Hampstead
Joined: Feb 20, 2001
# Posts: 1985
|
Posted: 09/09/2005 02:07 am
I have just received an email from Google about one of my test sites telling me that it is being blacklisted for 30 days.
the site in question uses doorway pages with JavaScript redirects to the home page.
It is the JavaScript redirects that have fallen foul of the algo. Google have sent me a link to the quality guidelines and also sent me a link for re-inclusion.
All in all, I think this is a good thing. Sites banned for use of cowboy tactics, which I agree that doorway pages are, will now be told why they are on penalty and how to get out of it.
I'll post again later to let you know how the re-inclusion goes.
|
 |
JakeJeck
Joined: Nov 15, 2000
# Posts: 131
|
Posted: 09/09/2005 07:03 am
How did they know what address to send to?
|
|
g1smd
Moderator
Joined: Jul 28, 2002
# Posts: 10178
|
Posted: 09/09/2005 01:27 pm
Are you sure that mail really came from Google; check the message headers? Might be someone messing about?
In any case, that exact topic (Google penalising sites using some types of JavaScript redirect) has been mentioned by GoogleGuy (over at WMW) in the last 48 hours. They are on the case of many black-hat spam techniques at this moment.
It might be one of your competitors who faked the mail, but there is a very good chance that it is real. I have heard of Google contacting sites they wanted to include, several years ago - those were sites blocking access using robots.txt or the robots meta tag.
If you're spamming then the watchword is:
Affear!!
[ Message was edited by: JimBot 09/21/2005 11:13 am ... Reason: Spelling ]
|
|
Hampstead
Joined: Feb 20, 2001
# Posts: 1985
|
Posted: 09/12/2005 05:33 am
Looks legit to me.
Email was sent to the email addresses found on the website. Also to generic addresses like webmaster@ and the like. I was also surprised to find that the host were coppied in too.
Here is an excerpt from the email.
Begin forwarded message:
From: Google Search Quality DO NOT REPLY <DONOTREPLY@google.com>
Date: 8 September 2005 23:10:04 BDT
To: admin@globalgold.co.uk, technical@globalgold.co.uk, [addresses removed]
Subject: Removal from Google's Index
Dear site owner or webmaster of [url removed],
While we were indexing your webpages, we detected that some of your
pages were using techniques that were outside our quality guidelines,
which can be found here: [link]
In order to preserve the quality of our search engine, we have
temporarily removed some webpages from our search results. Currently
pages from [url removed] are scheduled to be removed for at least 30 days.
Specifically, we detected the following practices on your webpages:
On [url removed], we noticed that pages such as
[url removed]/flight-to-sydney-australia.htm redirect to pages such as
[url removed] using JavaScript redirects.
We would prefer to have your pages in Google's index. If you wish to be
reincluded, please correct or remove all pages that are outside our
quality guidelines. When you are ready, please submit a reinclusion
request at [link]
You can select "I'm a webmaster inquiring about my website" and
then "Why my site disappeared from the search results or dropped in
ranking," click Continue, and then make sure to type "Reinclusion
Request" in the Subject: line of the resulting form.
Sincerely,
Google Search Quality Team
|
|
Logan
Moderator
Joined: Aug 14, 2002
# Posts: 3749
|
Posted: 09/12/2005 06:23 am
Thank you for sharing the email. It is helpful.
My two cents - You didn't email them asking and get that as a response? Not normal if it is the case (some say it crosses the threshold of spam even) but perhaps something new and a good thing. I'd want to know, so would be pleased to get the email. I'm still interested if it is legit. For example, can you check the ip of the email header that it was sent from and verify where it was sent from? I have a tendency to believe you Hampstead without doubt, but it would be something 'new' if it is the case so authenticity should be considered by those on the forum.
Regardless the advice is solid and should be followed.
|
|
Hampstead
Joined: Feb 20, 2001
# Posts: 1985
|
Posted: 09/13/2005 01:06 am
Logan, The message was delivered to info@url.com unsolicited.
I haven't had chance to check the headers properly. I will though.
The site in question has not gone on penalty in the traditional sense where the PR is reduced to 0, but the pages in question with the JavaScript re-direct are no longer ranking for the keywords so it correlates with the email.
It is worth pointing out that there are some more test pages there too using flash redirects and these have not yet been flagged up. I'll post again with any further news.
|
|
flyer77
Joined: Sep 14, 2005
# Posts: 3
|
Posted: 09/14/2005 11:21 am
This is very interesting if true. I've never heard of an SE informing someone that they were being delisted, let alone telling them why. If they're doing that, it's a good idea.
I recently had a site delisted that had 200 or so pages of original content, PR 4 on the home page, several years old, no redirects or anything like that, even listed in dmoz. I have no idea why- I think they are randomly dropping sites in some cases.
> I was also surprised to find that the host were coppied in too.
Why? This has nothing to do with hosting. Google can drop the site, but what does the host have to do with it?
|
|
g1smd
Moderator
Joined: Jul 28, 2002
# Posts: 10178
|
Posted: 09/14/2005 11:27 am
The host would know who the webmaster is, and could forward the message if necesary. Just hedging their bets on the email getting through, I suppose.
|
|
Hampstead
Joined: Feb 20, 2001
# Posts: 1985
|
Posted: 09/15/2005 02:59 am
The site has now been dropped from the index.
