Drop in SERPS

[oagady]

Today my site dropped in SERPS on all the keywords, even though the number of BL is much higher after the BL update. I am trying to figure out if it is a penalty for something (I don't believe I break any rules, but you never know...), or Google is doing a lot of changes and I just have to wait until everything settles down.

Did anyone else notices a big change in SERPS today?

Agady

[GiftsForYouBiz]

All I know is that I don't rank near what I used to (or should, IMHO) for my two primary keyword phrases.

And in addition to SERPs, the PR keeps flip-flopping between 4 and 5.

In addition to that, my main site shows no backlinks (out of at least 300 that "are" linked), but one of my catalogs that doesn't have many shows 61. Go figure!

Can anyone say, "unreliable"?

I would start looking more at your Yahoo! and MSN rankings and take the 3-6 months to start figuring out their SEO tactics (as people like me have taken to learn Google's here at WPW). I think its time to start visiting the Yahoo! and MSN forums here.

Signed and sincerely,

Addicted to PR ...

[wednesday]

Hope the new MSN beta go official sooner. But this is not the forum to discus this ;)
Looks like some algo changes with this backlinks update at google. I see many frustrated avatars round the forums.

[jdavis]

I ran a visibility statistics report on Sunday and ranked in the top 10 in Google for most of my keyword terms. And for months I ranked poorly in Yahoo.

Today, I ran a report, and dropped drastically on Google, yet picked up ranking on Yahoo. My primary keyword terms dropped on average of 25 positions. Where i was once on the first page, I now rank on page 3 or 4, yet I have not made any significant changes to the site. All of my competitors seem to have retained their ranking. Is this a Google qwerk, or is there something I should be aware of?

Check out http://www.usamerchantsolutions.com if you have any suggestions.

Thanks for your help if you can provide any.

[oagady]

Did anyone had a big positive change in SERPS over the last couple of days?

[DriWashSolutions]

Originally Posted by oagady

Did anyone had a big positive change in SERPS over the last couple of days?

Nope. Up a few places is all. I'm still on the 9th page.

[cbp]

Don't panic - Google in big flux at moment - some sort of update.

CBP

[GiftsForYouBiz]

Originally Posted by oagady

Did anyone had a big positive change in SERPS over the last couple of days?

[for Google] I list at 45 for my primary keyword phrase and still nowhere to be found for my secondary keyword phrase.

But then I've jumped back and forth between the 40s and the 80s since the beginning of November. Prior to that (Jul-Oct) I was jumping back and forth between the 10s and the 40s.

You would think I did something wrong at the end of October, but sales were actually up this year, so I'm not changing back! ;)

I'm keeping track of my sales and which SE they're using. So far, from Oct on, Google and Yahoo! are pretty much neck-and-neck with a couple MSN, and one each of WebCrawler, Alta Vista and AOL.

[iwstats]

You all have to recall that the Google indexed pages went from four billion to eight billion. This new content changes everything. If before a search produced ten million results, now this same search will probably produce twenty million results, about twice as many results. In this new shuffle, some sites will go up and some will go down. It's a hole new ball game. Change is a way of life in the Internet.

[Keimos]

Hi oagady,

Fluctations will always happen.

1. The search engines change the way they percieve sites
2. You lose sight of what your customers are looking for.
3. The changes you make are probably irrelevant to the above.

The key thing is to know how people look for you and how the geeks design the search algorithms. These are two different things but at the end of the day it boils down to relevance.

I myself have stopped trying for specific keywords and phrases for the index or home page. Each page is simply designed for the information it contains.

Look at your site, whatever size, and every page has the potential to be the main page. More importantly as I have found out, look at the pages that you consider as minor - Why are they being found?

Its a mad world out there, its great to be a nut!

[AzGoldPros]

