Why have Google Penalised Me?

[PredatorNutrition]

I hope someone here can help, ideally from Google. My website Predator Nutrition . com is a UK based sports supplements retailer which has steadily been progressing on Google rankings, although doing better on Yahoo. Suddenly, last wednesday our rankings on Google have dropped dramatically across any and all search terms. For instance on the search terms below these are my old positiong:

Activate Xtreme 1st page position 4-6
Epistane 3rd page position 23-26
IBE X-Froce 1st page position 1
Reversitol 1st page

On none of these do I even rank in the first 100 results now but am in position 1 on yahoo on all 4 so I strongly suspect Google have penalised the site for reasons unknown to me. I was looking into requesting reconsideration but as I have not done anything wrong I am aware of feel admitting fault for something I haven't done is not right. A friend of mine says Google may have done this to make webmasters spend more on Adwords instead but I have no idea if that is true (although it sounds very unethical if it is).

Can anyone shed any light on this?

All I have done from an SEO point of view is:

Written articles with links back to my site
Submitted to Directories
Added comments to a select number of blogs related to my field
Gotten links back from suppliers (related field again)

From my understanding all this is good SEO and yet the site has been penalised while retaining a very good Yahoo ranking.

Can anyone provide advice on this? My SEO firm is clueless and gave some explanation about a Google dance last week!

The sitemap has already been submitted and is updated regularly and there are no dead links according to webmaster tools so I cannot see the problem at all.

Adding that I have also got some links where I sponsored relevant forums with a fee but other sites doing the same have not been penalised so I assume it is not because of this. The paid for links are at the bodybuilding forum muscletalk . co . uk. We sponsor that forum and have text links coming from there but so do companies who have sponsored there for several years. You will often see this type of corporate sponsorship in many industries and while I do not feel it is unethical as the industry clearly relates to ours, I would expect sites who have sponsored there for years would have been penalised by now if it was.

What do people think as all the other sites sponsoring there are always on the 1st page at google. I also paid for a yahoo directory link on google's own advice!

 

[david64]

How old is your site? New sites (or sites that previously didn't have many incoming links) that get either a lot links or some really poor links in a short period of time can take a turn in the search engines. I have only ever seen this as a temporary thing.

I checked out your incoming and they are poor quality links, so I am guessing that this is why Google has decided to punt your site.

My advice would be to leave it for a few weeks to see if it recovers. If not you will want to look at submitting a request for re-inclusion.

I would also advise that you look at getting some better quality links. However, this is not going to be easy as your site is a purely commercial site and there are probably only a handful of sites that would link to it. Higher quality links are usually gained passively, rather than by seeking them. This is achieved by producing content that sites in your field might link to anyway. Getting links from them can be better facilitated by interacting with people in your field in communities.

 

[iamlijo]

Dont worry about rankig . Wait 2-3 weeks , by the time continue building quality back links from related and high PR sites

 

[amyieroberts]

Wait for some time. And stop link building also.

 

[Delicious Webdesign]

I should place all the sites graphics on your own server, currently your site has 10-20 calls to http://www42.instantestore.com for your shopping cart images on the index page.

The webmaster reconsideration requests is for sites that have been removed from the index https://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=40052&ctx=tltp&hl=en

I have you at position 30 in google.co.uk for Sports Supplements Distributor which I assume is your main search term

 

[fisicx]

Do not do what Techseol suggests. The problem lies much deeper.

Most of your inbound links are worthless. Blog commenting is a complete waste of time since the links will be no-follow. The directory links are pretty much worthless since they are all on very low ranking asites. Article links again pass little link juice since it's clearly self promo (and links within the article are no follow anyway. Can't find any supplier links in the diagnosis.

The real problem however is the complete lack of unique content - all you seem to have done is imported the suppliers data and Google has now decided that you don't deserve to rank as high as you do. The good news is that you are still in the index albeit way doen on page 11 and below.

 

[LiamZing]

Hi there

A similar thing happened to me a few months ago and I had a little panic, but thankfully my website soon found itself back on the front page (and for some keywords top spot) within a couple of weeks. I think its easy to assume that Google has penalised you when in reality something else has caused the drop in serps ranking.

