Bourbon, Sandbox and Google.

Re: Bourbon, Sandbox and Google.

SEO Dave wrote:[color=green]
>>Look after your old domains, they may be the only chance that you will get.
>I'd agree with this.[/color]

Recently the UK registrar reclaimed one of my domains - it was one of
the really old ones from back in the late 80s registered with the
University of Kent so you didn't have to pay an annual registration fee.
Nominet didn't like this and made it difficult to keep the domain.

I moved all the content to a new domain... about 200 pages that had been
around for a number of years. Initially I noticed some heavy traffic to
one or two pages - when Google found the content it was seemingly
placing the pages very high in results which matched the Title keywords
- way above much older and better ranked pages. After a couple of weeks
though things settled down and the pages ended up pretty much where they
had been with the old domain. These are just some obs for the record and
this is not an optimized site so maybe with a heavily optimized site
things would have been much different.

The recent Google patent, if any of it has been implemented, would
suggest that new domains with what Google considers unnatural link
growth could be penalized, but there is also the suggestion in the
patent that new domains and links could also suggest fresher content and
so should rank higher than older domains. It all depends on the nature
of IBL acquisition.

A lot of what I see on WMW is voodoo and not analysis. Just coz some of
the guys consider themselves net gods shouldn't lead people to consider
their word as 100% gospel. The Sandbox is frequently used as an excuse
for sites that have many other problems.

Re: Bourbon, Sandbox and Google.

On Sat, 04 Jun 2005 17:10:35 +0200, Big Bill wrote:
[color=green]
>> What is the story behind 301/302? I did some URL shuffling on my site
>> once
>> I read some of the SEO advices, however, as some of old links have been
>> published I am using 301 to redirect visitors. Problem is Google still
>> tries to visit these old URLs.
>
> My guess would be here that the links to these old urls are rarely
> travelled and so Google hasn't got the redirect process into its
> muddled head yet. In time it will. Or it should.[/color]

OK. It is too short to say, besides, every datacenter does crawling on its
own - so perhaps every have to get its own 301. So far three crawlers did
it in about 10 days intervals for one of my pages. I am too lazy at the
moment to do some deeper analysis.

But I was referring to something other - I believe I have seen some
between lines information on possible penalties for 302? I did a mistake
of using default php header("location:...") function and it sends 302
instead of 301. I wonder if it can do any harm to my site?

Best,
Borek
--
http://www.chembuddy.com - chemical calculators for labs and education
BATE - Base Acid Titration and Equilibria
program for pH calculations
CASC - Concentration and Solution Calculator
program for solution preparation and concentration conversions

Re: bon

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In Jez wrote:
>I took this from WMW - the thread URL is at the bottom.
>
>I lay awake last night thinking the very same as this guy wrote about
>the sandbox and how sandbox combined with new algos must be hurting the
>web design quarter and how we are all on a knife edge with no apparent
>way of coming back with a new domain if a domain is lost - possibly from
>no fault of our own - one day google loves what you do and the next day
>the new algo doesn't support your tactics.
>
>Look after your old domains
>they may be the only chance that you will get.
>
>I thought I would post it here before it gets censored by WMW.
>
>Jez.
>
>---------
>
>Dear Webmasters and readers
>
>
>???Google is the biggest spammer the internet has ever known???
>
>Hopefully my post here will stay as it is unlike the shambolic vestiges
>of my previous posts that were either fragmented to Brett?s taste or
>splintered in a way to make google and GoogleGuy look good. If any
>editing is indicated below
>please disregard any of the contents in this
>post.
>

If you are concerned about your posting being altered, you should PGP sign it.
This way alterations are obvious to anyone who attempts to verify the signature
because a digitally signed message will NOT verify if it's been altered.

Then all you need to do is make your readers aware that only the pgp signed
version is from you.

-----END TYPE III ANONYMOUS MESSAGE-----

Re: Bourbon, Sandbox and Google.

SEO Dave wrote:
> On Sat, 04 Jun 2005 10:43:14 +0100, Jez wrote:
>
>[color=green]
>>I lay awake last night thinking the very same as this guy wrote about
>>the sandbox and how sandbox combined with new algos must be hurting the
>>web design quarter and how we are all on a knife edge with no apparent
>>way of coming back with a new domain if a domain is lost - possibly from
>>no fault of our own - one day google loves what you do and the next day
>>the new algo doesn't support your tactics.
>
>
> To date I've not had a single domain that fits the so called sandbox
> effect and in the last two years I've registered about 40 domains and
> created various extra sub domains (that to Google are separate sites)
> so this is based on a fair sample of new site.
>[/color]

Dave,

I don't think that the same rules can apply to you. You have an
extraordinary amount of resources at your disposal and are unlikely to
even notice the sandbox as you can just "outlink it" for want of a
better expression. Your sites are probably reacted to by google as a new
popular viral sort of site as links are added steadily and smoothly.

I on the other hand have just enough resources to trigger the sandbox
every time.

A prime example is my blog http://www.hitfix.co.uk/blog/ - I put it up
to react to an unfavourable building project near me (planners want to
build 2,600 new houses on a notorious flood plain) and now that the plan
is approved and going ahead, my blog is just starting to rank for the
phrase "Horley Master Plan" and is currently 3rd on google (I have now
broadened my horizons to the South East Plan which is a plan to build up
to 33,000 houses PER YEAR across the South East - which I also rank
nowhere for).

