Q and A: Why doesn't Google show all our backward links?

Dear Kalena...

I came across your site as I was searching for "why doesn't google show my links?". Yahoo and MSN show over 200 links to our www.Rubber-Bracelets.com site, but Google shows 2! What's up with that? We have the keywords in our domain name and I can't find us in the first five pages for "rubber bracelets". What gives? Of course, people aren't searching for rubber bracelets like they once were, but it appears in Google Suggest that there are still a good number of searches. Can you help?

Thanks!
Tony

Kalena's Answer:

Dear Tony

First up, what makes you think that having keywords in your domain automatically makes your site more relevant for searches involving those keywords? What if I purchased a domain like www.safe-kids-toys.com and loaded it up with porn? Do you think Google's algorithm will automatically assume my content is about "safe kids toys" just because my domain suggests it is? Uh uh. It doesn't work like that. I answered a similar question about keyword domains just yesterday.

Secondly, Google never displays the true number of backlinks your site has, only a sampling of the ones they consider to be important. You can get a better indication of who is linking to you from Yahoo Site Explorer.

Lastly, if your site is under 9 months old or has recently undergone a major re-design, it could be suffering from Google's aging delay for new sites. If that's the case, it won't rank in Google for your target keywords until it is released from limbo. It's Google's little screening process to help them weed out the dodgy sites from the authentic ones.

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Q and A: Is my site in the Google Sandbox?

Dear Kalena...

I have owned a site of more than 70 pages for 1 month. Even Google indexed a part of them and I submitted to other directories, but I have no visitors (health.com.md). Where is my mistake? Does this mean that I am in Google sandbox? Thank you all for your time.

Oleg

Kalena's Answer:

Dear Oleg

Google last indexed your site on 18 April so at least some pages of the site are being indexed. If the site is only a month old, then it is highly likely that you are experiencing Google's "sandbox", more accurately known as the Aging Delay, which can effectively make new sites invisible in Google for up to 9 months.

I see that you have a Google verification meta tag in the site, so you have likely uploaded an XML sitemap and verified your site in Google's Webmaster Tools. You should check your site's statistics here regularly to ensure it is being fully indexed and also track the Google search queries the site is being found for.

Once your site is released from the aging delay, you will start to see the number of search queries increase and your traffic will soon follow.

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Q and A: Why does my site rank in MSN and Yahoo but not Google?

Dear Kalena...

My web site www.narenmunna.com appears for some keywords in MSN and Yahoo in the first page itself, but not for the same in Google. What is the reason?

Webmaster Naren

Kalena's Answer:

Dear Naren

Simple. Your site has no link popularity and zero PageRank right now. Is it less than 9 months old? If so, then the site is probably still suffering from the Google Aging Delay. Even if it isn't, then you'd better work on your link popularity pronto.

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Q and A: How will search engine ranking be affected if I change domain names?

Dear Kalena...

As always, I am very much enjoying your insightful newsletters.

I have a question for you: If I change domain names and keep the identical website on the new domain, how will search engine ranking be affected?

Thanks!
Marco


Kalena's Answer:

Dear Marco

If you are moving your site to an entirely new domain, you've got to be careful that your search rankings and link popularity aren't negatively affected. This can occur if you use the standard 301 "permanently moved" redirects on your old pages, or worse, use no redirects at all.

Technically, your new domain is treated as a brand new site, regardless of whether the content you use on it has been published on another domain and therefore, Google will subject it to the aging delay for new sites.

To avoid losing all those hard-earned rankings for the six to nine month Google limbo that is the aging delay, it's recommended that you use 302 "temporarily moved" redirects on your old domain pages until your new domain has aged the required time in Google. You can then safely switch the redirects to 301's. You can read more about this method in Scottie Claiborne's article: Switching to a New Domain Without Losing Your Google Rankings.

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Q and A: Is my site in the Google Sandbox?

Dear Kalena...

Hello, I have read some of your comments with great interest. Like others, my site keyword listing on google have been dropped (am I in the "sandbox"?). This accounted for quite a bit of traffic for me hence my desire to do everything possible to rectify the situation.

I would be grateful for any help you might be able to provide.

