I don't need to tell you that Google is the most powerful web searching tool in town. I use it for everything: phone numbers, random information, pictures, restaurant reviews, recipes. And it used to be that if you Googled certain terms--cupcake, rhubarb, bra stuffing--my website would come up high on the list. Now my website doesn't come up at all. That's because more than a month ago, Google completely dropped me. No matter what you type in their search engine--even if you type "Amateur Gourmet"--you won't find a direct link to my site in the results.
This is sort of devastating because more than 50% of my hits, back when I was on Google, came from Google. And though I'm still doing well, not being on Google is sort of like losing a kidney. Sure, I'll still live without that kidney but I'm that much closer to death.
I started a correspondence with Google these past few weeks which concluded with the following e-mail from them:
Hi Adam,
Thank you for your reply. We strongly encourage you to review our
Webmaster Guidelines at www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html. If you
make changes to your site to comply with these guidelines, please let us
know.
Regards,
The Google Team
The subject of the e-mail was "Re: [#372636XX] (SPAM: 7.238) Re: Dropped From Google."
I've studied the Webmaster Guidelines and I have no idea what I'm violating. The fact that the subject has "Spam" in it makes me think they think I'm spamming the internet somehow.
So I turn to you, my savvy readers, to help me get back on Google. I defer to your superior knowledge of search engine politics and pray that you have more insight into this than I do. Hopefully, together, we can get me back on Google and when we do we'll celebrate by bringing our laptops to a central wireless location and Googling food related material into the wee hours... Oh the fun we'll have... Thanks in advance.
Comments (25)
That's too bad about Google but if it's any consolation, at least your website comes up first when typing "amateur gourmet" in Yahoo.
Posted by Carlo | November 28, 2005 3:17 AM
Sure would be nice if they gave something useful. The only thing I can think of quickly looking at it is that your robots.txt file seems to be a link to:
http://6a.typepad.com/robots.txt
Perhaps google sees that as you forwarding or something? Maybe you need to put one on your actual domain.
Posted by ExtraMSG | November 28, 2005 3:52 AM
One more thing. I'd suggest filling in your meta tags more. Just viewing the source of your site, it doesn't seem like there's much there. I can't imagine that *should* matter though.
Posted by ExtraMSG | November 28, 2005 3:54 AM
You know, there are people out there doing comment spam and using legit blog addresses in their comments. So, they put in their info and stuff within the comment to get visitors to their site, but the address of the person commenting shows a legit blog. I complained about some poor student because he was spamming my blog. Only he wasn't.
That's probably what happened to you. I don't know how you could prove it's not you...except, if whoever might have accused you of spamming could give them the IP address that went with your supposed comments, that might be/probably would be the spammer's IP, rather than yours.
Ask them who says you've been spamming, and ask them for the particulars. You can't defend yourself if you don't know what you've been accused of. And it's pretty tacky of Google to just drop you and not even tell you 1. that they were doing it, and 2. why they were doing it.
Posted by B'gina | November 28, 2005 4:50 AM
Adam,
Sorry to hear your google woes. The internets work in mysterious ways I suppose. A while ago I suddenly got a whole bunch of emails from my readers telling me that they could no longer access Chez Pim from their office computers -something about my blog being blocked for porn or some such things.
I didn't even have a clue whom to complain to. It just all sounded so arbitrary -why would anyone think Chez Pim is a porn site? And wouldn't you think before they put me on the blocked list they'd at least take a look to see for themselves! So my answer to my readers was, sorry but I guess you'd just have to read my blog at home.. :-(
Again, good luck with getting back on Google.
cheers,
Pim
Posted by Pim | November 28, 2005 5:22 AM
Did you try asking TypePad? I know that Anil from Six Apart is something of a search engine genius.
Posted by brian w | November 28, 2005 7:11 AM
The "Spam" in the subject line most likely has nothing to do with your web site -- it comes from Google's spam filter, which flagged your email to them as possible spam. I wouldn't worry about that.
If I were you, I would reply to their email and say, "I believe that I am in compliance with Google's WebMaster Guidelines and would like my site to be added to Google's results."