I too have noticed what everyone else here has as well. I just got off the phone with a friend of mine who also has many websites on the web and we discussed similarities of our websites' SERP changes. Keep in mind, we do not link any of our websites, not even one. We do this as we both approach SEO in two different ways and wish to experiment and see which works best. I tend to use most of the optimizaion practices most of you here also use while he tends to use less optimization. I work hard to make the websites more "eye-appealing" whereas his tend to be less so. Between us we handle 150 websites and maintain over 60 separate IP's over many geographic regions to maintain separation of the websites. Apparently we can both take 1st page ranking in Yahoo and MSN but when we do, Google drops the same websites to below 100 pages, that's over 1,000th place! Yesterday Yahoo updated and sites I had there that were doing ok but not well went to good and great and they were immediately banished to beyond the 100th page on same terms on Google. Keep in mind, some of them had both 1st page and 1st position ranking on Google prior to Yahoo raising their status. This happened on each and every site that was lifted! Coincidence? The same happened to my friend's sites as well! He told me he also discontinued an AdSense campaign for a skincare product, which he had the number 1 and 2 place on the search term for this product in Google, and the day after he discontinued his long ad campaign his sites were moved to page 2! Coincidence? When Yahoo and MSN broke from Google's feeds we were both ranking high on Google with all of our websites. One by one as they began to become ranked high in Yahoo and MSN their Google ranking slipped from their previous positions and has continued to this last update battle. Coincidence? When Yahoo and MSN broke with Google I also had many sites that ranked 5 and over 100 pages that ranked 4. When they were indexed at Yahoo and MSN with a decent ranking, each of them was dropped to a 3 PR ranking, no exceptions. Coincidence? One of my main sites, that has done well in Google and never was indexed in Yahoo or MSN, was recently indexed into both and suddenly disappears from the top 1000 rankings with Google. Coincidence? My top two sites have between 8,000 and 9,000 links from the top 7 engines so they do not lack in this area. My typical site has between 800 and 4,000 backlinks so this is not a problem with them either, only that when they begin to do well in Yahoo and MSN they are penalized in Google, plain and simple. The reverse situation has also been observed. When I had a site in Yahoo that did well suddenly drop it's position some, Google suddenly puts it on the 2nd page results when before it too had been dropped below the top 20 pages when it was indexed into Yahoo with a good ranking. Coincidence? I also tried an experiment on a first page ranking site on Yahoo where I put a link on it to Yahoo, MSN and Google. Within 2 days it was dropped to 2nd page results. Coincidence? Apparently Yahoo does not care for Google very much either. Naturally I've removed the links to MSN and Google to see if it will attain 1st page ranking again but that was only today so the result may take awhile if it comes at all. I have too many different examples with the same results where it simply seems to be just a plain old battle of tug-of-war between the search engines with our websites being the rope they are tugging on. Ususally, when you keep smelling smoke over a period of time there really is a fire somewhere, you just have to find out where.

It also appears that the "Google Dance" may not be over, at least I hope it isn't. Some search terms appear to have all of their data centers meshed as neither I nor my browser can read Chinese, Korean or any other Asian language yet some terms have more of these results in the first 4 pages than those which use English so all you see are little rectangles where text is. This can't be right or good for Google either. They need to keep their data centers separated better than this. We just have to give them time to see if the dance is really over before we make any final judgements but the trend of the search engine battle is one that has been ongoing for over a year now.

I for one am sick of the Google games that they play with legitimate websites while using them as pawns in their battles with Yahoo and MSN etc. I have observed this behavior over the last year and have kept silent but this has been the recurring theme over the last 12-18 months with more than 100 incidents, all of which pointed to this conclusion. For those of you doing well in both of these two worlds I congratulate you, but do not say this idea is ridiculous just because your site(s) don't fit the mold, you are simply the exception to the rule now. I've observed this with too many other webmaster's websites and if you have an exception thank your lucky stars and be thankful. Google may say they want legitimate websites, but many times I have seen 7 of the top 10 results cloaking, stuffing keywords, hiding keywords and using other nefarious tactics, many of which are hard to see with conventional methods. Report them all you want, they never take them down, even when multiple people submit multiple reports. All they apparently seem to do is try to work in another twist into their algorithm which usually ends up hurting legitimate websites, I've seen it too often over the last 18 months. I agree we should just keep on doing what we do best in legitimate SEO and hope that Google will one day come back to their senses where they began when they were a great search engine. All their little manipulative algorithm changes have only hurt many good websites and the cheaters always find another way around it to take the top positions so they are the winners and we the losers. Yahoo has apparently realized Google's mistakes and recognizes the good websites much more than Google can or is willing to do now. Sometimes coffee with cream and sugar works better than one that takes 8 words, 20 syllables and 15 seconds to say, listen up Google, keep it simple! You might say this is Google's way of saying Merry Christmas, in a mean spirited sort of way, but then we all realize they could care less if you make your living and feed your family by working on the internet, they've made their billions and your welfare is certainly no concern of theirs. Ce la vi!

Maybe my associate and I are alone in our observations, but I would certainly like to know if we are. I look forward to reading how more of you have either seen this same problem over the last year or have experienced the opposite situation and hope that you share your secret(s) and wisdom with the rest of us.

In parting, I want to wish each and everyone a Happy Holidays and hope that your SERPS will rise higher in the New Year.

