Age: More than just a number?

[Blackicicle]

Does anyone know or thinks that the age of a site is a major factor when it comes to ranking?

Well I think so, but please correct me if I wrong. The reason for this is that I did a search for a very competitive keyword "Professional web design" and went to archive.org to see what the ages are for the top 15 sites in the serp's, and it seems that all those pages are from 1996-2000(2001).

Does google add more weight to older sites? Of course this is keeping in mind that older sites would theorethically have more links to it, but do you think that a sites age itself is a factor?

[cbp]

As far as I know age is not a factor. HOWEVER, older sites are more likely to have more links to them and rank better becauseof that.

CBP

[keywordguru]

as much as I would have to agree, I personally think that age actually does have a few factors in the algorithm. I too have found similar situations where some of the most competitive markets are sometimes dominated by older domains.
To make it more confusing I have seens sites with far less backlinks and still rank well.

So the question is basically dead ended. Google is the only one to say if it is so:)
KG

[scisoft]

The age, or rather the implicated stability as well as the theming focused over the time, should be a factor.

[jawn_tech]

This would be a good study, because after thinking about it, I could see why they might consider adding that factor into an algorithm. Sites come and go, but ones that stay around longer may seem more relevant. As everyone said above, older sites naturally have more backlinks. One would need to compare a slew of older sites with new ones, and the first set would need the same number of backlinks as their counterparts for a fair study.

On the other hand, I know googlebot comes around more often to sites that update more frequently, even adding newer pages. So even if the theory is true, the old timer needs to still have a pulse.

[urknighterrent]

I'm fairly certain that age does play a factor, at least with Google. I don't as a rule, optimize my sites at all. I don't do link strategy. I don't even submit them. SEO is a special request thing I charge extra for, and I don't pretend to be an expert. If you're looking for hardcore optimization you need an expert. I tell my clients to dig down deep and cough up at least 6G a year to do the job right.

Still, some of my older sites are starting to appear for no discernable reason at all. If people are linking to them I don't know about it, and they don't come up on a link check.

[sudhani]

Its not the "age of a site" but the "age of a link" that might be playing a bigger role. And this could only be for a short period. This is what we've been discussing as "Google SandBox Effect"

If Google starts giving us the results from older websites, how can its results be up-to-date?

[BGump]

I would think that age would play a minor part in a sites ranking but that the algo would not rely to heavily on it.

If you think about it there are thousands - no, Millions of sites out there that are simply spammy and created for the sole purpose of promoting a main site.

If a site is old, say 8 years, chances are its legit, and not simply a doorway.

Also, for sites that have been around since the early days, its likely a safe bet that they do hold some level of authority on the topic.

- Really when it comes down to it, I doubt there is much weight on this at all, but I would not be surprised if there was at least some.

[Blackicicle]

I have seens sites with far less backlinks and still rank well

I have actually seen the same thing in the past also.

Thanks all for your views on this matter, you all brough out some fine points to consider.

[rlrouse]

I have seens sites with far less backlinks and still rank well.

It all depends on anchor text and the quality of those links, not just the quantity. Yahoo.com has hundreds of thousands of backlinks yet my sites outrank them for literally thousands of search terms.

A page with 1000 backlinks all with a cryptic URL as the anchor text will rank lower than a page with 10 high quality backlinks with the search term in the anchor text.

[jawn_tech]

This is true, that the age can benefit the quality of links. As the site that links to you gets older, it may aquire more backlinks as well. So the PR 4 site that began linking to you years ago could now be a PR 8.

[Terry Van Horne]

Originally Posted by rlrouse

It all depends on anchor text and the quality of those links, not just the quantity. Yahoo.com has hundreds of thousands of backlinks yet my sites outrank them for literally thousands of search terms.

A page with 1000 backlinks all with a cryptic URL as the anchor text will rank lower than a page with 10 high quality backlinks with the search term in the anchor text.

