Click here to read Dan’s article about the recent Google algorithm changes and minisite slaps!
Question of the week:
Have your niche-site rankings suffered since the recent Google change?
Cheers,
Please leave a comment below.
Note that I don’t reply to all comments, but I do read them all. If I don’t reply to your comment, it most likely means that I agree with what you say and don’t have anything meaningful to add, myself. I appreciate and read all comments and your comments play an important part in what I write about, so keep them coming.
Spammy comments are always filtered or removed. No surprise there.
Note that I don’t reply to all comments, but I do read them all. If I don’t reply to your comment, it most likely means that I agree with what you say and don’t have anything meaningful to add, myself. I appreciate and read all comments and your comments play an important part in what I write about, so keep them coming.
Spammy comments are always filtered or removed. No surprise there.
Gosh this must be esp! I just posted about this on E1kAD.
I read Daniels post about an hour ago and found that my older sites haven’t changed when I looked into them. They are all EMD and small focused sites, I have P1 listings on Google still, no change at all. They have mainly articles pointing to them no profiles or anything along those lines.
I’ve set some Adsense sites up over the last three months and it’s difficult to tell with them as they are moving about more so I don’t yet know if they will settle high or low.
It will be interesting to see what others have found. I read a lot of the comments on Daniels post and it does seem others are experiencing a hit too!
I’m all for not putting my eggs in one basket so am focusing on other things for now. My niche sites are just one element of a handful.
Thanks
Lynne
The algo has definitely slapped me. Adsense is my big income earner, and my income has dropped off by about 40% so far this month.
Guess it’s time to promote more affiliate stuff. Like Lynne said above, best not to rely too much on a single thing.
But who know? This could be temporary too. It will be interesting to see how things look with Adsense by this time next month.
Ouch, 40% is a big drop. I do hope your sites recover.
Diversifiying is certainly a good idea. Maybe some modifications made to the slapped sites could also get them back on their feet, though.
The Guru’s will trick the newbies into buying there high ticket items and I guess they can live with that.
You have choosen to do your marketing with Integrity and have found a loyal following.
I’m in for the long haul and appreciate you work.
Thank you
Richard
Just come back from vacation without internet connection :) and found that my best Adsense/Amazon site is dropped down and an another Adsense/Amazon site jump up for their main keywords. Both made exactly the same (WP theme, plugins, backlinks and so on) just for different niches.
I checked one of my niches for best coffee maker keyword and found out that pages 1,2,3… of Google is mostly occupied by Adsense and/or Amazon affiliate sites such as bestcoffeemaker.net – so business as usual.
I do not see much change here.
P.S. The article from Daniel McGonagle is good but too misty – no solution, no exact criteria, just description of what happening, as author fairly noted it.
Good that you got one increase in rankings to go along with the drop of another site!
I agree with your “business as usual” assessment. I’ve certainly seen many typical affilite sites still ranking on page one and I have some very thin sies myself, that have not been affected by the change.
So, it’s still not quite clear what exactly happened, but it’s not the apocalypse, I’d say. :D
IMO I don’t think Google has time to look at each of these sites that Dan and Ben discuss (the article by Ben was much more informative; http://www.makemoneyonlinewithseo.com/how-not-to-make-money-online/).
Rather I think Google did a once over analysis, then altered their algorithm so that if you have an adsense site, and it has x number of sites with ads, and those sites have x # of pages, with x amount of content, etc, etc. Then if you reached that threshold, boom everything got de-indexed or penalized. Not fair? Maybe. But, remember that these guys were gaming the system to force an outcome that is NOT in line with what Google or any other search engine considers their model, that is to provide quality search results to people who use their search engine so that they will continue to use it.
Here is a Warrior post explaining a technique that I have found to be effective. http://www.warriorforum.com/adsense-ppc-seo-discussion-forum/309407-tutorial-screenshots-here-how-build-sites-google-looooves.html.
Thanks for your honesty Shane. I enjoy your work.
Thanks for your reply!
That first link isn’t working, though. I took a look through the site, but couldn’t find the article you referred to. If you see this, it would be cool if you could post the correct link. thanks!
