Sudden ranking drop, no manual action

[sandlappercreative]

Sort of a strange situation I'm having and I wanted to see if I could get some thoughts. Here's what has happened...

Monday morning, I realized that my website, which had been showing up at the bottom of page 2 for a specific result, had now been demoted to the bottom of page 6 (roughly a 40 spot demotion). No other keyword searches were affected. I immediately figured that this was some sort of keyword-specific penalty that I had incurred.

I had done a bit of link building over the weekend (two or three directory type sites and a bio link from a site I contribute to). I also changed some anchor text on another site to match my homepage's title tag (which just so happened to be the exact phrase match I had dropped in) - I assumed this was what got me. I was slowly beginning to climb up the rankings and just got a bit impatient/overzealous.

Changed the anchor text back to what it originally was and submitted a reconsideration request on Tuesday. This morning, I get the automated response in Webmaster Tools that no manual action had been taken.

So my question is, would this drop have been an automated deal? If that's the case, then it's going to be mighty hard to pinpoint what I did wrong, since there's no way to know when I did whatever it was to cause the drop.

Any ideas/thoughts/suggestions to regain my modest original placement?

[waqid]

How about some real valuable input.

[inhouseninja]

The bad advice on this thread is rampant.

[sandlappercreative]

Yes, seems to be dancing between around #20 - #25. This dance would happen a good bit before this whole process started as well, so nothing new there.

[ResslerMotors]

Are you utilizing an unused browser, and clearing out all the cookies/history/data before checking rankings?

[waqid]

You are on page 3 from a PC in houston!

[inhouseninja]

Jim, this just goes to show that there's no sense in freaking out over a change in rankings based on 3 days' time.  I can't even count the number of times I've seen a site drop after link building - only to come back to the same place or a higher placement a week later.  This is typical and almost expected when I'm doing SEO.   As long as you're not doing anything blackhat your site will be just fine.  There's no way Google is going to single your tiny site out among billions of others.

In the future, give your site a minimum of 2 weeks.  I think of it like this:

I do solid SEO. No blackhat. No crap.  Because I do solid work I should be rewarded by Google and never penalized.  With that in mind, if my site starts moving around in Google I know its a GOOD thing because it means Google is reevaluating my site.  I also know that because I only do good work a reevaluation by Google is always going to show me in a favorable light.  I want to see fluctuations in my rankings. It can only mean good things for me.

[sandlappercreative]

And to follow up with the initial question, I'm now back at the bottom of page 2. Still not sure what happened there, but it appears to have cleared itself up.

[sandlappercreative]

Thanks for the time and effort you put into your reply! Here's some background info that might help paint the picture of what I'm doing/after...

I'm a freelancer that works from home in Simpsonville, a suburb of Greenville (by just a mile or two). Most of my client base comes from Greenville, and anyone in the area searching for creative services is going to be looking for "xxxxxx in Greenville, SC."

As far as my business is concerned, I started out just under my name but then registered with the government under Sandlapper Creative (and I'm using this in directories, as it sounds more professional).

I've actually been trying to standardize the listings, as you mentioned (and Google did come down on me for the keyword related title on my place page - fixing/updating that as well). Obviously, I have no problems giving my business name and phone number but I am a little reluctant to give my home address (if possible). Would just the city/state/zip be sufficient information on-site?

[duanermb]

Hi Jim,

I like everything that Ryan stated above and would like to add a little about local search factors. I noticed that you are in Simpsonville, not Greenville. This can be problematic in local search, but not insurmountable, but the first task is a little house cleaning.

Google is hyperlocal these days and will NOT trust a site that doesn't list their physical address which I'm sure you have chosen because you are not in Greenville. I see you used Simpsonville in the title tag here.

http://jimferguson.me/web-design/sandlapper-studio

Google likes consistency and relevance.

Including place names in searches adds a different dimension to your SEO tasks all together and can be summed up by Name / Address / Phone number. (NAP). For businesses targeting local searches, they should include their address and phone number in the footer in readable text. It's easy to do and not unreasonable to have it there from a user's standpoint.

The key is consistency

Your NAP should read (ideally) the same throughout the web, with the same punctuation and the same text. I tend to follow the punctuation that Google chooses to use for phone numbers. (xxx) xxx-xxxx and so on. The first thing I do on a local search check is to Google in quotes the NAP. At first I thought you hadn't claimed your directory listings then I realized that your company name is Sandlapper Creative. (Or was) I also found you place page which includes a keyword derived title. ("Web & Graphic Design - Jim Ferguson") your physical address and phone number. Google might just slap you in cuffs for using that title.

Being consistent is better than using keywords on your place page. Google "knows" the game well. To continue numbering from above:

#5 Change your title to your business name.

#6 Scrub the web. Find any and all references to your phone number, business name and address and change them to what is identical to your business page.

#7 Since you are in Simpsonville and want to rank in Greenville Try titles like this... Web Design Greenville SC | Sandlapper Creative - Simpsonville SC It may seem somewhat counter intuitive to what you are trying to accomplish, but until you gain trust from Google about your actual address and and area served, you'll be in the abyss for the others.

#8 Add service areas to Google places. I bet within a few weeks you'll see your place page showing up in search and you'll be able to tackle Greenville after that.

[sandlappercreative]

Thanks for the input Ryan, I'll definitely look at implementing some of these things. I'm a bit gun shy about using the exact anchor text after getting pushed back so far in such a short time period, but I know that's important. I'm still scratching my head as to why I was on page 2 for this exact phrase one week ago and now I'm on page 6. Guess we'll never have a definitive answer on that one.