Posted by CM | November 28, 2005 8:43 AM
Adam,
I assume you've already seen this, but in case not:
http://www.pandia.com/features/banned.html
Sounds like your problem is a part of the site not conforming to a guideline rather than a lack in traffic, but for what it's worth, you will be amazed by the amount of inbounds you get from including "Giada De Laurentis boobs" somewhere in a post.
Posted by Holy | November 28, 2005 9:27 AM
Google is like the Stalin of the internet. Have fun in the gulags buddy.
Posted by The Daily Kirk | November 28, 2005 9:56 AM
robots.txt is a good place to look for problems.
Also look at the program Google has where you can specifically *tell them* about your site. Info is at https://www.google.com/webmasters/sitemaps
Posted by willson | November 28, 2005 10:25 AM
Unfortunately, I don't think anyone at Google can/will help cause it's all done completely robotically. I had the same experience. Used to be when I googled my name I got ME... my websites. Now I get three porn stars, two doctoral candidates, a serial killer, a professional basketball player and a mother of six from Utah, before I get any of my websites. Just one idea: links, somehow it seems that the more links...to you and from you...the higher your ranking. Just a hunch but perhaps worth looking into. Good Luck.
Posted by patricia | November 28, 2005 1:23 PM
i second robot.txt and https://www.google.com/webmasters/sitemaps. google's search engine user will not tell you any specifics mostly because that's starting to give away ranking algorithm secrets which they need to guard carefully. however, i'm sure you can get back up there. maybe some nice search engine optimizer would help you out of the kindness of their heart?
Posted by anonymous | November 28, 2005 2:52 PM
I got hundred of hits the day before black friday, because I posted a list of black friday deals I copied from a website. So...if you just want lots of hits...go to bf2005.com and copy&paste one of their deals list to your website and watch the visitors start pouring in... of course then you'll have to explain to them why they're at your site... haha... sorry I know this is totally random... but that's my experience with google.
Posted by Amy | November 28, 2005 5:12 PM
I would suggest just emailing them back and saying that you are now in compliance with the guidelines.
Don't say "I think I'm in compliance" or "I'm already complying..." -- make it seem like you made a change...
"Hi, I looked over the Google Webmaster Guidelines and made sure my site complies with them, and now it does, please reinstate me!!!"
Also, make sure your robots.txt file isn't doing something to piss off Google, like excluding it... if you don't know how to do that, ask your web host about it.
Chances are it was an automatic thing where they changed their ranking formula and your site got hurt in that process. I don't think an actual person does any of these changes, so getting more inbound links, and making sure your site is accessible to Google (by making sure robots.txt is not prohibiting it in any way, and your site has a friendly link scheme - which it seems to) is the way to get back up on the listing.
Posted by M. Bean | November 28, 2005 10:17 PM
I just looked over the guidelines more closely...
This is a typepad hosted site right? Is it available through a typepad domain name as well as through amateurgourmet.com? If so... Google might think you have a duplicate site scheme running (as they might have indexed it initially at the typepad address, then again at the amateurgourmet address, then seen that they were the same and thus in violation)... might want to have that looked into.
Also, make sure that you aren't being linked by illicit sites that could get you in trouble... I know you don't have control over other people's links, but it would at least explain some of your problems if you determine that scam sites of some kind are linking to you (if you have been completely snarked from Google, then you'd have to use other search engines to figure this out).
Posted by M. Bean | November 28, 2005 10:38 PM
Hi Adam,
Google will not penalize you for any spam sites that link to you, but it will penalize you if you link out to known spammers. Where might this happen? In your comments. I found what looks to be a spam comment here:
http://www.amateurgourmet.com/the_amateur_gourmet/2004/01/comment_prompt__3.html#comments
Look at the last comment. My suggestion, delete all comments more than a month old, or go through each and every one, and check each and every link to make sure that it is legit. Delete any that aren't.
Posted by elise | November 28, 2005 11:29 PM
Those google bastards. They're worse than Bill Gates and Microsoft, thinking they own the fucking world.
Of course, I did google my blog every day for a month before they noticed me. When I finally showed up, I was giddy like a hard-nippled kid eating a tootsie pop.
Posted by allhookedup | November 29, 2005 12:39 AM
It's more than just a matter of bad rankings. He's flat out erased from the database right now as far as I can tell. You can't even do a site search of amateurgourmet.com.
