Google Slower to Trust New Pages than One Year Ago?
-
It seems to me that Google is slower to trust (and rank) new pages today than in the past.
I used to be able to put up a new page and it would go right to the top of a competitive SERP.
For about the past year when I launch a new page it starts deep in the SERPs, sits there for a few weeks, then starts slowly moving up. These pages still eventually rank on the first page of Google - often at #1 or #2 after wikipedia or another strong site - but it can take a few months to get there, several months in a competitive SERP.
These are not "hot news" topics where freshness is an important factor. Instead they are product pages or general information articles.
Anybody else seeing this?
[ Just stabbing in the dark here... I am wondering if Google is relying more on visitor behavior these days and the delay is while they collect data?... Just stabbing in the dark.]
-
Thanks for the report, Jesse.
-
Thanks for the analysis. Your description makes a lot of sense. Maybe that is what Google is doing. Assessing to see if all of the boxes are checked.
-
The keywords that the articles target have a Moz KW Difficulty of about 50%. All of this is being done without any linkbuilding or other promotion. Just the ranking power of unique, substantive content on an authority domain.
A year ago these pages would have gone to the first page of Google within 24 hours. Now they still go to the first page but it might take 24 weeks.
-
Is it weird that I like this way better? It's making me work harder, but I think it's much more "fair."
-
Nice work on getting those quick rankings.
These types of results are becoming hard to get.
-
...in the past you'd see them have a big jump quickly and then start to fade back down...
Right... in the past a good page on a strong site would bust right to the top and Google would play "whack a mole". Now the good pages on a strong site will start deep in the SERPs and without promotion, they will climb slowly to the spot that you would have initially expected them to rank.
Instead of "whack a mole" google is saying... "prove the you deserve it". At least, that's what it looks like to me.
-
So I just 404'd an old page and changed it's URL and re-launched it last Tuesday. Today it has been indexed and is on page 3 for a fairly competitive keyword. That was much quicker than I expected.
Granted, I built a few links for this one last week and didn't let it just go without but I still find this relevant.
Also, I still feel like a few months back this would have happened by Thursday/Friday of last week.
Anyway that's my latest findings.
-
I'd agree. I think the reason is because there are so many boxes to tick nowadays if you want to have good rankings in the SERPs. Google is looking deeper into every website now (after Penguin 2.0) and this is clearly having an affect on how quickly websites are ranking for keywords on deeper pages.
On the flip side, whereas rankings would jump around quite a lot in the past, as Google as delved deeper into a website, hopefully once a new website has its rankings, there shouldn't be too much fluctuation which is great as you can put some budgets, strategies and plans in place.
-
It must depend on the keyword because in the past few weeks, I've had a couple of brand new domains hit the first page of Google very quickly. It's not for ultra competitive keywords, but it isn't for bad keywords that people aren't searching for either.
I've got well over 1,000 website that I do testing with, I'll add another 50+ this week to do some testing on.
Any particular keywords you guys want me to test? Give me something that is middle or the road, nothing too hard or easy, that way we should get some pretty quick results.
-
Good chance either some or all of these things happened:
a.) your competitors had built links through black-hat seo firms
b.) you are a victim/beneficiary of the Google Honeymoon (keep building links/content and don't be sad if you disappear in a few days back down the SERPs. You can gain it back quickly!)
c.) your content was stronger and your keyword/on-site SEO work was done proper
-
Social media plays a big part in getting noticed, crawled and indexed faster by Google, Bing and Yahoo. When launching a new website, try registering the main social networking channels (Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, YouTube, LinkedIn) and complete user profiles, including the URL of your new website. If you regularly update each social media channel, connect with other users, and post relevant content, you may find that your new site gets indexed faster.
-
I launched a dental website a couple of months ago and within a month, we had incredible keyword rankings ahead of many of the competitors in the same town. We had a brand new url, brand new content and everything. So in this case, we seemed to rank well in a short amount of time. Our content was nothing special, but unique of course. I am still scratching my head to figure this one out!
-
ABSOLUTELY!
I'm so glad I'm not the only one. Lately I've re-launched a few penguined pages with new URLs so the 404 would rid the black-hat action. The keywords have slowly regenerated whereas in the past you'd see them have a big jump quickly and then start to fade back down (if your SEM campaign didn't keep up of course.)