I have worked on some sites for up to ten years. IMO, the link thing has near zero value in the age/sandbox algo which IMO, is part of a bigger "trust algo" that uses domain age, content themes over time and links& link Text. The link theories are IMO, just SEO's not seeing the forest for the trees. I do no linking and if a client insists... I fire 'em! Yet... I can show you every site I monitor that has been around for over 8 years and have only a few links... are consistently in the top 5 for their competitive terms. Why? IMO, the reasons are:
1. age of internal and external links
2. age/stability of internal link text (how often has it changed)
3. Superior content/products selection

One of the theories I've had is fresh content is neccessary and failure to do so leads to positions degrading. Lately I have come to question that because I see these sites that have done nothing for years rising. I recently updated one site and am curious about how the link text change will affect the positions it's holding presently and how well the old links do with new text or old text at a new page with no parameters. This research will tell me where to go from here.

IMO, the trust is such that the site will rise for the new term (which is currently in the 13th position) and I will not be surprised if the new page outranks the old page because on page factors like KW in title and description.

[kgun]

In my opinion age is an important ranking factor.

Number 4 according to the concenus view of the experts.

[Dubbya]

Attaboy kgun!

Straight to the point and still on-topic! Fantastic!!

Age of the site and domain are definitely factored into the algorithms. More important, are the inbound links to content and the speed at which new content and links are being generated.

Inbound links to older sites help establish them as "Authority Sites" in their niche. If an older site can maintain older links while still acquiring search traffic and if the site continues to post new, relevant content that generates new links, they're pretty tough to beat.

[Terry Van Horne]

Originally Posted by kgun

In my opinion age is an important ranking factor.

Number 4 according to the concenus view of the experts.

I'm surprised to see it that high considering the source.

Yeah, why do links seem to carry so much more weight... hmmm... 7 out of top 10? if you have watched these guys and I know some of the experts personally... then you know many are a little biased on the link side and don't give much credit to how HTML elements/site IA, and languistic semantics are possibly used in ranking and links. The consensus "opinion" was heavily skewed to SEO by link development and controlling incoming link text. IMO, Age as a factor is hidden by the trees in the forest ie:most Seo's pre-occupation with links.

Age could easily influence all or most of the top 10 factors listed there. IMO, llike many things experts tout.... take it with a grain of salt and do what fits your skill set. Personally, the link stuff is given waaaaaaaaaaay more credit then it's due!

[Terry Van Horne]

Originally Posted by Dubbya

if the site continues to post new, relevant content that generates new links, they're pretty tough to beat.

I used to agree with that but, IMO, the new content has to "mature" and accumulate links so it takes longer for that content to really contribute in a big way. It will/can get found in the long tail but seldom does it stay in the top positions for really competitive terms. That will come with age or it becomes an indented result.

[kgun]

I thought everybody at WPW knew my opinion on stable semantic IBL's with foccused anchor text.

There may be written much nonsense on old as well as on new sites and some are able to manipulate the SE's.

[Portucuenta]

I strongly believe it does affect, I have been trying to beat a site since two years ago, they don't have any seo work at all, even my visible page rank is much better, I have more indexed pages, yet I can't be first because of them, I am second

[Terry Van Horne]

IMO, if you were to look at a site I SEO'd it wouldn't look like there was SEO being done because I don't chase links because IBLs are not really a part of my strategy, getting targeted buyers is my strategy, I think 301's are overused, uninspired webmasters use robots.txt to protect anything from spiders and Robot meta tags are useless for anything except manipulating PR because the SEs haven't supported them uniformly and documentation has been at best a feeble effort.

The SEO Big 3:
Title
KW rich copy and IA
Link worthy content (Do not call this linkbait!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

If you have to beg people to link to it, the content probably isn't link worthy content! A few contacts with the right people gets the ball rolling nicely. Seek to influence those the audience are listening to and you don't do that by opening the relationship with an invite to a link scheme.

[kgun]

My first three:

1. Domain name.
2. (Old) Stable semantic IBL's with a relevant anchor text.
3. Title tag.

[Terry Van Horne]

Kgun, I'd be interested in your reasons for domain over title for #1. Domain IMO, is no stronger than using the Keywords anywhere in the Information architecture ie folders and filenames. I've never seen anything that convinced me that keyword rich domains were better thatn keyword rich IA. That is to believe they weight the domain name heavier. That could like that because of age keeping in mind that the most of the KW rich domains were gobbled up years ago because registrars claimed these were weighted heavier. That could make that another deceptive affect of aging of a site.

[kgun]

My above ranking is based on intuition and not facts.

