Q and A: Are other sites hijacking my Google search results?
Dear Kalena...
I would like to ask your opinion to what has happend to the rankings of [myURL], they have dropped and dropped in Google. I think Google has a filter that totally has knocked [myURL], yes it has affiliates on it , but is has info too.
Other shopping directories seem to be okay in Google's search. Can you please email me personally if you have the time. One theory I have is that other sites are hijacking the search results. I do not know what to do.
I await your reply,
Vic
Kalena's Answer:
Dear Vic
Couple of questions to ask yourself before blaming Google:
1) Have the number of backlinks pointing to my site dropped recently?
2) Did my site have a hosting outage at any point recently?
3) Did I make any recent changes to my site that would cause it to no longer meet Google's Quality Guidelines for inclusion?
Conspiracy theories aside, Google generally has pretty good spam filters in place to prevent unscrupulous firms from "hijacking" search results, as you put it. Their detailed ranking algorithm is based on over 100 factors and includes some clever filters designed to sort out relevant web pages from those who are trying to game the rankings system. You can even send them a spam report if you spot deceptive tactics in their search results.
That said, sometimes the gang at Google accidently throw the baby out with the bathwater, meaning that relevant, quality web pages that even follow Google's own Webmaster Guidelines can sometimes get caught in the spam filters and penalized in the ranking results or suffer from an indexing issue. This usually sorts itself out after a re-index but if this hasn't changed after a few months and you suspect an unfair penalty, try contacting Google directly.
But I think patience is probably all that is needed here. If you've made major changes to your site recently, Google's Patent implications tell us (thanks Jill!) that it may have been placed in the Google Sandbox. If so, time will heal! In the meantime, you could use the new Google Sitemaps to ensure all your site pages get indexed and keep steadily gathering high quality, relevant backlinks.
I would like to ask your opinion to what has happend to the rankings of [myURL], they have dropped and dropped in Google. I think Google has a filter that totally has knocked [myURL], yes it has affiliates on it , but is has info too.
Other shopping directories seem to be okay in Google's search. Can you please email me personally if you have the time. One theory I have is that other sites are hijacking the search results. I do not know what to do.
I await your reply,
Vic
Kalena's Answer:
Dear Vic
Couple of questions to ask yourself before blaming Google:
1) Have the number of backlinks pointing to my site dropped recently?
2) Did my site have a hosting outage at any point recently?
3) Did I make any recent changes to my site that would cause it to no longer meet Google's Quality Guidelines for inclusion?
Conspiracy theories aside, Google generally has pretty good spam filters in place to prevent unscrupulous firms from "hijacking" search results, as you put it. Their detailed ranking algorithm is based on over 100 factors and includes some clever filters designed to sort out relevant web pages from those who are trying to game the rankings system. You can even send them a spam report if you spot deceptive tactics in their search results.
That said, sometimes the gang at Google accidently throw the baby out with the bathwater, meaning that relevant, quality web pages that even follow Google's own Webmaster Guidelines can sometimes get caught in the spam filters and penalized in the ranking results or suffer from an indexing issue. This usually sorts itself out after a re-index but if this hasn't changed after a few months and you suspect an unfair penalty, try contacting Google directly.
But I think patience is probably all that is needed here. If you've made major changes to your site recently, Google's Patent implications tell us (thanks Jill!) that it may have been placed in the Google Sandbox. If so, time will heal! In the meantime, you could use the new Google Sitemaps to ensure all your site pages get indexed and keep steadily gathering high quality, relevant backlinks.
1 Comments:
Kalena,
No major changes have been added to the site. Since the site is a shopping directory, not many sites are interested in trading links. I have applied to register on dmoz.org and they say the site has affialiate sites on it. It does, but I try to add extra info.
By using affialiate sites, most of them on my site are trading properly as far as I know. I cannot add any shop in because I do not if they are safe.
Vic
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