Oct. 2005 Google Update "Jagger"

[flam]

Guys,

I see huge changes in rankings for some competitive terms (including seo terms) and I see it on all servers (I mean all that I know).

So far I find results almost laughable , well that's my opinion though.

Can someone with more expertise confirm there is something going on ? And confirm that the result is definetely as bad as I see it

[I, Brian]

Definitely a big update just hit.

[flam]

Hey Brian,

So far it doesn't look good at all right ? Or am I not being objective ?

[jestep]

Definitely looking at a huge update / algo change. I am seeing massive changes for everything, and it looks like sites who actually optimize are being hit hard. I already hate this update.

[sem4u]

Something big is definitely going on. One of my sites is doing a lot better and one is doing a lot worse...

[glengara]

From what I see from my "test" site, internal links/anchor text appear discounted, inner pages that ranked solely on internals have mostly dropped 15-30 places.

Sort of makes sense, last big change was when they dropped file names from their allinanchor calculations....

[search10]

No update going on, but a lot more panic activity. Why Google wants to add millions more pages from 2004 is anybody's guess.

[flam]

It looks like a lot of supplemental pages ranking there, and some real junk sites/pages are doing well.
Looks a bit like if the results were bringing back websites from before february 05 ? Which is insane

[Chris_D]

New post in Matt Cutts Blog today......

...Or a few European folks might have noticed some changes around Oct. 7, 2005. Or some people might have noticed some changes this past weekend.

Just to give you a heads-up, I think a new set of backlinks (and possibly PageRank) will probably be visible relatively soon; I’m guessing within the next few days. I still expect some flux after that though, just to let you know.

http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/more-info-on-updates/

[scubajared]

I am in utter awe at these changes going on in Google. I run a Miami real estate site for a client where we had #1 rankings for almost every building in South Florida and first page rankings for bigger search terms. Before Sunday we received visitors from over 250 different search terms a day from Google and after Sunday 50. I would understand if our site was replaced with sites with better content but the sites that jumped ahead of us were sites I have never seen in Google and sites with little to no content.

Ex. Sunny Isles real estate - We use to be number one for this term for over 6 months without spamming the search engines and only doing SEO by the guidelines. We are now second from the bottom and been replaced by sites that have little or no content

<snip>

even Yahoo Dir jumped in front of us

Is it just me or does it seem that Google dumped millions of pages into their index just to say they are the biggest and have no processed the pages?

I don't think I am being bias when I say that this update has filled Google up with less relevant sites and seems to reward sites that does not practice any SEO. What are your opinions on what is going on here?


Thanks

Jared

[5starAffiliatePrograms]

Jared, I got hit too so have been doing tons of research.

Over at WMW there is a huge long thread about it and FYI they are reporting that the whole real estate industry seemed to be hit hard by this fubar update or glitch or whatever it is. I still have a sneaking suspicion it's the canonical issue again. (canonical URL issue Google seeing www and non-www as dups.) I know just enough to be dangerous, most of what I have learned has been from trying to figure this thing out over the past few days.

Just in case it is the canonical URL issue, here are some resources.

Easiest plain english description I have found.
http://www.socialpatterns.com/search...ith-redirects/

Interesting stuff about Matt Cutts own blog having canonical URL issues.
http://www.seroundtable.com/archives/002603.html

http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/bacon-polenta/
Read the whole thing so you don't tak this out of context, but here is part of what Matt (GoogleGuy says)

Why my site disappeared from the search results or dropped in ranking” and click continue. In the webform that you get to, make sure you put “canonicalpage” in the Subject line, then put the details in the Message body. Someone will route that message to an engineering mailing list where we dissect claims of canonicalization problems (that is, picking the wrong url).

I also got one email today about a site being indexed under both www.domain.com and domain.com. The proper procedure (assuming that you want www.domain.com to show up) is to make domain.com do a permanent (301) redirect to www.domain.com.