Question:
What is easiest to spam do-main-na-me or title ... tag?

[Terry Van Horne]

Originally Posted by kgun

My above ranking is based on intuition and not facts.

Qestion:
What is easiest to spam do-main-na-me or title ... tag?

Pretty hard to spam titles without making it obvious. People who choose domains based on SEO are buying a bill of goods/myth as old as SEO! The myth was propagated by registrars and domain name resellers way back in the day. hmmm... I wonder if they are biased? I have been buying up domain names because people are paying stupid amounts of cash for them especially those I've owned for a long time. Simply stupid but... I think you should be considering many things when choosing a domain and SEO benefits are such that they should be farrrrrrrrr down the list of considerations. Just one being the domain name is often "The Brand".

The domain name myth was written off by many in the industry as KW rich IA is likely as effective as a domain name ages ago. I have yet to see any indications of more weighting for the domain name over the folder or file name and in an image search file name is likely more important than domain.

IMO, it is awful hard to determine which if one is weighted more because they both are affected by overlapping age, anchor text (internal/external) and positioning of the KW in many HTML elements. I've been an avid researcher of the - and KW rich domain name/IA for most of my carreer. I'm definitely not someone who puts a lot of stock in the domain name myth. It's a plus but... not a "criteria" I'd include in a list of things to consider when choosing a good domain name.

[kgun]

Can you comment on post 12 and 13 of this

Aaron Wall gets special treatment from Google?

thread before we continue?

[Terry Van Horne]

#13
I believe CocaCola was actually called Coca-Cola when I was a kid! So that makes a lot of sense. Also if you know americans or use an american spell checker you are aware americans use - way more than someone from the "proper" old english style you were likely taught and I murder on a daily basis.
#12
I agree with the customers first stuff. Stockholders should know the risk and any Internet company I've watched that tried to run their business for stockholders don't have to worry because they have none now or are also-rans that are just pieces of vacant RE collecting queries.

I think that theread is hilarious, Dan is usually so serious when he writes that most didn't get the sarcasm.

[kgun]

This is about eProperty and online branding. In my personal opinion

<TITLE>Coca-Cola.com</TITLE>

should not beat

www dot coca-cola dot com

as a ranking factor.

The last is uniquely related to the eProperty:

Why do we call them websites anyway?

I learned English at school, so I personally, prefer www dot cocacola dot com to www dot coca-cola dot com

Note:
Bots and crawlers are not "human beings" yet.

[Terry Van Horne]

I understand where you are coming from now. I don't know why or for sure if <Title> is weighted heaviest. It's function set out by the HTML spec may be one of the reasons Title is considered widely to be weighted the heaviest. I can say that has been my belief from the first day to now. I have seen nothing to change my mind on that. IMO, it is near impossible to know for sure because the algo has gotten so complicated and there are overlapping algos being applied to links and IA/domain names. IMO, the best SEOs are not prioritizing these elements choosing to fully optimize all of them and moving on.

[kgun]

Originally Posted by Terry Van Horne

IMO, it is near impossible to know for sure because the algo has gotten so complicated and there are overlapping algos being applied to links and IA/domain names.

Agree. That was the reason I wrote:

Originally Posted by kgun

My above ranking is based on intuition and not facts.

Again, what is easiest to spam, the domain name or the title tag? If the BOT regards the domain name as spam, what would be the consequence for the rest of the site? How would you program your "own SE SERP's" in that case?

[TryUsOut]

Age of a domain, hosting are just factors that would suggest a site is well maintained - provided that there has been no change in the ownership of the domain and hosting provider. This is my personal opinion though, but I strongly think that this is one factor that is being determined by the SE algo in the ranking process.

[kgun]

I don't judge you from where you come, but for what you bring to the table

It takes time to read what has already been said.

[TryUsOut]

A little off-topic:

May I ask why I got a -3 RepRank on this thread? With this comment: "Stop posting obvious things."

[Webnauts]

Age of site is obviously an important ranking factor. Especially for sites that are younger than a year. That is a good one for fighting against temporally web sites or black hat techniques. But also the domain expiry age seems to be a factor too. I advise my customers "where possible", to have their domains not expire earlier than 3 years.

My site domain expires: 2017-10-05. At that date my domain will be 14 years old.

