. GeexAghgh!£W!@!
i) I have 54 backlinks showing, and none are PR4+ Some are PR0-1.ii) If I check "sites that contain the term 'domain.com'" there are hundreds more sites, some of which are definitely HTML links, but these are NOT showing as backlinks. What the hell?!
Beastie,
Backlinks are still a bit shakey now, IMO, and PR definitely is. Its possible that those backlinks that are showing as PR0-1 are actually 4+ but just haven't quite solidified. In any case, the "sites that contain the term..." search should return many more results since its not filtering any levels of PR and doesn't have to contain a link. I would sure be pissed if I found a PR7 link in there that didn't show up as a backlink, though. ;)
[edited by: Marcia at 9:20 pm (utc) on June 29, 2003]
I also agree about the page rank results being flaky, I have some sites showing PR0 with backawards links with top place for some search terms.
[edited by: Marcia at 9:21 pm (utc) on June 29, 2003]
Cheers Guys :)
[edited by: Marcia at 9:24 pm (utc) on June 29, 2003]
[edit reason] Note: Editing done. [/edit]
I too am worried that my H1 is effecting my index page drop. I also had the css on page in the html, rather than external.
I also removed my H1 tag, just to see if anything would happen. Like changing anything could make the current situation WORSE. G crawled deep last night after I made changes, so we should know by tomorrow if it did any good. I'll let you know what happens.
BUT, I do have to say, that I use the same H1 set up on ALL of my pages, including a sub-directory, and NONE of these pages have had an ill effect in this "Google weirdness". So, it's quite possible that by us removing the H1's, we won't see much change, if any. I sure hope so, but I doubt it since all my other pages use it just fine.
OTOH, maybe this H1 problem only has to do with the index page, which is why mine is gone. Only time will tell I guess.
Always be respectful of other users, the system, and the moderators. We put the system online in good faith, please use it in good faith.
We need to remember that we're all in this together and all here to help each other.
That does make sense, but I don't think that it applies to my situation. At first, I thought it was very possible, but upon checking Google, I found nothing when I searched for my domain - minus the www. So, I don't think I have any internal or external links without it. I do, however, have some backlinks, that have the anchor text as MyCompany.com and maybe even some links to www.MyCompany.com. At the time, I thought the capitalizing was a good idea, so I would stand out..but now think maybe it could hurt me?
I was wondering though, if I'm right, and I don't have any domain.com links, would adding the mod-rewrite hurt anything? I thought maybe I should go ahead with it, just in case. Better to be safe than sorry, especially if it wouldn't hurt to add it, right?
[edited by: Marcia at 11:11 pm (utc) on June 29, 2003]
[edit reason] No specifics necessary. [/edit]
I meant that I modify my H1 with css, but have the css in the HEAD section, instead of externally. Do you think it makes a big difference?
Kirby,
Holy Cow. That is quite a case of overusing. Maybe this is going to be the standard nowadays to achieving page 1. I, for one, would be too scared to even try it, for fear of ban. Gotta give these guys a little credit, they sure have guts.
At a certain point of overuse they just have to stop meaning something, though.
I would be curious to hear if someone gets a penalty for <Hx> abuse, but I don't know how someone would know for sure the real reason for the penalty.
Overoptimization seems to be popping up more these days. If I were Googlebot, I'd be looking at character lengths of <h> tags. I'd also be looking at surrounding text. Wrapping paragraph content in <h> tags might be an issue. Putting <h> tags back to back might also be an issue unless there is a logical structure. You've got to look at everything else surrounding those <h> tags to effectively determine whether or not you are utilizing them as they were intended to be.
Usually when there is <h> tag abuse, there are other areas that are abused. Google is going to have everyone guessing from this point forward. I say just keep doing what you are doing if it has proven successful. If you've seen some bumps this last update, wait until the next one, if there is one, to determine whether or not change is needed. Too many people rushing to change things and since this is not your typical Google behavior, I'd wait and see. What if everything is back to normal in 2 weeks, or tomorrow?
Validate the page, then scroll down past the error messages (if there are any) until you find the Document Outline. If the text list there does not look like a summary of your document then you are abusing the <hx> tag.
There may be penalties applied to on page optimization such as Hx tags, etc. But these are not an outright ban, just a depreciation.
It appears from the examples that I gave that off page is where the action is. Why else would pages with zero copy rate #1, 2 or 3? Title and domain name are a factor in gaining a boost. On page stuff, at best, can cause a loss of position.
It is a new game when image map navigation, framed pages and pure graphic pages with no alt tags can take the top three positions.
Does anyone have evidence that off-page stuff has not taken on new importance? I just did a search that returns 1,150,000 results. Discount widgets. Check the cache and it says "These terms only appear in links pointing to this page: discount" No H tags at all. Terrible code bloat. JS galore. But the domain name is "discount-keyword.com"
Hmmm....
I have already picked up a keyword1-keyword2 domain name :) Now I will work on off page stuff while I wait a month to see what changes the Google gods might make. If these are spam filters, they are far too tight. If nothing changes in a month I will simply remove all spiderable content from my index page, stuff my title with keywords, use the keyword stuffed domain name and let the off page stuff do it's magic :)
WBF
Keyword density for the first page of the SERPs for the two keyword phrase range from 0% to 46%. For my page it is at 31%.
Number of occurences range from 0 to 35. For my page it is 17.
The only significant difference is that the Text to HTML ratio for my site is at almost 34% while it ranges between 6% to 27% for sites on the 1st page of the SERPS.
More text generally equals more content.... so where could the problem lie?
I also see these symptoms with some of my sites. Of course the high traffic keywords are what makes sales for my clients, so the erratic behaviour is causing serious pain. A page that was no1 in a high traffic keyword is bouncing around in the SERP's - who knows where it will pop up next!
Pages (from the same website) that were no1 for less competitive terms/lower-trafficed have held their placement.
Could there be some problem with Google's database in being able to handle results from higher volumes of queries or where there are a higher number of pages returned that fit the search criteria? I'm clutching at straws maybe but there's not much that makes a lot of sense in the results from this update.
Also there seems to be more problems with sites of mine that have been recently placed in Google ie. just prior to the Dominic update (first indexed during march/April). Older sites seem to be a lot more stable.
Maybe the algo change is taking time to import all the variables back?
I vanished pre dominic but if you look at my previous post, everhing said I should be higher.
