Brand New Site Penalized?
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I recently launched 2 completely separate and unrelated websites at the same time. Both are new domains and hosting accounts. neither have any links. One is ranking for a branded search and the other is not. The interesting thing is that I tested both sites on the back end of my server before launch. The site that is not ranking for branded search IS ranking still on the back end of my site for the branded search. I have removed all content and 301 redirected the testing urls back to my portfolio page.
Could this be do to Google indexing one but not the other. Does it have anything to do with testing on my server first and my DA being higher than current new sites? Or is it something completely different I'm missing completely. Is this a Penalty?
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I originally thought this myself. The problem I have with that is that it occurred on only one of the websites. If the issue was content duplication wouldn't both sites have the issue?
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It's not a penalty, but it sounds like it could be a duplicate content issue. Google doesn't like to show duplicate content in its results, so if the content you had on your backend is ranking, then that's probably why the new domain isn't.
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