[Webnauts]

Originally Posted by TryUsOut

A little off-topic:

May I ask why I got a -3 RepRank on this thread? With this comment: "Stop posting obvious things."

Answer to little off-topic:

Looks like you skip/ignore the posts of others in threads, and you repeat again and again stuff that have been already said. And that is annoying. At least I think that is what was met.

[Terry Van Horne]

Originally Posted by kgun

Again, what is easiest to spam, the domain name or the title tag?

kgun, I see where you are coming from. Obviously the title is easiest to spam. I guess for me I think SE's look at the two and weight it not by how easy/safe it is to spam, but, how relavent it is to the page. The funcetion of Title in the HTML spec is to give an overview of the page hence it is, based on the "function" of the tag the "most likely indicator of relevancy to a query.

Originally Posted by kgun

If the BOT regards the domain name as spam, what would be the consequence for the rest of the site?

Lose of trust across the whole site. IMO, the worst penalty of all. IMO, you don't recover from that. Checkout Webmaster T's World of design. .Edu Links, likely the second oldest SEO site on the web and pretty much invisible in Google because I refused to take down the original content from an older url. Every SE but Google has figured that out. Google is waiting for me to beg for re-inclusion. For what? The old site was in offline books so how disrespectful is it to break their work?

Originally Posted by kgun

How would you program your "own SE SERP's" in that case?

Title, copy, IA, internal contextual links (I would not trust links on every page), OBL quality (not relevance quality) and IBL text (number of link would have no value, it would be more about a KEI analysis).

[kgun]

Originally Posted by Terry Van Horne

I guess for me I think SE's look at the two and weight it not by how easy/safe it is to spam, but, how relavent it is to the page. The funcetion of Title in the HTML spec is to give an overview of the page hence it is, based on the "function" of the tag the "most likely indicator of relevancy to a query.

Ideally yes. Note it is a BOT

Millions of new pages and thousands of new sites are put on the web each day. Only Bots (software) operating close to the speed of light can handle that information flow (bitstream if you prefer - the Bitstream algebra is a C* algebra, not for the faint hearted).

But there is a difference. How easy is it for a human being to see the difference between a cloud, a plane, a bird, a sheet of paper, a leaf, an insect etc. floating / hovering in the air above you? How easy is it to identyfy that difference by a computer program? Read the story on my blog that should be easy to find (first link in my signature) about trustrank.

If you was early on buying The ABB Group - Automation and Power Technologies (the domain name of course) you may have been rich today. What does the domain name tell you and what does the title tell you? What is the brand. What is the worth of that brand and a brand like Coca Cola mentioned above?

To simplyfy (one factor at a time), let us make the title identical to the URL and let abb be the search term. Do you take the point? There may be exeptions where the brand is already taken (in an URL) and you have to use the title tag. I am not talking about exeptions, but about web branding. Ceteris paribus (a very much used term in economics) I would prefer the brand in the URL. No, don't start a discussion about buying domain names. I personally still think that can be valuable, but the first GoldRush is over. With more flexible URL naming, the potential is also decreasing, but as long as somebody regards .com extensions as the most important there can be value.

Originally Posted by Terry Van Horne

Lose of trust across the whole site. IMO, the worst penalty of all. IMO, you don't recover from that. Checkout Webmaster T's World of design. .Edu Links, likely the second oldest SEO site on the web and pretty much invisible in Google because I refused to take down the original content from an older url. Every SE but Google has figured that out. Google is waiting for me to beg for re-inclusion. For what?

Agree that begging for re-inclusion should be unnecessary in a digital world. GoogleBOT should be able to figure that out "himself". Is that the sole reason? If they blocked the right person, that may be a bad solution. Content is always the king in my world and the surfer the boss. That is why I have no problems linking to a competitor site. Who is my online competitor? The worst are the spammers that change content in links that I thought was stable. That is a reason that I do not use a single redirect on my own sites, and hopefully I never need to.


P.S.

1. How many Professors and Dr's writing content online do you think have read the SE's guidelines and have time to keep up with them. (My own opinion. Very few).
2. How many copy writers do you think have read the SE's guidelines and have time to keep up with them. (My own opinion. Many. It is part of their business model).
3. How many cite their sources (difficult to manipulate), the idea between inverting the webs linkmatrix (easier to manipulate by using 1/4 of your time in the submitting business)?