[freegk]

We also charged by google, we have move 3000 BL to 23000 BL, but drop in SERPS, we have more than 10000 keyword and get rank in first page (75% first position), and today we doesn't find in google. Our website get 20000 hit per day and now we get 2000 hits per day (90% lost in visitor)

We hope this changes is temporery and soon resolve by google.

[Andilinks]

My Google referrals today are a third of what they were yesterday. The only consolation provided by this thread is that misery loves company, I thought it was just me...

Andi

[oagady]

You know, it sounds wierd that no one reports a positive change, only negative. There are sites that moved up when the others moved down. From my experience, people on this forum (the ones that have been here for a while) know what they are doing, they know the rules, they know SEO. And no one so far reported a positive change. I just hope that cbp is right, that it is a time of changes that still are going on, not finished yet.

[Andilinks]

...no one reports a positive change, only negative.

True, I have heard a few reports of "holding steady" but that's the best news there is...

Now some ecommerce is likely to drop about now, Christmas shoppers mostly figure that today is the last day for ordinary (not overnight) shipping. But still all those searchers that were seeing my site yesterday must be going somewhere...

Very curious.

Andi

[cbp]

...no one reports a positive change, only negative.

For every site that goes down, another go up - there will be just as many unhappy as happy webmasters out there.

My sites are either up or steady.

CBP

[mlevenhagen]

I show more backlinks since a BL update a few days ago, my keywords are doing better in the SERPS and the PR for my website on the Google toolbar disappeared... figure that one out.

Google must get a real kick out of watching the whole webmaster community freak out when they start pushing buttons and pulling levers.

[m_rashad]

it seems odd , my website is an online shop and I used to get around 500 unique visitors most of them coming from Google , I barely had 100 the past couple of days mostly from Yahoo ! I checked some of the keywords I ranked well before and ound myself in the 2nd or 3rd page of Google and sometimes couldn't find myself at all !

I noticed that some keywords produced results of sites linking to mine (Directories, forums , etc..) !! while my site is falling behind them ! Odd !

www.egyptgiftshop.com

[Andilinks]

Yes, the billionaires over at Google make a tiny adjustment and I lose 2000 visitors a day. Admittedly I wouldn't have had them in the first place were it not for Google so I can't complain too loudly.

But I was cruising along there and now I am forced to work very hard to get this traffic back. In the long-term this will make my site much better and me richer. But right now, I had made monetary arrangements based on the traffic I was getting, this relating to bandwidth. Now Google has been a bull in my china shop and I'm not happy about it.

Over the longer-term though, as I said, I will win.

Oh, BTW I am going to get those visitors back by making my site BETTER, not by trying to scam Google.

No point in being mad at Google, cursing God might be more productive...

Andi

[greeneagle]

We and all our sites and SERPs are steady as can be. If an update is occuring we don't see it.
Ken

[wednesday]

This one?
filter=0
http://forums.seochat.com/showthread.php?p=145839

[Andilinks]

I am pleased to report that the ratio of G to Y is markedly improved this morning. Over the weekend it was running 2:1, it now stands at 3:1. Nothing like the 10:1 that I saw last week but definitely an improvement. This does lend credence to the theory that this was some kind of system-wide data corruption and not a reindex.

I'm certain G doesn't lose data, but also certain that it must suffer the occasional setback which takes time to correct--as we all do from time to time.

I still think G is compromising the organic listings to favor paid clicks, I've noticed this happening for months now and see it as a corrupt practice on G's part. I know there are some here that would like to argue this and will tell me to submit proof. Well, I won't, this is just my observation as someone who does dozens and sometimes hundreds of searches daily... ummm you just get a feel for it.


Andi

This post is similar to one I just made on another forum. I seldom do that but this particular follow-up applied both places and I just don't have time to recast it this morning. Sorry about that.

[AzGoldPros]

Andi, I agree with you on the favortism as I also do many search engine checks and have had too many occurrences noted in this regard. In regards to this weekend’s debacle, well, I've noticed websites from all over the world in some of my search terms. Many of these new websites cannot be translated by my browser as they are from China, Japan, Korea, Germany, Romania and other countries I wasn't sure of. Even UK sites were in the US database so I think this was one big screwup and I sure hope they clean it up soon. I haven't noticed much of a return as my affected sites are still 5-7 pages back when they used to be first or second page results. The ones that were 1st and 2nd place are no where to be found at all right now and it's still the same for my friend who also was affected by this. Who knows, they may not clean it up for awhile, but I sure hope they do and soon. I just wonder what idiot thought that this weekend would have been the right time to screw with SERPS and the online e-commerce they represent when it was the last weekend you could order gifts online and receive them by Christmas. Another sign that Google just doesn't care about website owners, who make a living on the Internet, such thoughtlessness is just not acceptable in the business arena and should not be forgotten very soon by those affected by it. They hurt a lot of people I am sure as many are reporting elsewhere the same situation. I just don't understand the callous lack of concern about those who literally make up their database but I guess what goes around comes around eventually. Hope everyone who was affected will attain their positions soon and sales return to normal.