PR n/a
I've filled out a re-inclusion request. I'll keep you posted.
|
|
Logan
Moderator
Joined: Aug 14, 2002
# Posts: 3749
|
Posted: 09/15/2005 01:22 pm
Thanks for keeping us posted Hampstead.
This thread here got a bit of attention today at ThreadWatch and Matt Cutts has commented that it is a new trial -
http://www.threadwatch.org/node/3843#comment-23690
Google is trying out a pilot program to alert site owners when we're removing their site for violating our guidelines. JavaScript redirects are the first trial, but we've also sent a few emails about hidden text, I believe. This is not targeted to sites like buy-my-cheap-viagra-here.com, but more for sites that have good content, but may not be as savvy about what their SEO was doing or what that "Make thousands of doorway pages for $39.95" software was doing. Personally, I think opening up a line of communication to let webmasters know when we're taking action is a really good thing--a site owner doesn't have to guess about what happened. But again, we're starting with a trial program.
I think this is a further sign that google is changing its tone on some key seo issues. I think this is a good thing.
|
|
msuggs3
Joined: Jun 06, 2005
# Posts: 40
|
Posted: 09/15/2005 02:53 pm
I think it may be a way of "outing" the competition. Google has motives behind every move, so I'd be interested to see where this experiment leads.
|
|
St0n3y
Joined: May 01, 2002
# Posts: 1620
|
Posted: 09/16/2005 08:10 am
I'm all for this. It may have some unintended consequences, but for now I think its a good thing. This will definately hurt many SEOs that run afoul of the engines.
|
|
philh
Joined: Sep 14, 2001
# Posts: 3050
|
Posted: 09/16/2005 08:36 am
Whilst I think this "help" for spammers and/or bad coders is commendable - I do think Google should help the "white hat" SEOers who follow the SEO guidelines only to be sandboxed for 9 months or a year.
Ending penalisation for putting the keyphrase in the title, adding a site map, adding more content and submitting to directories, etc should be a higher priority to G than helping the JS redirect/white on white text brigade, whether done intentionally or on purpose.
IMHO of course.
|
|
ortelius
Joined: Jun 25, 2005
# Posts: 1
|
Posted: 09/17/2005 05:21 am
Quoting philh:
Ending penalisation for putting the keyphrase in the title, adding a site map, adding more content and submitting to directories, etc should be a higher priority to G...
What do you mean? I didn't know there was a penalty for any of the above. I do it all the time. Seems like good SEO to me.
Ortelius
|
|
g1smd
Moderator
Joined: Jul 28, 2002
# Posts: 10178
|
Posted: 09/17/2005 11:33 am
... and so it should be; but some people are claiming they did all of that, and "by the book" too, yet Google still dropped them.
|
|
noon_an_night
Joined: Apr 06, 2005
# Posts: 51
|
Posted: 09/17/2005 08:41 pm
I have never heard of SE emailing a SEOer about their site getting penalized...sounds suspicious.
|
|
g1smd
Moderator
Joined: Jul 28, 2002
# Posts: 10178
|
Posted: 09/18/2005 12:31 am
There are mentions, even 2 years ago, of Google emailing sites to say they really like the content but their spider is disallowed or some technical problem with the site is stopping their bot; so this is not new.
Matt Cutts in his GoogleBlog, and GoogleGuy over at WMW have confirmed that Google is now writing to site owners about certain spam techniques - in case the site owner was not aware that their SEO is dodgy.
|
|
kencarroll
Joined: Sep 20, 2005
# Posts: 1
|
Posted: 09/20/2005 03:48 am
You're lucky to have had feedback from Google. My site, and many thousands of others, were banned last May, just after Google got is license to do business here. (I'm based i n China.) This was a disaster for us and it was caused by the same re-direction pages that we had used for 2 years without any problems. We got no feeback, not guideleines, nothing,even after I emailed several times, apologized, etc.
I can't tell you how much I resent Google. They treat people (especially anyone from outside the US) with contempt.
[url snip]
[ Message was edited by: Logan 09/20/2005 05:29 am ]
|
|
tarr
Joined: Sep 19, 2005
# Posts: 15
|
Posted: 09/20/2005 07:04 am
flyer77 wrote>
I recently had a site delisted that had 200 or so pages of original content, PR 4 on the home page, several years old, no redirects or anything like that, even listed in dmoz. I have no idea why- I think they are randomly dropping sites in some cases.
Same happened to me. My site was PR 6, no tricks, just ONE redirect whose aim was to notify an URL change.
|
|
Logan
Moderator
Joined: Aug 14, 2002
# Posts: 3749
|
Posted: 09/20/2005 10:43 am
This has been tested only for about '100' so far so I think the scope of this should be kept in perspective.
Matt Cutts has followed up regarding Hampstead here
One thing we found was that Hampstead got an email to the technical & admin contact email from a whois search. So we’re going to change it so that we try not to email those addresses.
|
|