Regards,
Nicholas

Kalena's Answer:

Dear Nicholas

The fact that your site was ranking for certain keywords and is no longer suggests that the problem is not sandboxed-related. Nor does it seem to be Google's aging delay. I think your ranking issues are due to a new algorithm introduced by Google in November which particularly affected sites containing adult-content.

Learn more via this site and this FAQ.

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Q and A: Have we been penalised by Google?

Dear Kalena...

Hi, what a useful website you have.

Our site has dropped from the first page of results in google to page 5 and upwards, resulting in thousands of pounds worth of business lost per month. Have we been penalised for something?

Wayne

Kalena's Answer:

Dear Wayne

Thanks for the backslap! I've taken a look at the site and checked it using Google's Site Status Tool. I don't see a penalty of any kind. Why? Because:

1) You've got a healthy Google Toolbar rating of 5 out of 10.

2) Over 4000 pages from your site have been indexed by Googlebot.

3) Googlebot last indexed your page on 1st December.

When you say your site has dropped to page five of search results - is that for a particular search term? Or for all of your major search terms? If it is only for a single search phrase, that is a fairly common occurence as Google changes their algorithm and adds more and more new sites.

Your site is in the highly competitive adult industry, where search rankings change much more often than in other industries. You simply have to optimize the site for a wider range of keywords and phrases (the long tail).

If you are seeing your site drop consistently for ALL your major search terms, then that may indicate the site has been sandboxed. Have you done a major design overall or content change recently? Sometimes this can trigger a site to be placed in the sandbox.

My advice is to keep optimizing, build quality links and start concentrating on your exposure on other search engines so you don't sweat Google's algorithm changes.

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Q and A: Has our site been penalized by Google?

Dear Kalena...

An excellent website! have found many useful articles in the "ask kalena" section.

I was curious as to whether our website www.simondelasalle.com has been penalized for some reason. We have recently changed our navigation from image based to text links to increase the amount of keywords on the page. Is it possible this website has been "sandboxed"?

It looks like Google's indexing of the site is weak compared to MSN. Any feedback you could provide would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for your time and have an excellent day.

Simon

Kalena's Answer:

Dear Simon

Thank you for the coffee! The caffeine is greatly appreciated.

I've had a look at your site and the first thing that strikes me is that there is no Google cache for many of the pages. Your home page has a healthy Toolbar PageRank of 5 out of 10 so there is no penalty. Next, I entered your URL into Google's new Site Status Tool. Bingo! I found two problems:

1) Googlebot last successfully accessed your home page on Jul 29, 2006 (which explains the caching issue).

2) Google does not know about all the pages of your site.

I'm not sure when your major re-design occurred, but if it was around the end of July, then it's highly likely the site has since been sandboxed, as you guessed. Best course of action is to prepare and submit an XML sitemap to Google Sitemaps using a free XML sitemap creator and wait till Googlebot travels your way again. After verifying your site with Google, you can check if Googlebot struck errors during his last crawl.

Good Luck!

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[If you found this post helpful, you might benefit from downloading our free Search Engine Optimization lesson]

Q and A: Why is Google indexing fewer pages on our site?

Dear Kalena...

Thanks for all your great advice. My question is this:

We have had www.livingwithanxiety.com for several years now. We just
recently did a major update and finally, after years, we changed our
meta tags, titles, and so on. We have been submitting an xml sitemap
to google now for about three months. We topped out at about 42 pages
being indexed, but today, we looked and have only 9. What happened? Is
it because of the changes? Traffic literally has halved. Hmm...

Thanks again for all you do!

Sincerely,
Nashell

Kalena's Answer:

Dear Nashell

I've checked and Google has currently indexed 25 pages on your site.

If you were ranking for particular keywords before your site update, the changes you made may have negatively impacted that. If you are certain your new page content, META and Title tags have been optimized well for target keywords, it is more likely that you have been caught up in the Google aging delay or Sandbox effect for re-designed sites.

You should continue to update and submit your XML sitemap whenever you add new content, build more incoming links and wait for Google to let you out of rankings limbo. Be patient!