Liam

 

Hi there

A similar thing happened to me a few months ago and I had a little panic, but thankfully my website soon found itself back on the front page (and for some keywords top spot) within a couple of weeks. I think its easy to assume that Google has penalised you when in reality something else has caused the drop in serps ranking.

Liam

agree its quite often that Google drops a few cards when shuffling the deck.

Wait a week or so.

Not sure I would agree that incoming links have a detrimental effect on your site unless for some strange reason google has decided your buying links.?

Earl

 

[fisicx]

agree its quite often that Google drops a few cards when shuffling the deck.

Wait a week or so.

Not sure I would agree that incoming links have a detrimental effect on your site unless for some strange reason google has decided your buying links.

I agree but in this case it's the complete lack of unique content that's worrying - there is no reason why Google should give this site a prominent position. But of course if the site does get back where it was next week then it means I was talking bollox.

 

I agree but in this case it's the complete lack of unique content that's worrying - there is no reason why Google should give this site a prominent position. But of course if the site does get back where it was next week then it means I was talking bollox.

I agree again

But one assumes it ranked before with the same content.?:|

Unless of course more changes have been done to the site than those described.

Earl

 

[Ali-v-8]

firstly your website has not been penalised.
Secondly you problem is on your home page.
anyone else seen the problem
give you till 1pm and then i shall tell him.

 

[Kneoteric_eSolutions]

A re-inclusion request is used when the website is removed from Google index, but that is not the case. You website is in their index so no point in filling out re-consideration request.

I rank searcher for your page title and unique phrases in the content and your website showed up. So it is definitely not a penalty.

The reason for the drop has to something different. What @Fisicx said about lack of original content could very well be true. If that be the case you will have to wait for a while and if the rankings do come back up then writing fresh unique content should be your recourse. Mind you, sometimes such drops are only temporary and return back to normal in a few days. so that leads me to ask you; When did you first notice a dip in rankings?

Secondly, have you done any on-pages changes recently? If so you will have to analyze them one by one.

For how long did you have these old rankings you are talking about?

Are you talking about rankings on Google.com or Google.co.uk. Your target market is seems to be UK but you have a .com TLD and is hosted in TLD.

There are so many things that could have triggered it. Keep us posted about the rankings and we could come with more issues that might have caused it.

 

[PredatorNutrition]

Hi Guys

Thanks for all the replies although I will be hear at 1pm to see if I missed a major one.

www . google. com/support/forum/p/Webmasters/thread?tid=31b0c50380f07960&hl=en

I posted at Google and got a different set of responses.

Some points worth mentioning:

1. Those incoming links are no follow and outside of my control as they are links from forums. In any case they have been there for a long time. Outside of that, I have some links from suppliers, and have contributed articles to magazines etc.

2. Duplicate Content is the standard and everyone does it much the same way without penalty.

3. As for paid links there are a few but potentially what is mentioned in the link above could have been a bigger reason - I created landing pages for some brands to act as brochures for that brand and then directing them onwards to Predator Nutrition. One of these went up last week (eas supplements . co .uk) and someone in the google thread touches upon that as a cause...

My rankings across all search terms had been steadily improving over the course of 6 mths since the site went live. Although I made some on page changes recently it was not across all pages (only maybe 2%). My old rankings were consistent day to day and steadily going up although not as well ranked as on Yahoo where I was number 1 on many terms. (still am in fact). It was the same on google com as google uk.

 

[fisicx]

What was is not always what is.

Google may well have changed the algorithm to chuckout all the duplicates unless they have some strong inbound links. Since all your inbound links are pretty much worhtless Google has decided to demote your site.

Remember the Google guidelines state: unique informative and interesting content that adds value to the visitor.

 

[PredatorNutrition]

As far as poor links go many of those links are not links at all but no follow links. In terms of actual links we have some good ones in fact compared to our competitors who have not been demoted and who ALL put duplicate copies on (as does every retail site I know of when describing products). I really do not think this is it at all.