This is typical of today's google in my view as stuff like this needs to
get coverage fast or it's yesterday's news and an opportunity to raise
awareness is past.

The rest of the site is also "dampened" though not surprisingly as it's
a testing ground with half finished ideas and plans. 🙂

Jez.

Re: Bourbon, Sandbox and Google.

On Sun, 05 Jun 2005 12:27:42 +0100, Jez wrote:

>I on the other hand have just enough resources to trigger the sandbox
>every time.
>
>A prime example is my blog http://www.hitfix.co.uk/blog/ - I put it up
>to react to an unfavourable building project near me (planners want to
>build 2,600 new houses on a notorious flood plain) and now that the plan
>is approved and going ahead, my blog is just starting to rank for the
>phrase "Horley Master Plan" and is currently 3rd on google (I have now
>broadened my horizons to the South East Plan which is a plan to build up
>to 33,000 houses PER YEAR across the South East - which I also rank
>nowhere for).

I understand your frustration, but is the above the sandbox effect as
I detailed in the last post, or Google ranking new sites very, very,
very slowly?

Did you have a big boost in traffic at first (did you rank for "Horley
Master Plan" quite quickly) and then for no apparent reason the
traffic dried up?

If you didn't see this it's not the sandbox effect.

I know to you it doesn't really matter since the bottom line is your
new stuff isn't getting ranked quickly, but if you understand you
aren't being penalized per se, just Google has changed how it ranks
new sites (and in my experience it effects almost all the ones I've
done) you know given time it should come good (a new site isn't new
forever).

So this problem is solved with patience, not very helpful for a site
like you describe above where time is a big factor, but then your new
project "South East Plan" might not be held back because the site is
older now.

Used to be little difference between a new domain and an existing
domain when new pages are added, now there clearly is a difference in
most cases.

It does make sense for Google to do this, before you could put a site
up and in a few months have a lot of visitors. Now you need to be
willing to market the site for a year basically.

Short term gain from building new sites has been decapitated by
Google! You have to really plan ahead now.

David
--
Free Search Engine Optimization Tutorial
http://www.seo-gold.com/tutorial/

Re: Bourbon, Sandbox and Google.

SEO Dave wrote:
> On Sun, 05 Jun 2005 12:27:42 +0100, Jez wrote:
>
>[color=green]
>>I on the other hand have just enough resources to trigger the sandbox
>>every time.
>>
>>A prime example is my blog http://www.hitfix.co.uk/blog/ - I put it up
>>to react to an unfavourable building project near me (planners want to
>>build 2,600 new houses on a notorious flood plain) and now that the plan
>>is approved and going ahead, my blog is just starting to rank for the
>>phrase "Horley Master Plan" and is currently 3rd on google (I have now
>>broadened my horizons to the South East Plan which is a plan to build up
>>to 33,000 houses PER YEAR across the South East - which I also rank
>>nowhere for).
>
>
> I understand your frustration, but is the above the sandbox effect as
> I detailed in the last post, or Google ranking new sites very, very,
> very slowly?
>
> Did you have a big boost in traffic at first (did you rank for "Horley
> Master Plan" quite quickly) and then for no apparent reason the
> traffic dried up?
>
> If you didn't see this it's not the sandbox effect.
>
> I know to you it doesn't really matter since the bottom line is your
> new stuff isn't getting ranked quickly, but if you understand you
> aren't being penalized per se, just Google has changed how it ranks
> new sites (and in my experience it effects almost all the ones I've
> done) you know given time it should come good (a new site isn't new
> forever).
>
> So this problem is solved with patience, not very helpful for a site
> like you describe above where time is a big factor, but then your new
> project "South East Plan" might not be held back because the site is
> older now.
>
> Used to be little difference between a new domain and an existing
> domain when new pages are added, now there clearly is a difference in
> most cases.
>
> It does make sense for Google to do this, before you could put a site
> up and in a few months have a lot of visitors. Now you need to be
> willing to market the site for a year basically.
>
> Short term gain from building new sites has been decapitated by
> Google! You have to really plan ahead now.
>
> David[/color]

Dave,

What do you make of the sandbox filter removal tool at
http://roberttaft.com/no_filter.htm

Search for The South East Plan without filters on that and you get my
site in the results - whether this just removes all filters or just the
sandbox ones is another matter!

Jez.

Re: Bourbon, Sandbox and Google.

SEO Dave wrote:

>
> I understand your frustration, but is the above the sandbox effect as
> I detailed in the last post, or Google ranking new sites very, very,
> very slowly?
>
> Did you have a big boost in traffic at first (did you rank for "Horley
> Master Plan" quite quickly) and then for no apparent reason the
> traffic dried up?
>
> If you didn't see this it's not the sandbox effect.

Dave, I missed replying to this bit.

It's very difficult to tell whether there was a boost in traffic - it's
a very low traffic phrase. I can only assume that it fits the sandbox
effect as it seems to be following all the other sandbox criteria. It's
suddenly appeared this morning at 62 (UK search) for "South East Plan"
which I can only assume may be slightly higher traffic but the SERPS are
dominated by .gov sites that are pretty hard to beat!

The blog went up in February. Other parts of the site still seem
sandboxed (I didn't think this could happen) but again, very difficult
to tell as other parts have few links and little or no concept.

If you want to see my prime example of a site that has been sandboxed
for over a year - since last April, let me know and I will email you the
URL.

Jez.