Another issue, and you can't be blamed for this one, is perhaps they do think you've been prostituting your site or something. I mean, you've got great coverage if you do a search for "amateur gourmet" on google you get tons of hits on other sites.
The problem isn't that google has such a policy. It's part of what makes their search engine actually work. The problem is that it's so damn difficult to rectify the problem. Screw being like Microshaft. It's like Experian or the other credit bureaus. Try explaining that you're not the John C. Harper that has had two cars repo'd like my friend had to so that he could buy a house. Fight Club!
Posted by ExtraMSG | November 29, 2005 3:58 AM
Could this have anything to do with the fact that your banner changes regularly? I don't know if it is a flash item or not, but maybe it is in a format that breaks your searchability.
Or...Could it be the "dating hook up" thing you are doing? Is that considered somehow illicit or off-topic? Does it seem to invite persons with intentions not as nice as what you intended? Again I don't know.
Also check your trackbacks because apparently there is a way for spammers to use those too. Read what Typepad has to say about spam commenting.
Posted by Andrea | November 29, 2005 4:20 PM
I was thinking along the same lines as M. Bean - duplicate content.
The other question I have, Adam, is did your site always have the same structure?
amateurgourmet.com/the_amateur_gourmet/blah?
I seem to remember there was no directory with the underscores.
Posted by Greg | November 29, 2005 5:18 PM
Andrea: I can say with substantial certainty that it's not the dating hookup thing or the banner. For one, many sites that *are* indexed do this, and they are hardly prohibited content -- for Google or elsewhere.
Furthermore, his removal occurred quite some time before those things took place anyway, so there's the issue of time order... or rather, it's a non-issue because of the time order.
Greg: To further expound on your theory (good point, btw)... if his directory structure did change (I've been reading for a long time, but never paid much attention), and the old locations were not properly redirected, then Google might have seen that they disappeared, and seen that a number of old URLs and links suddenly became "dead" and the robot might have "decided" that his site was no longer around and removed it.
It's a possibility, anyway.
Also, elise: Google *does* penalize you for "spam" sites that link to you, very much so, in fact, because your link relevance is diluted... you'd essentially drop to the bottom of the results. Of this I am 100% certain. *However,* you have to be in the database first for this to happen (heh), and at the time I wrote my initial conjectures, I hadn't completely realized Adam's site was not just pushed to the bottom, but totally obliterated from Google, which is baffling to say the least. He's not even around to be penalized in the first place...
I still think his best course of action is for him to write and say that his site now complies completely with their guidelines and he would like to be reinstated. For good measure, I went to Google's "add a site" page and manually submitted his URL for review by Google to be put in their database. Dunno if that will help, but it couldn't hurt.
Posted by M. Bean | November 30, 2005 3:10 AM
Something else just dawned on me...
Google's Terms of Service for their advertising stuff are notoriously restrictive... he might want to make sure that he didn't, say, accidentally say something bad about Google ads, or try to pimp for hits, or otherwise violate those terms, which would have put him in bad stead with Google... I would assume the penalty for that is being kicked off the advertising service, not total removal from the Google index, but it's something else to look at.
Posted by M. Bean | November 30, 2005 3:17 AM
I'll post this one anonymously...
You may get more flies with vinegar than sugar, ultimately, on this one. (Yes, the turn of phrase is intentional.)
There are more and more tech journalists who are anti-Google as they get bigger and bigger. And the anti-corporate culture in America is clearly growing, especially within the media.
Therefore, you may want to actually push the story out to the media if they continue to be less-than-helpful. Frankly, I think they do their product a disservice, but also it smacks of the sort of attitude Lily Tomlin lampooned in her famous SNL commercial ending with: "We don't care. We don't have to. We're the phone company."
Posted by Anonymous | November 30, 2005 3:17 PM
I think it might have something to do with the whole typepad thing. I saw a couple of similar problems in the google forums with this suggestion...
Your other website isn't an alias...but a mirrored domain. Put a 301
redirect on the one you want to use all the time or you will get
banned for spam.
Posted by jonathan | November 30, 2005 7:18 PM
try reading through some guidelines here: http://www.seomoz.org/beginners.php
The link was just posted on slashdot.
good luck!
Posted by jm | December 7, 2005 6:56 PM