 

[fisicx]

You do have a lot of followed inbound links including your paid adverts (but you won't get penalised for these). As suggested it could simply be a glitch in the system but even so, relying on duplicate copy and a few good quality inbound links isn't good practice. Just because everybody uses the same copy doesn't mean Google is going to accept this as 'informative and interesting content'.

If it is Google having a bad hair day then you just have to be patient.

If you are still down in the dolrums in 3 weeks time then it means Google doesn't consider your site to be offering value to the visitor. That's just the way it is. The onlyt solution is to change the site.

 

[SFD]

Are the 'Products by Brand' doing the OP any favours as they all seem to link to an 'Advanced Search Page' with the same title?

 

[PredatorNutrition]

Ali - I tried calling with no reply but can you explain here what the robot.txt thing means?

 

[YODspica]

try google webmaster tools, sign up, its all there explained.

 

[fisicx]

Don't think there is a problem with the robots.txt, all you are doing is telling the search engines not index your admin area.

 

[bcmedia]

There was an algorithm change last week - maybe its affected you temporarily (the duplicate content will not be doing you any favours though)

http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2009/04/20/google-set-to-change-ranking-algorithm

 

[PredatorNutrition]

That change happened after my rankings dropped.

I know people keep talking about duplicate content but every single site in the field has this, and in actual fact our site has generally modified product descriptions slightly compared to others.

Plus of course, we have original content in the form of articles (although some of these articles were published elsewhere before being placed on our site - an error I know but we always publish at our site first now).

Reggie

 

[david64]

@PredatorNutrition - The thing is no one here will really know why your site has been kicked into touch because we don't know. We are just making guesses based on past experience.

The two things that have come up are your duplicate content and your incoming links. It is possible that neither of these caused the problem, but both should be on your to do list for improving your site. A site that is largely dupe is not serious in my opinion. I have a friend who set up an eCommerce site and they put in the effort to re-write all the product descriptions from scratch as well as find out what awards each product had.

If you want to get a response direct from Google your best shot is in Google Webmaster Groups. However, it is very rare anyone from Google will actually reply. You'll just get the same sort of replies you have done from here.

 

[bcmedia]

If you check copyscape you'll see that even partial duplicate content can be flagged (so if you've modified small parts of the content its still isn't enough).

I think the two major things brought up are the content and the links. No magic tricks required there, just some good, unique content for your pages - takes a while to write but Google tries to reward those who publish good content.

 

[PredatorNutrition]

I have taken on board what people have said here about content and begun to modify the descriptions a little - basically by adding a block of text immediately at the start of the product description so for instance on the link below:

http://www.predatornutrition.com/pd-napalm-4oz.cfm

I have added this text:

"
WARNING: Napalm Can Cause Serious Damage To Fat If Used Properly. Napalm Will Initiate Fat Cell Destruction Upon Application To The Skin!"


I noticed that this type of Ad copy/hype is one thing most of the biggest sites in the field tend to have just before the product descriptions (although many which rank well still do not).

Should this brief amendment to the descriptions (otherwise unchanged) be enough to not be penalised (if indeed that is one of the potential causes of the problem)?

 

[david64]

Should this brief amendment to the descriptions (otherwise unchanged) be enough to not be penalised (if indeed that is one of the potential causes of the problem)?

I don't think the duplicate content has anything to do with your tanked rankings. As you have pointed out, your competitors have the same text. However, adding a single line to the top of the product descriptions is not going to fool search engines. You would need to either change whole paragraphs or substitute at least one word in every sentence.

It could be a real boost to put the hard work in and get this text re-written. Since most/all of your competitors are using the same text, it will be a lot easier to rank for product searches as they are all taking a hit with the duplicate content filter. Products searches are also good converters as people are specifically looking for a certain item.

As others have mentioned, I would just wait. These things tend to happen with sites that are new and or don't have much of an incoming link profile.

 

[4little1s]

Have followed the thread....we appear to be in the same boat. Suddenly dropping from P1 and P2 for our keywords, to off the planet, roughly about a week or so ago.

