Comments on: GWHG Highlight: Hidden text and the reconsideration request http://www.jlh-design.com/2007/07/gwhg-highlight-hidden-text-and-reconsideration-request/ Terrible writing and mere conjecture Sat, 11 Oct 2008 20:19:14 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=abc By: JLH http://www.jlh-design.com/2007/07/gwhg-highlight-hidden-text-and-reconsideration-request/#comment-4946 JLH Thu, 12 Jul 2007 05:39:30 +0000 http://www.jlh-design.com/2007/07/gwhg-highlight-hidden-text-and-reconsideration-request/#comment-4946 Thanks for dropping in Susan. I appreciate your contribution, I don't have the millions of readers that some blogs do, but the regular readers are great and very knowledgeable. It makes sense that you'd only use the regular forensic tools, since using the super-secret bat-cave tools publicly could show too much information. I'd imagine the MAJORITY of the what's-wrong-with-my-site concerns are not due to penalties, but rather just a simple downgrade in ranking, which happens. Content get's stale, link accruing slows down, other sites outperform them, search volume switches direction...all reasons why "I used to rank better" is not always an indication that the site is now under penalty. Thanks for dropping in Susan. I appreciate your contribution, I don’t have the millions of readers that some blogs do, but the regular readers are great and very knowledgeable.

It makes sense that you’d only use the regular forensic tools, since using the super-secret bat-cave tools publicly could show too much information.

I’d imagine the MAJORITY of the what’s-wrong-with-my-site concerns are not due to penalties, but rather just a simple downgrade in ranking, which happens. Content get’s stale, link accruing slows down, other sites outperform them, search volume switches direction…all reasons why “I used to rank better” is not always an indication that the site is now under penalty.

]]> By: Susan M. http://www.jlh-design.com/2007/07/gwhg-highlight-hidden-text-and-reconsideration-request/#comment-4939 Susan M. Wed, 11 Jul 2007 23:25:39 +0000 http://www.jlh-design.com/2007/07/gwhg-highlight-hidden-text-and-reconsideration-request/#comment-4939 It's true that we don't do a lot of one-off site-specific diagnoses, since they're not always interesting/valuable to the community at large. However, when we do, we try to use tools that any of you would have access to, to try to "demystify" the process (so that people don't think that the only way to get answers is by speaking to a Googler directly). That's not to say that we don't also have a bunch of awesome secret tools, but we like to use the "teach a man to fish" school of thought when possible. :) In this case, if you look up www .feedroller.com in Yahoo! Site Explorer, you'll notice that the first 4 URLs lead to the same style of (keyword-free) site design that you currently see on FeedRoller's homepage; but the next 3 URLs (the ones without the /Store/ directory) lead to what looks like a totally separate minisite (it has a different look'n'feel from the blue-themed homepage, and the two don't seem to link between each other). Clicking around this gray-themed site, you'll see lots of pages with keywords at the bottom. The page that Matt referenced (www .feedroller.com/nstalnstructns.html) is the #6 URL in Site Explorer right now. Also worth noting is that, even when Googlers make suggestions, it doesn't necessarily mean that there's been a penalty for the issue(s) that we call out. A lot of the can-you-tell-me-what's-wrong-with-my-site requests we get are for sites that don't have any penalties, but (as you've noted in the past) no penalties doesn't always equal no violations, so we can still point out things that a webmaster could improve about their site whether or not it's actually causing a penalty. It’s true that we don’t do a lot of one-off site-specific diagnoses, since they’re not always interesting/valuable to the community at large. However, when we do, we try to use tools that any of you would have access to, to try to “demystify” the process (so that people don’t think that the only way to get answers is by speaking to a Googler directly). That’s not to say that we don’t also have a bunch of awesome secret tools, but we like to use the “teach a man to fish” school of thought when possible. :)

In this case, if you look up www .feedroller.com in Yahoo! Site Explorer, you’ll notice that the first 4 URLs lead to the same style of (keyword-free) site design that you currently see on FeedRoller’s homepage; but the next 3 URLs (the ones without the /Store/ directory) lead to what looks like a totally separate minisite (it has a different look’n'feel from the blue-themed homepage, and the two don’t seem to link between each other). Clicking around this gray-themed site, you’ll see lots of pages with keywords at the bottom. The page that Matt referenced (www .feedroller.com/nstalnstructns.html) is the #6 URL in Site Explorer right now.

Also worth noting is that, even when Googlers make suggestions, it doesn’t necessarily mean that there’s been a penalty for the issue(s) that we call out. A lot of the can-you-tell-me-what’s-wrong-with-my-site requests we get are for sites that don’t have any penalties, but (as you’ve noted in the past) no penalties doesn’t always equal no violations, so we can still point out things that a webmaster could improve about their site whether or not it’s actually causing a penalty.

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