Q and A: Why has our site suddenly dropped out of Google?
Dear Kalena...
Hi there, I have done a lot of work optimizing my wife's web site and succeeded in getting the site to number one on Google, Yahoo and MSN for the search term - "childminder milton keynes" - It took me 3 months to do it and her business has boomed. She is now completely booked up. I do regular checks to ensure the site is still no 1 for the search term and on Yahoo and MSN the site is still at number 1, however, on Google the site isn't even listed in the first 15 pages whereas 2 weeks ago it was indeed listed number 1. I am completely baffled, can you help please.
Thank you very much.
Mark
Kalena's Answer:
Hi Mark
First up, thanks for the caffeine contribution, it really helps! Now, about that site.
I've run the site through Google's Site Status Tool and according to the results, it is still being indexed, with the last visit by Googlebot on 14 January. However: the current Google cache of the site is completely blank and the Google Toolbar PageRank for the site is zero out of 10. Both these things indicate a major problem.
Now, I know the site is over a year old and that you last made changes over a month ago, so my guess is that rather than the aging delay, an algorithm penalty or other such manual suppression, Googlebot encountered problems when indexing the site last, which resulted in zero pages being indexed and stored. Naturally, the site has dropped off the charts because there is zero information stored in Google's datacenter as a result of the indexing and caching issue.
However, I'm not surprised Googlebot had trouble indexing the site. It breaks all the rules for search engine compatibility by using outdated Frames technology. Honestly! Frames are sooooo 1996. Search engines have always had trouble indexing frames-based sites and haven't gotten much better at it over the years. Search engine spiders generally only see the master frame-set (the page pulling all the frames together), not the individual frames. Consequently, there is no content for the search engine to index, apart from the content of the NoFrames element.
Because search engine spiders index sites by following links and because there are usually no links within the frame-set HTML code, search engines are usually unable to index frames-based sites beyond the home page. If you insist on using such dated design technology, you absolutely need to give the search engines a juicy No Frames tag to suck on. Yours currently states:
Ideally, a short keyword-filled description of the site should be included in the NoFrames element, as well as a link to the site map or main links page, which acts like a signpost for search engines so they know where to find and index further site content. Danny Sullivan wrote a terrific tutorial about how to optimize frames-based sites. Make sure you read it. But if you are really serious about optimizing your wife's site for search engines, you'll update the technology to a design that is search engine friendly.
To fix your immediate problem, here's what I suggest:
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Hi there, I have done a lot of work optimizing my wife's web site and succeeded in getting the site to number one on Google, Yahoo and MSN for the search term - "childminder milton keynes" - It took me 3 months to do it and her business has boomed. She is now completely booked up. I do regular checks to ensure the site is still no 1 for the search term and on Yahoo and MSN the site is still at number 1, however, on Google the site isn't even listed in the first 15 pages whereas 2 weeks ago it was indeed listed number 1. I am completely baffled, can you help please.
Thank you very much.
Mark
Kalena's Answer:
Hi Mark
First up, thanks for the caffeine contribution, it really helps! Now, about that site.
I've run the site through Google's Site Status Tool and according to the results, it is still being indexed, with the last visit by Googlebot on 14 January. However: the current Google cache of the site is completely blank and the Google Toolbar PageRank for the site is zero out of 10. Both these things indicate a major problem.
Now, I know the site is over a year old and that you last made changes over a month ago, so my guess is that rather than the aging delay, an algorithm penalty or other such manual suppression, Googlebot encountered problems when indexing the site last, which resulted in zero pages being indexed and stored. Naturally, the site has dropped off the charts because there is zero information stored in Google's datacenter as a result of the indexing and caching issue.
However, I'm not surprised Googlebot had trouble indexing the site. It breaks all the rules for search engine compatibility by using outdated Frames technology. Honestly! Frames are sooooo 1996. Search engines have always had trouble indexing frames-based sites and haven't gotten much better at it over the years. Search engine spiders generally only see the master frame-set (the page pulling all the frames together), not the individual frames. Consequently, there is no content for the search engine to index, apart from the content of the NoFrames element.
Because search engine spiders index sites by following links and because there are usually no links within the frame-set HTML code, search engines are usually unable to index frames-based sites beyond the home page. If you insist on using such dated design technology, you absolutely need to give the search engines a juicy No Frames tag to suck on. Yours currently states:
"Sorry, the Little Steppers website is only veiwable (sic) through a frame compatible browser. Please upgrade to a frame compatible browser."What does that tell a search engine about your business? Zero, zilch, zip. The only reason your site was ranking on Google for "childminder milton keynes", was because you used that phrase within your Title Tag.
Ideally, a short keyword-filled description of the site should be included in the NoFrames element, as well as a link to the site map or main links page, which acts like a signpost for search engines so they know where to find and index further site content. Danny Sullivan wrote a terrific tutorial about how to optimize frames-based sites. Make sure you read it. But if you are really serious about optimizing your wife's site for search engines, you'll update the technology to a design that is search engine friendly.
To fix your immediate problem, here's what I suggest:
- Verify your site with Google's Webmaster Tools, check for site errors and study Googlebot's indexing patterns.
- Create and upload an XML sitemap to Google Sitemaps and study the results via Webmaster Tools. See the free sitemap creator that I recommend.
- Use Danny's tutorial to reestablish the Frames Context for each page on your site so search engines can jump from one page to the next when indexing.
- Give Frames the flick!
Add to: Digg | Del.icio.us | Ma.gnolia | RawSugar | Reddit
Subscribe via: Yahoo Feeds | Feedburner | Technorati | Bloglines
Labels: frames, google indexing, google page rank, google site status tool, google sitemaps
3 Comments:
I didn't write the question, but would like to thank you for the tools and info, this will help me as I start to try to up my PR.
Hello,
I had an excellent website www.fraserandbeyler.com. I have worked on the website a lot for more than 6 month to get it to first positions in google. After all my effort it happened and the site appeared in first page in google for a great number of keywords. Unfortunatelly, after a few days the site dropped and now it hardly shows anywhere. Can you please tell me why this happened?
Thank you very much
Jana
Thanks Jany, but if you want me to answer your FAQ, you'll need to send it via the big green "Ask Kalena" button
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