[John Currie]

My three main websites have remained absolutly constant in the SERPS but I have noticed a huge drop in the number of IBL'S to the sites.

My main site which was was showing 1,600 last week is now only showing 320 links. The page rank has stayed at 6 and my most important keyword is still in the top 10 altough it has moved down one position since last week.

In the last week my main site has started showing up very well in Yahoo for all my main keywords and keyphrases but thankfully I have not seen any loss of position in Google as reported by AzGoldPros.

[Andilinks]

Another sign that Google just doesn't care about website owners

If it is "one big screwup" as you say a little earlier then it is not an indication of how much they care.

It is not Google's job to care about webmasters, though caring can help. Their responsibility is first to the searcher (the source of it all) and then to their advertisers. Webmasters trail behind their hardware vendors in the caring order.

Unless this was some calculated move to funnel business into certain larger sites for the sake of straight revenue or an under the table kickback it was probably just a screw-up.

But if it were engineered at a lower level then disguising it as a screw-up would be the easiest ruse.

My opinion is that it was a screw-up and not a scam, though from the evidence I see a scam is certainly a possibility. I base my judgement more on Google's credibility than any analysis of the traffic, which remains quite scant at this end.

But the magnitude DOES RUN INTO THE MANY MILLIONS OF DOLLARS, so the dark side of human nature cannot be discounted entirely. As I said, it does not necessarily have to be engineered from the top.

Andi

[DarrenC]

Andi, I like your thinking.

I'm with you, what's the point complaining, yes it's baffled me, but I now have to sit down and plan my next move and look at why Google has done what it has to my site, but not to my competitors.

[AzGoldPros]

Sorry Andi, my fault for not expressing more content, I believed we were on the same level of thought which includes some assumptions etc. I tend to think with valid facts and/or assumptions to support those thoughts but did so on assumption all were on the same track as my thoughts. I like to believe that most webmasters who participate here in the forums do their best to practice good SEO practices and therefore not only is their site optimized for the SE's but their content and displays are also optimized for those who visit their sites. The end result is that they have the same goal as the SE's(search engines), which is to deliver good, relevant and useful content to the searcher.

I too purchase several hundred items annually over the Internet and when my searches come back all jumbled up, as many are now, I have not been well taken care of by Google have I? In my industry, my friend and I know the majority of the owners and manufacturers of the products we offer and also have some "in-house" products as well. I am aware of most of those in the business and therefore know which sites are extremely relevant to a content search, which are simply a notice of a product on one page in a site that caters mostly to other unrelated products, and those that obviously don't belong at all. If I am searching for information on "Widgets" then I don't want to have to open 40-60 websites that only offer information on "Whatcha-ma-call-its" to finally find one that has information on "Widgets". I also do not feel results in a language, which you cannot read, are very good to promote any of the above reasons for searching either.

I am also assuming that the majority of English speaking and US based customers are not interested in results they cannot read since they do not speak the language which the website is presented in. Nor do they wish to wait for shipping from a foreign country, especially when it's not even regionally geographically to their country, to clear customs etc. and therefore once again the results are flawed and not catering to the searchers needs. I believe the same to be true in non-English speaking countries and regions as well should their results have the same problems. So you see, for several very simple reasons Google is not "caring" about their real customers who come first as you and I agree on. I agree they don't have to care about us as webmasters specifically, but I also believe they have an obligation on some level to webmasters as without our product, the website, they would have very little to offer their searchers and therefore would be insignificant in our regards too. Remember that this is a symbiotic, mutually dependent nature between webmasters and the search engines, a cooperative so to speak, to offer the best results based on search terms that the searcher is looking for. Should either of us "manipulate" the results without offering the searcher relevant and useful content then we have "cheated" the searcher of their time and lowered their confidence and ability to find relevant information on the terms for which they search. This end result defeats the whole reason for being for both the SE and the website as the searcher fails to find the desired product, service or information. Also, when the SE publishes a set of standard "rules" of practice for webmasters to follow to be indexed in their SE, then they do have a legal and ethical obligation to follow that same set of practices. If they don't then they violate their own set of "rules and practices" which they put forth in a public venue. I hope this explanation helps to show my thoughts etc. behind the statement.