We haven't done anything we shouldn't have...am just waiting as per advice on this thread. However if anyone can spot any 'clangers' it would be appreciated.

 

[david64]

@4little1s - I have just had a look around and can't see any glaring problems. The only things that I could say are:

* You have a great big links page - I am guessing that is reciprocal. If you are doing reciprocal links it is best to think out of the box. Do something like set up a glossary and add recip. links to relevant sites.

* Also you are using Actinic, which is a terrible eCommerce option that churns out loads of invalid HTML including elements in the Actinic namespace (<actinic:* />). The HTML is a jumbled mess. I also noticed that when I look at your source code, your site pushes my CPU up to 100% use. Not sure why that is.

How long have you been running those adverts for? Sites that are pushing aff can sometimes get booted.

 

[fisicx]

Predator,

If it's just a glitch in the system you should be back where you were in a week or two.

If it's not a glitch then it means Google does like your site anymore. It's no good complaining that everybody else uses the same content, this and all those wonky links could be the very reason why you have dropped down the index. Funny how the guys on the Google forum all suggest the same thing.

And a UK wide search for 'Reversito' has this thread and the one on the google forum ranking well thereby proving that unique content prevails.

 

[OldWelshGuy]

There has indeed over the last 2 weeks een a major shift in spam filtering on Google. many sites have dropped, while others have flown up to take their place.

Too early to tell really, but it looks liek some sort of llowering of the bar on dupllication, tied in with backlink quality. In short, over all footprint tightening.

That said, it could just be a glitch, and one should NEVEr make changes to a site that have been nailed during an update, as it is impossible to monitor cause and effect.

 

[4little1s]

@David64 - Thanks for the comments, been running the adverts for about a year, hasn't had any effect previously..... Will see what I can do with the HTML.

Note sure if this is related but we seem to have lost about 600 odd internal and external links today according to Google Webmaster !

 

[david64]

Note sure if this is related but we seem to have lost about 600 odd internal and external links today according to Google Webmaster !

This could be because Google have de-indexed sites that were linking to yours or you had site-wide links that have disappeared. Think those are the most likely issues. I have had a look at your Yahoo links and there is not much to go on this from there.

Re. your HTML, I don't think there is much you can do about it. Actinic is a disgusting brute. I doubt it will have had any impact on your SERPs. I am familiar with creating XML parsers (the same things that read HTML) and your HTML is still readable. I just mentioned it as I couldn't really see much wrong with the site.

 

[PredatorNutrition]

Any SEO companies who can correctly diagnose and provide a solution to this please let me know and we will take a look at your proposal.

I spoke to a contact at Google's Adwords dept who said he will ask someone to take a look and he did not think the content would be an issue given that every other site using the same content has not been flagged. Nor did he think that forum sponsorship should result in bad results as otherwise other companies doing the same thing (for much longer I might add) would be tagged as well....

 

[OldWelshGuy]

Any SEO companies who can correctly diagnose and provide a solution to this please let me know and we will take a look at your proposal.

I spoke to a contact at Google's Adwords dept who said he will ask someone to take a look and he did not think the content would be an issue given that every other site using the same content has not been flagged. Nor did he think that forum sponsorship should result in bad results as otherwise other companies doing the same thing (for much longer I might add) would be tagged as well....

The guy at Google adwords was talking rubbish then, he is way out of his depth on this one

Google use a base 5 sliding scale algorithm. That means that with the 250 or so elements to the ranking algo, ALL of these are relational, and all can be altered by plus or minus value of base 5. So quite how he can say that because other sites haven't been affected it can't be x. y or Z, is beyond me.

Let me try to explain.

A site might have a spammy title, but it has decent links, and because of that, Google forgive the spammy title, as it is scoring above the bar.

The site loses some of its high quality links, and now the 'trust' element has dropped, and that spammy title is now seen as spammy, and alters the rankings.

What caused the ranking drop, the loss of links or the Spammy title ?

 

[4little1s]

Been following thread and we are still nowhere to be seen in Google for our keywords. Just checked out MSN and Yahoo ...we are on page 1 no problem....very confusing !

