google organic ranking dropped after going with adwords

[Hunter Vaughan]

Hi All,
am learnng all I can about this topic....but from my experience this year with google it seems that once you go ppc with adwords, google dumps your organic rankings so far down that you HAVE to use adwords to be near the top.....I plummeted from top 1-2 pages to below 25th page while other sites with barely any info on my keywords (personalized wedding cake toppers)are way in front.....
any other info or opinions on how to regain organics after the google dumping??...still on page 1 on both yahoo and msn....it seeems google rewards those who use adwords by flushing their organic rankings down the tube. .....any comments????....

[stymiee]

Adwords is in no way associated with Google's organic search, Using adwords never helps or hurts you in the SERPs.

[Hunter Vaughan]

stymiee,
that is very comforting to read but is not what I experienced at all....my huge decline was experienced after I started using adwords....any other opinions on this issue??

[klawjon]

I used to tell my Google adwords team that all the time. Why do my organics fall as my bids go up. But it is simply not true, they have no relation as previously stated.

[Hunter Vaughan]

klawjon,
thanks for the verification....seemed so coincidental that I needed some "assurance" that they weren't connected....funny that you seemed to have a similar experience...thanks again for your input...Happy New Year!
Hunter

[blitzen]

Adwords is in no way associated with Google's organic search, Using adwords never helps or hurts you in the SERPs.

But it is simply not true, they have no relation as previously stated.

I've read some third-party research done on click fraud. Is there any data or evidence to your conclusions about losing organic position as AdWords budget increases? Has a research company done any stats on this issue? If so, please post the link.

[klawjon]

It is easy to measure click fraud. Generally they are one and out. If you are finding that the average use is above three pages viewed per unique visitor than click fraud is minimal. Click fraud is not as bad as it was a couple of years ago. My organic links went down because of the Florida update, I fixed them and everything went back to normal. PPC is so convienent that sometimes it can make you lazy.

[stymiee]

It's coincidence. Google is making a big change right now (even if they deny it) and a lot of sites have experienced the same thing you have.

[activeco]

I agree, probably coincidence.
I usually discard such claims (adwords=losing rankings), but a few comments here brought some other thoughts.
Click fraud. Sure, higher CPC brings more probability for third party fraud.
So it's not excluded that the traffic to your site and eventual strange linking schemes coming from questionable sources could indeed have some influence on rankings.
Just a speculation, of course.

[andersonweb]

More and more lately, I'm thinking less and less that this is coincidence.

I've been working on a client's site for over 6 months now and have made absolutely NO progress in improving his site's rankings in Google. My methods are all above board and nothing hinky. I play by the rules. The site has made strides in Yahoo and has done absolutely nothing in Google! Normally I find that I have good success with Google and extremely slow progress with Yahoo. The only differenece that I can come up with between this site and any of my other SEO clients is that this client has a high budget Adwords campaign. So, I have no reason to believe that Adwords does not influence how Google ranks a website. If a company is willing to pay thousands of dollars per month to be on the first page via Adwords, then why would they give up that revenue and allow that site to rank high organically? I'm sorry, but my experience has just frustrated me beyond belief to change my mind about Adwords having no influence on Google's organic results.

If anyone can look at www.casterconcepts.com and tell me why it's not ranking in Top 10 pages for keyword phrases such as "industrial casters", "industrial wheels" or "custom casters" - the keyword phrases they pay the highest CPC for, then I'll be happy to receive some constructive criticsm. I have been building backlinks for 6 months and for some reason Google still only shows 9 backlinks. I've been getting backlinks from pages that are indexed in Google and get cached on a regular basis, yet those pages are still not showing up in the results for link:http://www.casterconcepts.com Any suggestions would be greatly welcomed.


Thanks.

[activeco]

Originally Posted by andersonweb

I have been building backlinks for 6 months and for some reason Google still only shows 9 backlinks. I've been getting backlinks from pages that are indexed in Google and get cached on a regular basis, yet those pages are still not showing up in the results for link:http://www.casterconcepts.com

Very nice, related links indeed. Yahoo shows them all (probably), while Google has never been trusted with the link: results.
Besides, recently, Google has become very picky in 'approving' links. The chance is huge that the key no-no word is "exchange".

[andersonweb]

Very nice, related links indeed. Yahoo shows them all (probably), while Google has never been trusted with the link: results.
Besides, recently, Google has become very picky in 'approving' links. The chance is huge that the key no-no word is "exchange".

We actually have been doing 3-way linking to avoid the appearance of "exchange". The site we're "exchanging" links with will link to us and we provide a link back from a related partner resource site. Thus, we avoid the typical 2-way link which has lost value with Google in recent years. In addition, I'm finding these "exchange" partners by following Google's backlinks from high ranking sites for our keywords. Logically, I figure that if Google recognizes the page as a backlink for other similar sites using these keywords, then they should also recognize the backlink from that page to our site. This strategy has reaped great dividends for my other clients, but I'm at a loss as to why this site is stuck in the mud.

[activeco]

Originally Posted by andersonweb

We actually have been doing 3-way linking to avoid the appearance of "exchange".

Of course. I am not saying this definitely doesn't work anymore, but it still looks like Google broadened the ways in finding multiple-leveled exchanges.

This is an interesting link which could be helpful in understanding Google's reasoning.

The related part starts from here:
"My favorite for the real estate licensing site is that in less that a minute, I was able to find 50+ other domains that this person had–everything from learning Spanish to military training."

BTW, have you SEO-ed more sites in the same period? If so, what are the results?

[andersonweb]

Originally Posted by activeco

BTW, have you SEO-ed more sites in the same period? If so, what are the results?

Yes, I actually have 2 brand new sites that I launched in August and each are being cached on a weekly and bi-weekly basis. One of the sites is already ranking well (Top 30) for most of our keywords on Google, MSN, & Yahoo. I use the same techniques for all 3 with the exception of Adwords. They are not related in content, but based on what I am doing, this should have no bearing. The only other difference is that www.casterconcepts.com is an established site which I SEO'ed and the other 2 are brand new. Either way, it would seem to me that the established site would receive quicker results than a brand new site that's never even been indexed by Google before.

[westie]

RE: casterconcepts.com

I would definitely say it is a linking problem - I can't comment on adwords effect as I have not used it. As you say above G is showing very few links - 4 by my count. This is quite poor for an established site and MSN show 850 - so somewhere along the line G is not crediting your links.

The result is most of your site is in supplemental index, (try site:your domain) so won't usually show up in serps! We've been there so can sympathise. Only tips I can give is use unique title tags - usually for one idea/prduct per page. I also think it helps if you have a description that includes the keyword and also put in url if possible. We're not an SEO company but managed to get a few pages out of the SI. Yeah - also get quality links or change strategy - you've got plenty of links but they don't get recognised - not sure why!

Regards