[Terry Van Horne]

Originally Posted by kgun

Agree that begging for re-inclusion should be unnecessary in a digital world. GoogleBOT should be able to figure that out "himself". Is that the sole reason

The old site was on a virtual server and I had no control of anything to 301 to the new. So for a while T's world did very well because it had the original content and updates on the algos. Where I mistepped was I linked to TsWorld from the old sites home page. It said right on the page it was an archive etc. A year or so ago the host folded. Google nailed TsWorld hard around the time of the florida update. It has no business value but with the age thing going on I know it would do well. There are lots of 10 yr old links from authorities.

Originally Posted by kgun

P.S.

1. How many Professors and Dr's writing content online do you think have read the SE's guidelines and have time to keep up with them. (My own opinion. Very few).
2. How many copy writers do you think have read the SE's guidelines and have time to keep up with them. (My own opinion. Many. It is part of their business model).
3. How many cite their sources (difficult to manipulate), the idea between inverting the webs linkmatrix (easier to manipulate by using 1/4 of your time in the submitting business)

1. 3 is why the link text works if they are citations or endorsements and the opposite of that is why Google is pushing "nofowllow". I'd prefer they would do something about the subdomains ruling a SERP. That is IMO, rewarding what was regarded as a risky SEO tactic.

[kgun]

Originally Posted by Terry Van Horne

I'd prefer they would do something about the subdomains ruling a SERP. That is IMO, rewarding what was regarded as a risky SEO tactic.

1. Can content on sub domains be more up to date than on the main site?
2. Is it (can it be) a natural way to strucutre a site (content) and for a site (content) to evolve?
3. Can it in some situations be better than using a folder structure?

Recommended study (as a minimum Google's video about Ted Nelson) Ignore the misunderstandings that have produced the present world.


Related to subdomains:
A large collection of links for webmasters

Page search (CTRL + F) +

Internet com sites

Valuable content or spam?

Example: Click in the upper left corner of this

Grid Computing Planet - Jupitermedia

site that had the same layout as

internet.com - the Internet and IT Network from Jupitermedia Corp.

that is now changed.

[Terry Van Horne]

IMO, Those are development considerations. I'm thinking of the usability of SERPs that are dominated by one domain. Sorry One and indent is all any site should deserve or, IMO, you are rewarding shoddy IA and people that pushed the SEO envelope using subdomains. I think this is temporary. There may be a good reason to develop a part of a site on a subdomain, SEO isn't one. All my secure/encrypted sites are on subdomains, just not the public areas.

[kgun]

Here

Aaron Wall gets special treatment from Google?


is an example.

1. What would you as a human being present first to the surfer?
2. Would that depend on digital structure or content?

[TryUsOut]

Originally Posted by Webnauts

Answer to little off-topic:

Looks like you skip/ignore the posts of others in threads, and you repeat again and again stuff that have been already said. And that is annoying. At least I think that is what was met.

I don't think that is the case as I also added the hosting factor. I just stated my views about the topic - the way I see it. It's better than just saying something like "I agree with #%$@, great explanation".

[Webnauts]

Originally Posted by TryUsOut

I don't think that is the case as I also added the hosting factor. I just stated my views about the topic - the way I see it. It's better than just saying something like "I agree with #%$@, great explanation".

The original poster asked:

Age: More than just a number?

[Peter (IMC)]

Age is a huge factor and a small factor at the same time. You need to be within certain age limits, but once you´re inside those limits, age becomes less important. But age limits are dynamic, they´re determined by "what's out there", Google doesn't use preset age limits, but measures the average values of various age factors. If you´re really successful with something, your success will change those age factors.

Some SERP's show only older sites, that's definitely true. But that doesn't mean that all you have to do is get older to get into a SERP. Ask first why those older sites are in the top 10. Don't use age as the reason because that's not why. If that would be true, all SERP's would be governed by older sites.

Suppose you have a new drink that in your opinion is better than coke, pepsi, beer and coffee. Those 4 drinks are old, have existed longer than most people can remember. How do you get your drink to kick out one of those 4 and become one of the 4?

Just getting older won't do the trick.