Somehow the parentheses got included in the link. Its the article by Ben that Dan references. Here it is;
http://www.makemoneyonlinewithseo.com/how-not-to-make-money-online/
I have several established (2 years+) websites where the income has increased over the past 3 months. These are WP and Html and are all content rich sites which are updated regularly – none incorporate Adsense.
I have others which are a bit skinny (work in progress sites) and I have noticed a reduction in traffic to these and therefore a reduction in income. These sites do incorporate Adsense but are essentially content sites and are earmarked now for further content and additional quality backlinking. I’m not a great fan of Adsense so a reduction of income from Google does’nt concern me unduly.
I have always tried to work on good content researched and written by myself having tried the outsourcing approach with not a great deal of success.
The internet is evolving and Google is endeavouring to stamp it’s authority on quality content and so it should considering the absolute rubbish out there.
Give Google what it wants and you won’t go far wrong.
Google’s ultimate goal is to show the most relevant content possible, no doubt about that.
I also believe that creating really high quality, targeted content is a long-term strategy that should continue working indefinitely.
On the other hand, I’m often too lazy to create such content myself…
Hi Shane,
Cool info … Not surprised about the $$ this site makes directly or indirectly :)
I saw Dan’s article too … interesting …
My sites (all low comp/ med traffic) sites with Adsense were not impacted but then again Asesnse is the secondary monetization method on those … My first Adsense focused site is still being extricated from the basement (I got a little aggressive regarding comp when I set that one up) …
So about new products … There is a rumor about something that blows Optimize Press away? :)
Jim
Hi Shane,
actually i’ve experienced a bit of both up and down rankings. my sites geared mostly towards adsense dropped a bit whereas my main larger sites with a bit more content seemed to fair better. more of my keyword phrases on the big sites got a bit of a bump up.
my take away from this is that the fundamentals are still at play here and that no matter how we want to try to get around it, the facts STILL point to content. you would think that after everything is said and done we would get it, but it seems that google continues to have to make it’s point. i would be interested though, in knowing how the content farms are fairing during all of this.
Hi Shane,
Well, I’m one of those who subscribed to your list, bought some of your products and as of yesterday also a SwissMade Marketing affiliate – All because of the honesty in your reviews, the valuable information on your blog and the personal help I got from you from time to time whenevr help was needed.
From my perspective too it definitely does you good.
Keep it up!
The IM Impact site is nice for review content. I would refer this page if there’s relevant product review. Your reviews have been straight forward and helpful.
Not sure about the Google change. Everything appears normal. I did have a (page disappear) then a ( post rise to page one #7 ) at http://secockpit.info keyword (SECockpit). Maybe that is normal! I liked my Home Page better, but google wants the post.
Q&A
1. I missed the boat on the adsense challenge. I would like to learn more on this. Do you have any recommended e-books to read?
2. IM Automator is a product integrated into SECockpit user campaigns section. What kind of review do you give this program? I did not see a review in Backlink Battleplan.
Note: I use Backlink Energizer, Article Ranks ( moving to Build My Ranks, and Authority Link Network).
Regards,
Stanley
You can go here and sign up for the AdSense challenge: http://activegrowth.com/adsense-challenge-liftoff/.
It will put you on an autoresponder sequence where you will get the challenge updates at the correct intervals, automatically. :)
IM Automator is very interesting because it can be used for free. The premium version I’m not so sure about. I guess it’s okay, but not an earth-shatteringly good tool. Although they have added article submissions recently, which is a cool addition.
Wow…I’ve NEVER had a site make even close to $700 – 1000 a month. It’s interesting you don’t consider it that much money. Hopefully, soon, I’ll have a site which doesn’t perform as well as this one. LOL
I didn’t mean to complain about the earnings. I’ll take an extra $700/month anytime. :)
But I have some sites that get 10x less traffic and make $100-$300/month with just a trickle of traffic, compared to what imimpact gets.
Also: I don’t have THAT many sites. Just wanted to mention that in case someone reads the above and thinks I have an armada of sites making 3 figures a month each. I also have my fair share of duds that make me nothing. ;)
Shane
You are one of 2/3 marketeers that I now follow. I have purchased a couple of your products and subscribe to SEO Cockpit. I admire your honesty and integrity in a marketplace where thing are getting from bad to worse.
Keep up the good work and I’m sure I will be buying more products from you in the future. Also, thank you for all of the free high quality content!
