New Sites Put Into a "Sand Box" by Google Options

[rustybrick]

There is a large amount of discussion on this topic given the name, "sand boxing". It appears that Google is holding out on new domain names for a 2 - 4 month period of time. So a new domain name might rank very well a few weeks after the site is launched, but soon after it will get bumped down in the results for a 2 - 4 mont period for no apparent reason.

Instead of restating all the information, there are two blog posts at the blog I run. Both link to threads at other sites, including WMW and IHelpYou.

The reason I am posting this topic here is because this forum has some of the smartest members and I value your feedback. I have read most the other threads (still going through the private forum at WMW). Your thoughts?

Here are the links to the blog entries on this topic:
http://www.seroundtable.com/archives/000346.html
http://www.seroundtable.com/archives/000368.html

As always, thank you.

[MrCrip]

I am seeing exactly this pattern with a site that has gone live within the last few weeks.

The site was spidered well and was holding its own in Google and then it was gone. I do expect the site to surface again within the fullness of time, it is interesting to read that there appears to be a pattern to this.

[Grumpus]

I'm not so sure this is really anything new. With a new site (and even a new page, really) Google makes a guess as to the PR. This guess has always been pretty generous. Then there's the "fresh bonus" that gives a page that has fresh content a little kick in the pants to rank well.

So, right there, you have two pretty important factors that are elevated over what the page is likely going to even out as. It ranks well at first because of the guessed PR and the fresh bonus and once the real PR kicks in (and the fresh bonus goes away) it'll settle down.

It's not that new sites are getting penalized at all, but rather, new sites are getting a free bonus for a while when it first starts.

G.

[rustybrick]

G.,

These sites are not ranking even for really really non competitive keyword phrases.

[bwelford]

rustybrick, my experience is in line with that of Grumpus. The web pages are still indexed but may fall off the radar for a month or two. Are the web pages you're looking at still in the Google database?

[rustybrick]

Well its not really me. Its tons of SEOs. I have one site that follows this pattern, but I am not too upset about it, like others are.

I will give you an example of a situation from my client.

airmontinc.com, use to rank number 2 from Feb 5th to Mar 11th for "Negative Pressure Isolation Rooms". Now that is not competitive at all.

March 17th it jumped to the 25th position and remained there even after a few minor tweaks.



Again, this is not a huge deal for me but I know there are hundreds experiencing the same thing.

[added for further clarification] Even with a PR2, this site should rank #2 for such a non competitive keyword phrase.

[zapataz]

From what I have read on WMW there is a difference between the normal boost n drop for new sites and what people are seeing now.

The problem is with sites that are more than two months old but first went online this year. Sites are still in the index and do ok for some less competitive terms. Sites did well for a short time then dropped but never bounced back. Sites are not showing in top 1000 for competitive terms. Sites have PR from 5 to 7 and come top 5 on yahoo. Same SEO’s have optimised older sites which rank as expected. Some big name SEO’s effected.

Lots of theory’s as to why people are seeing this

[rustybrick]

Yea I know. Hoping to get the magic answer here. Ahem...

[zapataz]

Sure would be nice to know why so many are seeing this and if its going to be the norm. Most of the sites i work on are new and the normal 6-8 weeks i’ve been telling people no longer seems to apply. Guess i’ll have to change that to 6 weeks to possibly some time this year maybe

[sanity]

I'm not so sure this is really anything new. With a new site (and even a new page, really) Google makes a guess as to the PR. This guess has always been pretty generous. Then there's the \"fresh bonus\" that gives a page that has fresh content a little kick in the pants to rank well.

This is something totally different and being discussed in many forums. Sites get crawled and indexed fine but they don't rank even for basic phrases.

I'm seeing it on a number of sites I run.

[rustybrick]

So your saying that this particular site seems not to be in a "sand box"?

[HHI Golf Guy]

I would agree that there is some sort of waiting period. We launched a new real estate in mid-March with about 90 pages of solid content (not including the dynamically generated listings) and 60+ backlinks (all PR4+).

We happened to catch a PR update cycle that found some of our links and we started out with a PR4. Considering that there was only one competitor at a PR5 and a couple at PR4 in our main key phrase we figured that we would soon be ranked well in at least one of our 3 main phrases. Heck, only 4 other agents/brokers showed up on the first 3 SERPS - the rest were mostly directories, newspapers, and a few regional publications.