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[If you found this post helpful, you might benefit from downloading our free Search Engine Optimization lesson]

Q and A: Why has my site disappeared from Google?

Dear Kalena...

I am very new to web site development and use front page to put the page together. When I first published the page my Google listing was on the first or second page, I added keywords to help my chances of stay high on the page and totally disappeared any suggestions?

Thanks

Russ

Kalena's Answer:

Dear Russ

It's not uncommon for new sites to appear in Google for a few days and then disappear without trace. Most new sites experience what's called an aging delay before being allowed into the regular database results. It is thought to be some type of filter applied to new sites to give Google a chance to fully index them and assess their worth.

It's also thought that sites that undergo major changes or optimization are subject to a special aging filter of their own, nicknamed the sandbox. You can read more about the phenomenon here.

Be patient! You should see your site start to appear again within a few months.

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[If you found this post helpful, you might benefit from downloading our free Search Engine Optimization lesson]

Q and A: Why has my new site disappeared from Google?

Dear Kalena...

Maybe you can help me.

I have a new site which has been online for a few weeks. I have posted links in numerous directories and have registered by the top search engines. My site appeared for a few days in google and then was gone even the url. Then the url came back but no description, now the url has gone again (with google). I have although throughout this time a great ranking with MSN. Maybe you could help me find out whats up with google. my site is : http://www.pgalive.com

Thanks
Nick

Kalena's Answer:

Dear Nick

Sounds to me like the standard Google aging delay for new sites. You'll just have to be patient.

Q and A: Are we in the Google Sandbox?

Dear Kalena...

Having spent some time in an effort to get our site a good listing on Google I have now given up and started using Adwords. I am hoping that this is a short term thing and that in the long term I can improve our listings to the extent where I don't have to pay to be in the running with Google.

For some time I have suspected that there is something fundamentally wrong with the construction of the site. In the past we have spent many hundreds of pounds to a company that promised to get us a top 5 listing on Google (yes, I now know this cannot be promised by anyone!).

Today for the first time I learnt (from your site) about the Sandbox. Are we in the Sandbox?? Kalena I am a lost soul and need some help from a higher power! (That's you!)

Could you give me any guidance please? BTW I am aware we need to do some work on the site as the time users spend on the index page is very short, but I am juggling lots of missions!

Thanks Kalena, the site is fab and I learn day by day.

Best regards
Adrian

Kalena's Answer:

Dear Adrian

Regardless of whether your site is in the Sandbox, there is one big glaring problem that I can see on your site immediately. You use a META refresh to redirect all visitors from http://www.macoles.com/ to http://www.macoles.com/html/. What is the point of that?

META refreshes can be viewed as suspicious by search engines, because some spammers use them to pull the old "bait and switch" tactic. That is, advertise a certain type of content in the search engine listings but then redirect visitors to an entirely different site e.g. porn, gambling etc. I've also heard that META refreshes can cause problems for search bots trying to index your site. Some bots coming across refresh code will simply leave the site without indexing it.

According to this site, you should never use a META refresh on a page that you want indexed by search engines. It also states that Googlebot has trouble with pages that use a refresh time-out of "0" like yours does.

However having checked your site, I can see that:

1) Googlebot last cached it on November 16.
2) You have a Google Toolbar PageRank of 4/10 and 5 backward links.
3) Google has indexed 69 pages from your site.

So although Google may not currently have trouble with your META refresh, other engines might so I would trash it as soon as possible.

Regarding whether your site is in the Google Sandbox, I don't think it is. Why? Because a few searches for logical keyword phrases such as "self catering holidays Jersey" pulls up your site within the top 10. Sure your site doesn't rank highly for more competitive terms like "holiday cottages Jersey", but your poor link popularity probably has more to do with that. If your site was sandboxed, I wouldn't expect it to rank well for any of your target phrases.

So Adrian, if you want to boost your search engine rankings, get rid of that horrible META refresh, get to work increasing the links pointing to your site from related high quality sites and keep adding fresh content.

Q and A: Why doesn't my site show a Google PageRank?

Dear Kalena...

I have added my website to Google (www.lyriclabs.com). Now the search result come but the page ranking not come in my google toolbar.

what can I do? Please help me..