Des
Thanks for your comment, Des!
Hey Shane,
Great video, thank you.
Yes, I assumed you’d earn more monthly income than stated. However, I can see where giving HONEST product reviews AFTER having actually USED the product could be more damaging to affiliate sales. Nevertheless, it’s probably the main reason why your readers continue to subscribe and follow you.
Keep up the great work and stay honest!
Take care,
Fred S.
I too have noticed some drops and my income on one Adsense site has dropped by 50%. As it was only making $10 a month I don’t think my Bank manager will notice.
I am going to look more seriously at video marketing as it would appear the way to go. With that in mind I will sign up for your Screencast course!
Hey, I’m with Olivia. So what kind of income would rank highly on the Shaneometer? Ha! Making money on the net is hard! Well, raking leaves is harder, but making money on the net is long, anyway…unless you are some kind of whiz kid.
I have been busy plugging away out here with many and vast entrepreneurings and projects, so I haven’t done a site check lately, except for my latest work. A quick view just now doesn’t show much change on the older sites.
One that does bother me a great deal though was sent to the underworld in Google awhile back, for reasons I can’t fathom. I always figgered it would dance back to the top, but it hasn’t. Google still ranks it at PR3, but my big muckity muck keyword has vanished. If you visit Bing and Yahoo, it sits at the top of the page…as usual. And that word is… “xxx merchandise.”
The sad fact, in my humble experience, is that the tippy top ranking on any other search engine means diddly. If Google takes a disliking to your wares, you are yesterday’s news. Google giveth, and Google taketh away. Blessed be the name of Google.
As Google gets more powerful and continues to suck the life out the competition, and insinuates itself ever more into our lives, this illustrates the danger of too much power in one central location. It’s the old old story of monopoly.
But I rant. In the meantime, I continue to look forward to your Sunday updates, and I never come away without some new thing to apply to my work.
Norm
Yes, Google is really all that matters for traffic. Top spots on Yahoo and Bing really don’t deliver many clicks, even for “good” keywords.
Who knows how long the Google monopoly will last, though? Things are changing so fast online, maybe in five years people won’t remember what Google is anymore. Or perhaps we’ll all have Google-barcodes tattooed on our foreheads…
The link works for me Shane,
and I much prefer this guy’s response to Daniels.
http://www.makemoneyonlinewithseo.com/how-not-to-make-money-online/
Wayne.
Thanks!
Hi Shane,
I saw a pretty good increase in the rankings of my adsense site in the last week. from nowhere to page 2. I have been working on that site with your BB for about a month now. I was initially a bit disappointed as i was not getting any ranking improvements even after following the BB. However, i still kept at it and i guess i got the reward for that. I am gonna keep at it until it gets to top 3. I still havent made any money from it. i guess after reaching the first page, it might open its account.
Shane, your products are awesome. so much so that i bought the ghosturl product as it was quite quite cheap and i thought i will use it in future. but still havent used it. I would really like to buy you focus & product and also the video product (which i have been waiting as i am preparing to launch a niche site with videos to establish myself as an expert) but i am on the border as the cash is tight at the moment.
Hopefully i would be able to buy at a low price.
thanks
chirag
Hi Chirag,
Yeah, it can take a while for SEO efforts to really show results. On my own AdSense site (the first one), I couldn’t believe how long it took me to break into the top 100 for even the easiest keywords.
If you keep plugging away, it always happens, though. :)
I’ll be doing a lower-price WSO for the video product, after the price increase, so never fear.
Dan’s article – plus the many, many comments there start to paint a picture of several common threads to the ranking drops: High-Earning AdSense sites seemed most under scrutiny. Young sites more vulnerable. ‘Thinner’ sites with few pages more vulnerable. Auto-Blogs, which have a very obvious sort of footprint; vulnerable.
I have no doubt from my own sites and direct observations – around mid January (post Holiday shopping season)- Google did indeed start to ‘tighten the noose’. But that’s nothing new. It’s just getting better at it with each periodic algo update.
Agreed.
I also suspect that Google went and slapped people who simply have a huge number of sites in their AdSense account. If someone has 200 sites using AdSense, that’s a pretty clear indication that we’re dealing with MFA sites, I’d say.