Anyway I definitely have been seeing this lately. Good topic. Makes me feel better.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Renaming web pages vs new web site
I am struggling with renaming a lot of my web pages because I used short form acronyms vs long form keyword page names and now my pages aren't ranking where they should be and used to be. I am weighing a whole new web site or just a massive update with new page names. I also have an old domain that 301's to the new url but the old one outranks the new one. If you search google for cheap tubes the first domain you see is www.cheaptubesinc.com (the 301'd version) when the real url is www.cheaptubes.com. I know I am getting a duplicate content penalty and when moz crawls my site they see 2X the page that I really have. I tried fixing this with canonical tags but it only helped 5 pages according the moz crawls since doing them. Since last July 4th my business has been declining and I know there was an SEO algorithm update last July 4th. I think either method of renaming the web pages with better SEO for instance cheaptubes.com/single-wall-carbon-nanotubes.htm vs cheaptubes.com/swnts.htm as it is currently. In either case, it is still an HTML 2 website done on frontpage and the question I keep asking myself is if I should just scrap the whole site and start over with a more modern format. Should I try to get a new site together with good SEO and publish it quickly vs rename and 301 a bunch of pages? What about the old site? Do I need to track the old page names and 301 them to the new ones? Any help is appreciates Mike
Content Development | | cheaptubes0 -
Google Image Search - How to rank?
Hi, How would you optimise for rank higher in image search? Any tips/rules which need to be applied. Thanks.
Content Development | | Bondara0 -
Have i got my google adsense in the right place
Hi, i am working with a new site which is in wordpress and i am just wondering if i have the google adsense in the right place. I want great user experience but i also want maximum exposure to earn money to pay for the site. I must say i have no experience with google adsense, have used it for a couple of years but never sure where the right places are to put it. here is the page and i would be grateful for your thoughts. i was thinking of moving the top google adsense above the title and replace it with a 300 by 250 box in the middle of the content and either keeping the bottom or moving that to the side. any advice would be great. http://www.cheapflightsgatwick.com/rome-the-ideal-location-for-a-wedding-abroad/
Content Development | | ClaireH-1848860 -
Google Authorship for guest posts
I've set up google authorship on my site and my image appears in search result for posts.I run wordpress and my categories are also indexed but it doesn't show up for categories of posts? Is this possible? My other question though is that I do a lot of guest posting and want to get credit as a google author when I post on other people's sites. What code do I need to add at the end of guest posts so that I'm credited as the author via google authorship?
Content Development | | SamCUK0 -
Hit With Panda, How Should I block pages?
Hello! I believe Ive been hit with Panda, I have a large Ecommerce site with literally thousands of pages, but working on adding custom content daily. Should I block pages that have duplicated copy, that dynamically insert a product/artist/team name? Will this help with my huge ranking drop? If so after this has been done should I send a request reconsideration to google? Or will it just happen automatically? I believe this is a algo penalty and not manual, as I have not received any messages in my Webmaster. Any help would be greatly appreciated!! Thank You!
Content Development | | TP_Marketing0 -
Does Google really ignore Noindex pages?
Assume I may have some pages of my site that don't have a lot of text on them, and I have to keep them on the site. Let's say there are no more than 50 like this out of 400 great pages, and the ratio of great-to-short pages continues to increase. If I no index the short ones, will Google really ignore them in search? Will they ignore them enough to not downrank my site due to the short, noindexed pages? I know, theoretically, they are supposed to ignore them, but I don't always trust all the rules.
Content Development | | bizzer0 -
Blog and Website = 2 different URL's - Is it WORTH to merge content on to one site
Good day Mozzers! A friend of mine recently asked for my help in regards to online marketing. While getting familiar with his online presence, I realized that he has a blog hosted under a completely different URL Main Site = http://pardons.org/ (page rank 4)
Content Development | | vip4service
Blog = http://pardons.wordpress.com/ (page rank 3) What I am battling with is whether or not he should take all of the blog content he has, and merge it on to his main site. It has over 280+ blog posts spanning over a few years, so there is A LOT of content that could benefit his main site. However is it worth it, or should he continue to run everything as 2 different sites? Also, of you suggest moving the content over, what would be the best way to do it in your opinion? He currently has links on his blog TO his main site, so there is a little bit of link juice there, but with a average of 300 views a day, he only get about 10 clicks to his main site from the blog. Thanks a ton for your help!0 -
New Magento store with lots of duplicate contect
Hi, I am fairly new to SEOmoz and would really appreciate some pointers. I have just received the results of my first crawl and I have over 1800 pages of duplicate content. this is an example Cream poplin slim fit mens business shirt from Jermyn Street Shirt Co. http://jsshirts.com.au/aylesbury-cream-poplin-slim-fit-shirt.html Heading other URL's indicates 10 My questions are what does this figure 10 represent? what do I need to do to remove this duplicate content. Thanks | | | | |
Content Development | | mullsey
| | | | |
| | | | |0