How to fix - How to do a 301 re-direct
http://www.webmasterwoman.com/design...-homepage.html

I'm not smart enough to know if this is the main or only problem we are having, I only know it's one possibility I wanted to rule out so I did it. Especially after I realized that my site without the www (which I never use) was in Google cache from way back in July with an OLD site design. Then I also realized while my main www.site has been a PR 5 forever, my NON www was a PR1. That suggests to me that someone has been linking to the NON www site and G was indexing them both seperately. Thats how I read it and thats also what Fathom suggested to me could be part of what's happening. So I just did the 301 yesterday.

Took me the weekend to figure this out, non techy that I am.
Hope this info helps others too.

Linda

[scubajared]

Thanks for the reply. I am having trouble logging into my wmw account is it possible for you to copy the post of the real estate industry.

Thanks

Jared

[5starAffiliatePrograms]

Hi Jared, not sure if I can/should do that. Plus I've seen it mentioned in lots of different pages that the real estate industry seems to have been widely affected by this. I'm sure if you Google the site WMW - for terms like real estate google and similar terms you can find it. Plus I don't think you need to be logged in to read over there, but I may be mistaken.

[sonnylady]

I'm in the gift industry, not real estate and I'm having the same problem. My store was page 1 for several key words and now doesn't show up at all. I can search on Google for it and it's there, but it does not show with any keywords. I'm bummed. This is key season for Christmas when I do most of my business and now I'm not getting any.

I wish someone had an answer so we could all get back to where we were. I'd appreciate any information.

[DarkMatter]

There is nothing you can really do, rankings are going to be in a state of flux for a while. Best thing to do is to wait till it settles, most likely you will have all or most of your rankings back before that happens. If you don't get them back then you can panic.

[davdin]

On Monday I came in to the office to find 75% less orders than normal. The phones have been dead since then. I talked to others in our industry and they said Internet companies have been really slow this week compared to last week. Did something happen? Can't stay in business like this... help...

ToolParadise.com

[davdin]

I tried Google Rankings. I got Yahoo Ranking #1 / Google Sorry, Your site was not within the ranks in Google™'s results. Go Figure...

[SpeedyPin]

Everybody knows that the Real Estate Industry (online) is responsible for some serious SPAM. It should be of no surprise that it did get hit or will get hit in the future.

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JUST A THOUGHT:

Has anybody considered the possibility that Google, as part of it's war on spam, targets specific industries in each update instead of having to go through the entire Internet every time? Could our industry be next?

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Back to the topic at hand, which has been echoed numerous times. In fact, one would think that this horse has be beaten and bloodied enough, never to rise again.

Here's the deal people. There are two paths to follow:

1) The right way

2) The wrong way

If you travel down the wrong way you're going to get nailed eventually. If you go down the middle you MAY get nailed eventually. If you travel down the right way, you should never have to worry about being nailed, which let's you focus on growing your business.

It cracks me up (as a long time SEO practioner) to see the volumes of posts generated over and over and over and over and over and over again about the same boo-hoo stories, expecially since in almost every single case the site owner knew that their day to be nailed was coming.

Curiously, I wonder how many forum pages exist solely containing posts from people complaining after being nailed--eventually?

[scubajared]

My post had nothing to do with spam. I practice only "safe" SEO practices for my clients. What hurts is when you spend 1000's of hours optimizing a site and Google knocks you down and adds less relevant sites ahead of you.

http://www.google.com/search?sourcei...es+real+estate

We ranked number one for this term "sunny isles real estate" and hundreds of others which we have been knocked off since Sunday for other sites like yahoo dir. and sites with hardly or no original content.

[SpeedyPin]

Scuba / Jared:

Not a post against anything you've written. Just a general observation and unfortunately, you may be paying the consequence for other's actions in your industry. Chances are good that the ranking change is temporary.

I work in a very, very SPAM rich environment (prepaid phone cards) and can tell you that I see the most blatant and obvious attempts to deceive the SEs on a daily basis. We've been affected more than a handful of times, but our rankings always rebound and sometimes for the better. I don't every worry because I travel down the "right path."

As per my post, these spammers will have their day and I will cheer!

Eric

p.s. What is your domain name?