Have left it for about 3 weeks now thinking it will 'recover' (sales dropped off cliff)

Contacted Google for reinclusion but havent heard anything. Its very wiered and so extreme hwcih is odd....ie Google nowhere to be seen, MSN and Yahoo P1...HMMMMM

 

[webgeek]

I've had this happen on a couple of occasions, and probably almost had it happen on dozens of others.

In my case, Google took exception to my rate of inbound link acquisition and over-SEO'd inbound link anchors. I had the sites optimised just a little too well, and had pounded a ton of free directory submits all at once.

Yes, I tried de-optimising, to make it look more natural, and tried filing a re-inclusion request which fell on deaf ears.

In both cases, the sites originally had ranked top 5 for several terms, then was slapped down on all but 1 (each). The re-inclusion did nothing. Waiting 6-7 month, and voila one of the sites magically re-appeared top 5 for everything. I'm still waiting for the 6 month penalty time to expire on the other.

Supposedly these penalties are to prevent us from buying links for SERPS, keep us from over-optimising (which can hurt user experiences), etc, etc. Instead it just makes us better tight-rope walkers on the line between enough and too much promotion...

 

[peterjhale]

'4little1s - there is sometimes no easy answer to getting a penalty in google which you may or may not have.

Having a look at your backlinks google may have discounted some of those and they are not really of a high enough quality.

From this google has most of your site in its supplementary index (meaning mostly that your home page or inner pages are just not powerful enought) - see this query
http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=site:4little1s.com/*&btnG=Search&meta=cr=countryUK|countryGB where really you just have 20 pages - and 3 of those have duplicate metas

But there may be other fundementals at heart.

Just a quick look over your home page, and you have not 1, not 2 but THREE H1 tags in there. I mean that is just kinda spammy these days.

Other things to do:
- add your site to google webmaster tools and look through all the reports there to see if that says anything
- put your site into copyscape because there may be similar pages on your site and other sites you may own, this page http://www.4little1s.com/acatalog/ is almost identical to your home page
- Google (and I guess the other SEs) are indexing your popup images which may also be seen as duplicate content. eg: http://www.4little1s.com/acatalog/info_292.htm

I think you have a lot to do. Start with your home page and any other main category pages (like the acatalog index page) and sort them out, then go one category at a time.

 

[david64]

Supposedly these penalties are to prevent us from buying links for SERPS

If that was true I think there are much bigger fish to fry, like all the insurance companies that spend in excess of £5,000 each month on links.

Having a look at your backlinks google may have discounted some of those and they are not really of a high enough quality.

I've also had a look through the links and they are certainly not that good, but again there are so many more people with lower quality link profiles. Doesn't make sense why 4little1s should be hit. In fact, I know a competitors of theirs which has an awful link profile and gets serious traffic from Google.

From this google has most of your site in its supplementary index ...
http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en...ryUK|countryGB where really you just have 20 pages - and 3 of those have duplicate metas

Excellent observation. That could very well be the sort of reason you are having problems. You have 535 pages index by Google, but they only think 20 are really worth looking at. More good advice from Peter there. In the same vein, I also noticed your homepage title is really long and very unnatural.

I also just found this:

http://4little1s.4little1s.com/

It looks really spammy. Along with all those category links at the bottom of your page. There are also a lot of problems you have with the URLs and the HTML is very messy and contains a lot of non-existent HTML tags.

You need to have a massive on-site clean up and fix some of the architectural issues of the site and remove spammy content like this: http://4little1s.4little1s.com/

 

[david64]

http://4little1s.4little1s.com/ <- regarding this. I think if Google found that as an autonomous "blog" that they would remove it from the index completely. If I were you, I would get rid of that ASAP.

I'd also look at getting a new eCommerce system. Your current one is outdated and is causing numerous problems. Then, look at making a site that is not explicitly catering for search engines.

 

A site might have a spammy title, but it has decent links, and because of that, Google forgive the spammy title, as it is scoring above the bar.

whats a spammy title.?

If you can answer that your a better man than I Gunga din.

Earl