[RyanKent]

I like some aspects of your site, but I don't believe you earned a 2nd page ranking for the target phrase. There is seemingly a lot of competition for the keyword. Many developers from around the world might create a "web design greenville" page and attempt to compete with you. Here are some suggestions:

1. Your home page title and header presently target two keywords: "Website Design & Graphic Design Greenville, SC". If you perform a Google.com search for "Website Design & Graphic Design Greenville, SC" you are the #2 result. Your title and header represent the phrase for which you wish to rank.

If the most important phrase is "Web Design Greenville SC" then change your title and header to match. You will likely notice an immediately improvement in ranking once the change is made and crawled by Google.

2. You do not have a single backlink to your site using the phrase as anchor text. While you don't want all your backlinks to use the phrase, some of them definitely should.

3. Add your physical address and phone number to your page. Saying you are providing service for Greenville in your header is not enough. There are tons of companies in Los Angeles, NY, Miami, India and the rest of the world who are offering similar pages. You have the advantage of being authentic. Leverage that advantage by publishing your information on both your home page and the About page.

4. Use your target phrase at least once in your content. "I have been providing Web Design to Greenville residents for 5 years". There are many other ways to present the phrase but it needs to be there on your page. Preferably 2-3 times.

There are other changes you can made but these four changes alone have a great shot at bumping you to the first page of results. At the very least, you will dramatically improve your ranking.

[sandlappercreative]

The URL of the affected page is http://jimferguson.me

The keyword phrase is "web design greenville sc"

[RyanKent]

You originally shared "Monday morning, I realized that my website, which had been showing up at the bottom of page 2 for a specific result, had now been demoted to the bottom of page 6 (roughly a 40 spot demotion). No other keyword searches were affected."

What is the URL of the specific web page which was affected? What is the keyword phrase which experienced the drop?

[sandlappercreative]

I understand the algorithm changes and updates all the time, but a 40 spot drop all at once on just one key phrase is a little drastic, IMO

[sandlappercreative]

Yes, it was the homepage that dropped and I'm doing just fine on all of the other key phrases.

[sandlappercreative]

The website in question is here

The two directory sites were 1. listing my blog in Bloglines Local and 2. listing the blog in NetworkedBlogs.com

The backlink with the anchor text in question is a site-wide web design credit link in the footer from my photography side business site found here

The anchor text and title tag for the landing homepage was "web design greenville, sc" (have both been changed since, as noted in the original post).

[irvingw]

it's possible, also what other changes did he do 1 week, 2 weeks, a month ago. Also, maybe something changed in Googles algorithm.

without looking at the site and page it's all just speculation

[eTundra]

But if he had 50% keyword density to begin with he never would have ranked as highly as page 2 right?

Or maybe the existing over-optimization, coupled with the new anchor text made it the last "poof" that burst the bubble.  That makes sense to me.

[irvingw]

the tiny changes he made probably didn't cause the drop, something else most likely did like on page factors. he's just assuming that these changes did it because they were the last things he did for this term. getting demoted to the bottom of page 6 is definitely indicative of a penalty for that search term.

It is true that keyword density for example is just one of 200 or so factors helping determining ranking, but if you create a page with 50% keyword density for a term, that is enough to get that page suppressed in ranking for that term.

[eTundra]

Somehow missed the bottom of your post there where you responded to my question....  Thanks, that makes a lot of sense.

[eTundra]

So you think 3 or 4 new links and one anchor text change could be enough to result in any rank change, positive or negative (assuming at least a decently competitive keyword term)?

I don't know; I'm just asking.

[RyanKent]

would this drop have been an automated deal?

In my opinion 99.99% of ranking drops are automated. Google has clearly indicated their desire is for their algorithms to perform all the work automatically. In cases where the Spam Team manually takes action, it only makes sense that they then work with other teams to automate the process of catching the issue.

Google makes approximately 500 changes to their algorithm each year, so it is possible for your rankings to change without making any changes to your site. Based on your situation, it is likely that one or more of the changes you made negatively impacted your site. There is not any way to know which change caused the drop. That is intentional. Google wants you to examine your site and fix any and all issues, not just one.

You mentioned adding several directory links. Links from quality directories such as Yahoo, DMOZ, BOTW, etc. would generally be considered "good' links. On the other hand, most free directory links are low quality and many are "bad" links. Ensure any links you build to your site are of a quality nature. For now, treat your page as if your rankings are valid and work to improve them. I know that is not what you want to hear at all, but it is the best way for you to get your old ranking back.

@TheBackBurner, the algorithm has thresholds. It's like a balloon. You can puff 30 times and it doesn't matter but then that last bit of air and poof.

[eTundra]

I'd like to hear the community's opinion on this, because I simply can't imagine Google is micromanaging keyword penalties like this.

We know Google is paying attention algorithmically to the factors you mentioned - anchor text, page titles, backlinks - but we also know these are just a few factors out of hundreds that determine a ranking.

Really, in the grand scheme of the web or the thousands of other results that also show up  for the keyword term you're talking about here, are the tiny changes you made big enough to make any difference at all?

Is the algorithm really that sensitive?  I don't know, but I really don't think so.

Anyone else?

[irvingw]

it's very difficult to assess without the URL. The site that you changed the anchor text on, was that link a sitewide link? Changing a few links shouldn't cause the drop, it's probably over optimization on the page/site for that keyword term. It's the homepage that dropped to page 6 right? Is the homepage ranking OK for your other terms still?