Hello Shane,
You know, on second reflection, this new news has me flummoxed. After going back again and reviewing more closely, yes, I can see where one site in particular may have fell into the Adsense trap. It was making 3-5 bucks a day and then poof! It is made in the common fashion of having an Adsense ad where the links bar would normally go…all per well known practices. It has top positioning on Yahoo and Bing, but it has been sent to the back of the line for my top keywords on Google. It’s all right there plain as day on Google Analytics.
Even better, I think I managed to get myself partially sandbagged by too aggressively promoting another site in the last couple of days with backlinks. Sometimes in the heat of backlink battles, especially when you are winning, you just have to know when to run away and call it a day. I pulled the plug on the backlinking campaign, but it was already too late. Ah, before the fall goeth pride.
Norm
Don’t give up on the sandboxed site. That should come back with continued linkbuilding. Don’t know about the AdSense site, though…
My experience has been to keep promoting even though it drops. I had a position 4 site for a very competitive key phrase. I noticed some of the gorillas appear on the 1st page namely Amazon and Ebay and started to panic a bit. What was worse was the pages were optimised!. I started back linking the living day lights out of the key phrase and was promptly dumped out of the index or so it appeared. 4 weeks later after continual back linking it suddenly re-appeared at No.2.
I think if the quality of the site is good enough then it will come back and probabaly even stronger!
I also noticed a .org site I have which was at no.4 for a reasonably competitive phrase in the UK rankings suddenly disappear from the UK Serps only to go to no.1 in the US rankings. 2 weeks on it still hasn’t showed it’s face again in the UK but still ranks no1 in the US? Weird! It’s an adsense site so it doesn’t matter but I would be a bit miffed if it was promoting UK affiliate offers!
You need to get some Adsense on here mate!
So, Brian’s answer is to NOT sit on his hands and hope for salvation. Brian says to just promote the dickens out a vanished property. I might have to investigate that, and I know just the buried site to do it with.
Hmpf. The problem with friend Google, methinks, is that it is NOT linear, in that there is no guaranteed dependence to be put into it. (Ergo the disclaimer on truthful SEO sites.) It’s the abslolute definition of a damaged personality. You’re sitting there yelling “cat.” at it, and it’s hearing you say “froppage.”
lol, I like that analogy!
It sure does move in mysterious ways, sometimes.
Shane recommends Terry Kyle’s Hydra course. You need to buy it and study it.
Over promoting in the last couple of days with a few backlinks is not going to upset Google! And by the way stop yelling “Cat”.
Hi Shane,
Please keep up the excellent work you are doing. May I make a suggestion? When you review a product you almost certainly build up an excellent understanding of how the product can be used to advantage. Why not produce an “imimpact report” on these products providing advice and tips on how to get the best out of them. This is the added value that you can provide when visitors buy through your affiliate links.
Email me if you would like any help with this.
Regards,
Les
You’re right, that’s something I probably should do and it would likely increase the profitability of the site as well.
It’s more a question of having enough time to create such reports, but I think I’ll give it a shot with a review sometime soon and see what happens. Thanks for the suggestion!
I’ll share a quick experience with this latest algo change. I have quite a few websites in my business, but one in particular that got hit with this latest change was an Amazon review site I created and have been building for nearly 2 years. All original content and most of the reviews are 1200-1600 words. Site has over 80 pages and was ranking #1 for most of its top keywords for close to a year now. Individual product names also ranking in top 10, etc.
Then a few days ago it got hit. Went to the bottom of page one for a major keyword, and other keywords slid to page 2,3 and beyond. Went from 300 uniques a day to 25. Sales went from 10-25 items a day to 1. Income is basically gone as you can imagine. Linking has been BMR, articles, web 2.0 sites, etc.
My thoughts… Google’s SE results are a mess right now, moreso than I’ve seen in recent years with all their changes. I’m seeing things that don’t make a bit of sense showing up in the results at the moment.
I plan to continue building and letting things settle down as they always do. I believe that the results will return within days or a few weeks. If this has happened to you and you have a solid site, don’t give up on it. Keep going and things should return fine. But it can be a bit unnerving if you have never been through it before.
I am sorry to here that David. It is what we all dread. As you say though I am sure if you keep building it will come back. Good luck!