But if you can get 50% of the population to buy your drink, then after some time, you'll get your drink into the top 4. In fact, because of the sudden popularity of your drink, the whole list will be shaken up and the opinions about the original 4 may even change.

The SERP's are the result of public opinion, not the cause of it. Your success doesn't come from the search engines, it's better to think of the search engines showing the level of your success.

[Terry Van Horne]

Originally Posted by Peter (IMC)

Some SERP's show only older sites, that's definitely true. But that doesn't mean that all you have to do is get older to get into a SERP. Ask first why those older sites are in the top 10. Don't use age as the reason because that's not why. If that would be true, all SERP's would be governed by older sites.

Agreed age looks to be a dominant factor but age/maturity is aided and to some extent masks other factors that are part and parcel of all Successful sites.

I mentioned earlier I was redevloping an older site. Many of the terms are not very competitive but because they weren't as important to the the biz and SEO wasn't a big consideration they were not doing too good in the original devlopment. The new pages with new contextual links have gone to top 5 immediately and the original general page terms we changed the link text to rose from 13 to 8, but, not for the new more targeted term they continued to be found for the old term even though the link text was for the new term. The new KW in link text to the old page had in some searches indented the new page below the old. So... IMO, changing link text to an old page had little immediate benefit for the more targeted new term and pretty much rose for the more general terms we originally targeted even though the link text only conntained part of the old term. Some new pages immediately rose above pages that had been above them in the past. IMO, new link text to new pages is still pretty effective and changing link text likely doesn't help or hurt much. My next project will be SeoPros revamp and I will be doing a lot more testing in a more competitive environment.

[kevsta]

so im curious how much of a factor we think this is?

how much older is a real advantage? will one decent IBL get past an older site for the same term? 5?

personally i dont think it matters very much anymore.

[Peter (IMC)]

Originally Posted by kevsta

so im curious how much of a factor we think this is?

how much older is a real advantage? will one decent IBL get past an older site for the same term? 5?

personally i dont think it matters very much anymore.

Age of the domain is just one of many age factors. A domain of 10 years old can still be considered new if it's pages (urls) are recently made and links to the site are also just recently added.

So if all of those factors are either too old or too young, age is a huge factor. If you're within the age limits, it's a relatively small factor.

I guess it's like how important age is if you´re a fire fighter. If you´re between, say 20 and 50, age is a small factor, but when you´re 12 or 72, age is a huge factor. At the same time, if you´re 40 years old and never fought a single fire, and you all the sudden want to be a fire fighter, the "age" of your experience becomes a huge factor.

[Terry Van Horne]

Originally Posted by Peter (IMC)

Age of the domain is just one of many age factors. A domain of 10 years old can still be considered new if it's pages (urls) are recently made and links to the site are also just recently added.

My conclusion was new pages on the site were not really "sandboxed" at all in fact they were indexed before the old page (edited to a small degree to add the new pages). Whether that lasts will be more intelligence but I'm pretty sure it will last.

Originally Posted by Peter (IMC)

So if all of those factors are either too old or too young, age is a huge factor. If you're within the age limits, it's a relatively small factor.

Or age and freshness has been given more value then it's due by SEOs. IMO, at some point sheer size makes age less of a factor. That was my conclusion because
A. I assumed that the talk of fresh content being sandboxed on all sites was true. Obviously it doesn't appear so now but the page may drop later since it has been less than a week.

[AVC]

Age of site can work against you also, especially if the pages are never updated and have a load of dead end links.

Google does not like sites with a lot of hair on the backside, a good waxing of the old site will do one good in the SERP's !!

The more money the old bloke has will still allow it to attract the spiders though !

[kevsta]

if it is still a a factor I believe it to be very minor in comparison to the other factors involved in ranking these days. if it were significant, you would think that with a barely 8 month old domain, that we should not be able to write a brand new page, and launch it straight into the top 5, in some cases the top spot, for searches like, say:

seo services + (various geo locations)

..ahead of the next site down that is 18 months older than us, and the one below that which dates back to 2000?

examples available by PM if anyone is interested.

edit ..nor come to think of it would someone be able to rank #3 (4 today on .com) for internet marketing with an 18 month old domain?

[full house]

I think it depends. If the site has some quality backlinks possible it rank better but if its old site but no backlinks or quality backlinks it might not get a good rank but it will surely rank.