Out of Stock page ranking
-
When a competitive site is consistently ranking for a product that is never in stock, or in some cases, has been discontinued for several years and will never again be in stock, is there a way to communicate that information to Google?
-
The first thing I would do in this particular situation is to contact Kaboodle and see if you can get the Buy link to go to your store instead. They may have to remove that entry and you can post a new one.
That sparqstore domain expired on 01/26/2011 and is pending renewal or deletion from Network Solutions. It may be worth looking into how much it would cost to buy the domain and redirect relevant URLs like that to your product page.
That Kaboodle page is indeed a form of spam. It is what I would call a "stub page". Whether you report that page or not is up to you. Eugino provided the link above to where you would do the reporting. I would just say first that you should contact someone - by phone if possible - at Kaboodle to give them the chance to remove the page, as often this is just a matter of pour housekeeping and not outright spam.
Good luck.
-
Thanks for responding. Regarding your first question, how do I know the item will not be in stock, here is an example:
http://www.kaboodle.com/reviews/sparq-xlr8-digital-timing-system
That item was discontinued five years ago. If you click on the "Buy It Now" button, you will notice that it links to a url that is no longer maintained. I receive many inquiries about this product because it is similar to our line of products, so I wrote an article that not only discusses the product, but also mentions that the product was discontinued years ago. The article ranks well, but many people are frustrated by these stale links on other sites. I've contacted some of the shops that have stale links to clean things up though it does require considerable effort. It just seems that Google should be better at spotting these dead products, especially when "buy it now" points to a dead site.
Thanks again for responding.
Best,
Christopher -
There are many things to consider: first, if its your competitor, how would you know that the product will not be in stock anymore? If the whole website is ranking well, and no spammy procedures have been made by this website, there is no way to communicate it to Google, I think. And anyway, if its not a big problem, Google will not take it into consideration anyway.
Please note that Google has many ways in order to understand if a page is relevant (one of this is bounce rate, etc.)
So if a customer is not satisfied with what he/she finds in your competitors page, cause there is not the product that is being looked for, he/she will leave the page, and Google will notice that.
I would:
1. Try tell your competitor (even as unsatisfied customer) that the page in which they offer the product, is not valid, so please if they can take action to make it more relevant or remove it if needed.
2. Try rank better for that product on my own website. Once I'll have shares, compelling content, great user experience on page (and a few bunch of natural links if possible ), my page would rank better and outdo my competitors page (even if domain age and auth may be higher)
Anyway, if you really would like to send a request to Google, you can read this guide https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/93713?hl=en
Hope this helps
Eugenio | Social Engagement
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
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
-
I am looking to find the top pages based on traffic volume on my competitors websites, does anyone know of any good resources?
I want to know how which pages on my competitors websites are the most popular based on the traffic volume. I do not care how many links or directed to that page or any other metric. Only thing I am looking for is the traffic volume. It would also be nice to know the length of time spent on that page.
Competitive Research | | kanteenboy0 -
History of Page or Domain Authority...how?
Hi everyone, is there a way (tools) to see the "history" of any given website in terms of Page or Domain Authority? Like if I went to Alexa and typed in www.angieslist.com it tells me the site ranks #**2,691 **Globally and #670 in the USA. But, is there a way to see how the rank has gone up over time, or where it was a year, two or more ago? Thanks
Competitive Research | | co.mc0 -
Ranking for Competitive Keywords vs. Less Competitive Keyword Variations
I'm curious about situations where a website ranks very well for query variations, but doesn't rank for the query itself (or the reverse of that). For Redfin (where I work), here is the situation with regard to keyword rankings on Google (searched today from USA, incognito)... real estate search - #4 real estate online - #4 real estate site - #5 find real estate - #9 get real estate - #16 real estate - #163 It stands to reason that a site ranking well for a competitive query should also rank well for less competitive query variations - especially query variations that are non-limiting and do not demand a custom landing page (for example, I would consider 'board games' to dramatically limit the query 'games' and be best targeted with a targeted page...not so with 'real estate site' and 'real estate'). So, my question is, what are some theories regarding situations like this? Why do some sites rank so well for competitive queries but not for non-limiting query variations? Why aren't the sites that are crushing us for 'real estate' also crushing us for 'real estate' variations (to be clear...the top sites are crushing us for both)? Is it anchor text? Is it social signals? Is it offline signals, co-occurrence, or citations? What about internal linking and site structure? I realize it's likely a mix of all this, but I'm hoping we can drum up some new ideas here. FYI, on Bing we also rank very well for 'real estate' variations, but leap up to 31st for 'real estate'. Thoughts?
Competitive Research | | RyanOD0 -
How to understand a site's current ranking
I know this is basic stuff, so sorry for the beginners post... I offer primarily web design services, and I need to know when taking on a new client, how can I assess the current 'lay of the land' for their site in terms of their SEO? I have had some issues in the past where launching a new design negatively affected their performance for their keywords, and obviously I would like to avoid this in future without having to go to 3rd parties. In particular I have an issue where the client themselves are very bad at giving information about what keywords they currently rank for, and what SEO activities they may have done in the past. How can I make these assessments myself? thanks for any help p
Competitive Research | | panamandm0 -
Help! New site won't rank locally but should...
any help would be greatly appreciated... picked up a new client, a used car dealer in New Jersey. Have a VERY spammy site before, tons of keyword stuffing and lots of dupe content. also had a horrible design. (www.coopscars.com) We updated the design and the content, made it relevant and unique, fixed title tags, etc. Now he's not ranking for anything locally other than his business name. He's got a decent number of links, we've added relevant citations, his social signals are much stronger than they were... We do lots of SEO for car dealers, and we know that he should be ranking SOMEWHERE at this point - not saying he should be page 1, but he should at least be somewhere in the top 5... and yes, bing/yahoo are different, but he ranks over there... one page 1 for "used cars south river" - so why completely non-existant on Google? just as a test, he put up a free website at www.coopscars.net just last week - and it's already ranking for several local terms. I'm completely confused here - i'm not a noob, I know the tactics we've used on him work for other dealers. Thinking there's got to be something that's blocking him, especially since there aren't but maybe 15-20 car dealers to compete against locally and he still doesn't show up... thought i'd come over here and see if anyone has any ideas...
Competitive Research | | Greg_Gifford0 -
Competitor's Ranking's Reports are Showing Blank Values for Rankings
When selecting competitors to see how they rank for specific terms in the ranking's report page here, it loads the page normally, but without any actual rankings. Where values should be, it lists all values as our competition not ranking whatsoever (for all competitors). I'm not sure if there is something we're doing wrong, or perhaps we just need to wait for a refresh, but if anybody could help out, that would be wonderful!
Competitive Research | | ACLens0 -
In my competitive campigans have less ranking and points according to your analysis, how can i form external links or large links ???
in my competitive campigans have less ranking and points according to your analysis, how can i form external links or large links ???
Competitive Research | | bullionguru0 -
How can I find the pages on my site with the highest page rank?
I have a lot pages on my site and I'm wondering if there is a tool out there that will find all the pages with the highest pagerank for me? Also, it would be helpful to find that on competitors sites as well. Any ideas?
Competitive Research | | shawn810