Maran

Kalena's Answer:

Dear Maran

Your Google Toolbar PageRank shows at zero in my browser (all white). The toolbar PageRank is only an estimate of your actual Google PageRank. Even so, the fact that the estimate is at zero is cause for concern, unless your site was only recently launched. It's common for new sites to show a non-existent or very low PageRank until their backward links increase.

If your site is not new to the Internet, it is almost certainly a lack of link popularity and/or low relevance causing your poor PageRank. Google is not showing any backward links to your site so you should focus on building up high quality links. Try seeking out niche directories and similarly themed portals about translation or language services and submit your site to them requesting a link back.

Also consider your site from Google's perspective. Have you made it as relevant as possible for your target search queries? Does the site follow Google's Webmaster Guidelines? Have you implemented any tactics that Google frowns upon? Have you included lots of relevant, unique and useful content relating to your products and services? Make your site more usable and relevant for your visitors and your Google PageRank will normally improve.

The fact that I can't find your site using your target keyword phrase suggests it may be Sandboxed. You may just need to be patient and ride it out. Best of luck!

Q and A: How much site editing can be done before it gets sandboxed?

Dear Kalena...

I was wondering if there is any notion out there as to how much can be done to a site before causing Google to throw it in the sandbox.

In other words what kind of changes can I make to the mark up of the site before it goes into Google Search Result Limbo?

Adam

Kalena's Answer:

Dear Adam

There is no definitive answer to this. If you are making extensive changes to your linking structure or obtaining lots of incoming links in a short space of time, indications are that the site may get sandboxed.

But any excessive editing of your code, particularly optimization of pages for specific keywords may trigger filters within Google's latest algorithm.

Adam, you just can't let search engines define the changes you make to your site and when you want to make those changes. Your audience should be the prime motivation for any changes you want to make. If you spent all your time obsessing over whether code tweaks will impact your positions on this or that engine, you'd be a nervous wreck! Try to follow the search engine's own webmaster guidelines, keep your audience happy, update your site on YOUR schedule and relax!

Q and A: Has my site been penalized?

Dear Kalena...

In the past 3 days, my website has gone from the top 3 ranking positions all the way to #35 or below. Have I been penalized? Partially penalized?

Specifically, the website used to rank #3 for the term "hip hop samples" for the past six months. Plus, it ranked in the top 4 for several other terms like "fruity loops samples" and "free hip hop samples" etc.

FYI... most of the other competitor sites' rankings for the same terms "hip hop samples" & "fruity loops samples" have remained unchanged while www.modernbeats.com has plummeted.

Kind Regards,
Liam

Kalena's Answer:

Hi Liam

Your site has a Google Toolbar PageRank of 5, plus 68 backward links and Google has indexed nearly 200 pages of your site, so a manual penalty seems unlikely. Have you made a lot of changes to your site lately? Specifically, have you added visible or anchor text for your target phrases? My guess is your site has been sandboxed for competitive terms . See this post for more info.

In terms of your site's search engine compatibility, I can see some glaring issues there:

1) Your home page contains no visible body text apart from visitor testimonials at the bottom. How do you expect search engines to consider your site to be relevant for search queries for your target keywords if you don't actually use those keywords in your body text?

2) Your Title Tag appears to be a little long and not optimized for peak ranking performance or usability. It should ideally be a logical and grammatically correct sentence of 9 or 10 words, incorporating important keywords. Remember that people will see this title in the Favorites list if they bookmark your site.

3) Your META Description Tag is not formatted correctly and appears to be simply a bunch of keywords strung together. Again, this tag should be a grammatically correct sentence or two, incorporating your important keywords in a logical way. People may well see this description of your site in the search engine results pages so it should be enticing enough for them to click on.

4) You are using a technique with your Alt Img attributes that is almost certainly tripping search engine sp@m filters. What you have on your site is one of the worst cases of keyword-stuffed Alt tags that I've ever seen! Your Alt tags should be used to logically describe the images that exist on your site. They were developed primarily to allow accessibility to visually impaired visitors, not as some secret way to trick search engines.

And on that note, you've earned our:

Retro Spam Tactic of the Week!