I always try to give someone the benefit of the doubt so that's why I believe this was a screwup rather than an intentional incident like most of their updates, but make no doubt, they did do something with intent and if it resulted in this debacle then they are still responsible. They should have known, and most likely did, what the end result would have been to do whatever they did do. It may also be that they did this to test a new "clean up" program which may be a relevancy test to see how well their system can clean up and recover from something like this, we just don't know as they never really talk about these types of things. You may just be right, they may be have acted with nefarious intent and it quite possibly backfired on them, but their timing still is horrible for their searchers who are trying to find relevant content for items they wish to purchase for arrival by Christmas. Today I've had several calls from Cheyenne Mountain from top level brass for an order to arrive by Christmas so this is an example that even those who are literally buried deep underground depend on us to produce relevant content and the SE's to deliver that same relevant content to their patrons who use them to search for either a product, service or information.

It also sounds like you have more info that you haven't put forth here in regards to Google's nefarious activities and you are upset with them for it. I won't go into my AdSense campaigns which I had to terminate as all the hits were registering 0.00 seconds of actual on the website time and I've never gotten a penny back as they never caught it and I just didn't want to hassle with them over it. My sales didn't really change much but my overall net profit really went up, lol. Anyway, I have enjoyed reading many of your previous posts here in the forums and am somewhat a fan. I've come to acknowledge and respect your knowledge and insight when you've shared it so I would be interested in reading anything you wish to share and add it to my knowledge base, especially if it were relevant to my pursuits on the internet. Thanks for your caring and sharing here on the forums and I look forward to more of your insightful posts in the future.

[Andilinks]

wwhhomes and AzGoldPros, thank you for the kind words.

The loss of traffic to my site was a disappointment to me but fortunately I don't have anything critical riding on it. To those whose holidays have been tarnished by this my heart goes out, I know it must be tough.

The Internet has a history of being generous and then snatching it all away so I guess we just need to be mindful of that and not get too complacent when those numbers seem to be racking up.

This episode has caused me to re-double my efforts to improve my site so it can't be all bad.

I don't watch my serps all that much because my keywords are all over the place but judging by the ratio of Google's referrals to Yahoo's things are slowly getting better. Maybe it was just a massive data-loss somewhere in their system.

Likely we'll just never know...

Andi

[oagady]

I checked my SERPS twice today and it went down more than 100 positions in the morning (in addition to the drop which I had three days ago), and then returned back in the evening. Even went up a few positions. So, it looks like Google just has some kind of a system instability these days.

However, this drop was a wake up call for me. I reviewed my site page by page looking for any points that Google might not like, and I found some. First of all - external links (which I haven't checked for a couple of months), also several pages were using redirection to the home page if the visitor is not logged in (I know that Google doesn't like redirection of any kind, and it might also look like as a duplicate context).
I am fixing it now, may be it helps.

Olga

[jwm5411]

Has anyone noticed how poor the search results for Google have become. I have done a number of searches over the last week and many of the higher ranking results have no relevance to the topic. In many cases the pages show no results when clicked. They may be making changes to their search results, but they don't have any quality control review going on.

[GiftsForYouBiz]

Originally Posted by jwm5411

Has anyone noticed how poor the search results for Google have become. I have done a number of searches over the last week and many of the higher ranking results have no relevance to the topic. In many cases the pages show no results when clicked.

Could you provide some of the searches you queried so that we can see the results?

As much as I hate being in the 40s for my primary keyword phrase, there are many relevant sites above me (although there could certainly be many not-so-relevant too).

[pbdink]

I have seen two of our sites get hit big, mostly on seconday key words in Google but not the major ones. Yesterday I experienced a strange thing when I went to simply see if one our sites was listed: I searched both on pbdink.com and site:pbdink.com and for the first several tries it came up with "no such document". I tried several more times and lo and behold there it was back both with site: and without. Any clues to this one?

[cbp]

Has anyone noticed how poor the search results for Google have become

For the keywords I monitor, the results are fine - much more releveant than MSN and about the same as Yahoo.

CBP

[freegk]

Hey cbp try to search following keyword.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&l...an+andreas+map

[GiftsForYouBiz]

Originally Posted by freegk

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=san+andreas+map

I should say that the attention of the new game (Grand Theft Auto - San Andreas) has garnered the game a bit of attention: Not only in links, but click-through links. Pushed it right over what should be #1; info on the fault itself.

On the flip side, the game is a very hot topic right now, essentially making it more relevant than info on the fault. Meaning, more people out there looking up San Andreas are more likely trying to find info on the game than the fault.