Google has spidered almost all of the site, yet we still show poor results on our main phrases (i.e. city name real estate or city name MLS). But we have had a bunch of hits on our content pages that are optimized for the various residential communities.

It's disheartening that a site that is light years ahead of the competition in its content is not even ranked against these poorly designed sites that hardly have less than half of the backlinks. Not only do these sites have a low PR, but so do the few sites linking to them. Go figure!

We do have an upcoming project on a site that has been around for a few years. It will be an interesting comparison to see how their rankings change.

[Black_Knight]

It has been exceptionally difficult to get a real handle on this because I don't personally have any site affected by this. I'm having to go on third-hand reports, with no sure knowledge of what has changed or when on the site.

Naturally enough, a lot of people with classic known problems are automatically blaming this new thing for their own problems too, of course, and thus clouding the issue by putting in data that obscures the trends of what we want to examine.

What I have so far looks like it is something again related to link structures, and I'm suspecting it is a little bit connected with hilltop too. Its a very early observation, and one that is nowhere near conclusive or authoritative, but all the examples I've looked at had been given 'seed PR'. That is, they'd all had their links worked on to gain PR right from launch.

Now that of course is not a normal pattern for an average new domain. There are times of course whena big company launches a new service and it can instantly gain huge PR - but I'm suspecting that there may be a notable difference that Google have been able to detect on the amount of 'Authority score' versus the amount of 'hub score' that such genuine cases have, over sites that are simply being given some seeding PR.

That's the rawest of guesses right now, and something you guys will need to examine for yourselves. I don't have a test site to examine here for this scenario, and it would take me a couple of weeks or more to get one seeded into the position we're trying to examine.

I just haven't got the raw data to which I can attest to all factors that I need for a real analysis.

[peter_d]

RustyBrick:

It's certainly widespread. It's affecting too many new sites to be a localised blip, and it's something that started happening after Florida. Many new sites are getting indexed, but aren't ranking.

Why it's happening is anyones guess, athough I have my suspicions....

[sem4u]

One site I look after was launched at the end of January. It is now a PR5 and should be able to compete in the top 10, but it is simply not there for the most competitive phrases.

[peter_d]

It is now a PR5 and should be able to compete in the top 10, but it is simply not there for the most competitive phrases.

You're not alone, sem4u

[sem4u]

I know. Taking a look through various forums quite a few new sites are affected.

[rustybrick]

That was the type of feedback I was expecting. Thanks.

Not sure if it is worth continuing this thread but I will give it a shot.

I have read the WMW threads also, most are saying that these sites are well linked to and have nice PR. But not all, so is this clouding the issue? I don't think so. Based on what I have been reading, it seems to be unrelated to linking because of the widespread reports on sites that have one backlink and sites that have thousands of backlinks.

I have one site to test with. The site has a single backlink from my news section. In reality, my news section outranks my clients main keyword (I am in the 1st position, my client is in the 18th position for the same keyword). Based on what I have read, building links will not resolve the current issue, although it can't hurt.

I have told my client to try to build links by finding out where the competitors were listed and ask people in their industry to link to them. But I was upfront, I told them that I have no real idea why this is happening. The keywords are not competitive at all (FYI they did not hire my for SEO, just to do the Web site), so they did not bring in much traffic in the first place. It just bugs me to see this happening because I know it should rank at least #2 for 99% of its keywords.

Back to what is occurring on a more global level...

The only pattern I see from the threads is that these are new sites. I see a wide range of backlinks reported, a wide range of styles of on-page optimization. Only pattern is the site was launched after December.

[bwelford]

rustybrick, I'm in a holding pattern on Google backlinks at the moment.

I was very struck by a comment by Ammon in a thread on Backlinks in Yahoo just a few days back. I find that the Google results on backlinks are more variable than I am used to seeing. If Ammon's thought on Google's concerns are correct, then this may explain why they're trying to throw the dust up in everyone's eyes.

[rustybrick]

Barry W.,

If that is true, which I am sure it is. Why would this "sand box" effect be happening to sites with very little backlinks, where there is no "manipulation" flag being raised?