Webmaster Articles > Revising Your Site - What Happened To My Search Engine Placement
Tips to consider when revising your website so you don't get penalized by search engines.
As of September, Smartads went through what so many have done before. I changed the entire site. I knew what it meant. It means that your search engine placements your probably so proud of are probably going to be lost in the process.
Sad but true. See, search engines are getting smarter, not only are they getting smarter but they do what you do. When you change a design, typically you change it for a couple of reasons.
- You dont like the design anymore
- Youve learned knew tips on how to optimize your site better for search engine placements.
- Your revising your services
- You baught an old domain name
Whatever it may be, youre changing something. Now it wont happen right away but eventually, if your site already has a good search engine ranking, then search engines will find out what youve done.
But "ses" arent human Thats correct but they were built by humans. Most se programmers realize that eventually something changes and since they want their search engine to be the best, they try to recognize your changes right away but theres only one problem.
What do they do with the listings you have right now Well, lets say for instance you are attempting to change everything for the better.
Now lets also say that you HAD a page title called "good rank". Search engines previously know and still think that your page is all about "good rank". Moving along, your new page information is about "Getting a better rank". Your old placements are now wrong in the eyes of search engines. They now realize that something has changed. So what are they going to do
Dump your old listings and start over! Ouch is right. So why would you ever want to change your site if thats the case
Well heres some food for thought: Yes, you may loose your existing rankings but your roots are growing. Your new pages are growing bigger and better than before, it just takes a small transitional period to take effect.
For instance, within Google, Smartads had over 580 pages found when looking at all the links to smartads. Since we changed the whole site, there was a 2 day period were none of them were listed anymore. Normally, I would of gotten scared right away if I didnt know that my site had changed.
Not 4 days later, not only were my pages back but the old rotten pages that werent being used anymore got dumped and the many new pages got listed. All in all around 680 pages now. That was a jump of around 100 pages were added. Cause and effect.
Heres another example for you. Most of us know about link popularity within Google. Youve put all your effort into promoting your main page. Within all of the links that youve had placed on other sites, you gave your link title "Great Ranking Services". Once google saw your link, it started looking to see whether your information on your site is relevant to "Great Ranking Services" and awarded you appropriately.
Moving along a little, youve not only changed your site but youve also changed your link title to better fit the new content on your main page. The new link you now add on other sites reads something like this; "Boost Your Search Engine Rankings".
Before you changed your site, you got a GREAT rank for "Great Ranking Services" when people searched online.
Heres the catch. Now that your promoting a new site, a new page, new content within your page, the old content relavance goes straight down the drain. Search engines have recognized that everything has changed and are not paying any attention to your old links anymore. Yes, they still help your link popularity, but they dont help your content relevance.
See, search engines are consistently trying to improve their content relevance. Thats what people want. If they search "gidgets & widgets", they expect to get the best results for "gidgets & widgets".
In Conclusion:
If you plan on changing your site, be prepared to suffer for a small amount of time. Prepare yourself for the worst because the best is yet to arise and prevail.
I understand that we all want better search engine rankings and just be
ready to do what ever it takes, even if it means loosing your old se placements
for some newer, fresher ones.
Martin Lemieux
Smartads - President
http://www.smartads.info
Affordable Web Design & Web Site Marketing
http://www.flyinggelatingames.com
ASES - Affordable Search Engine Ranking Services
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Canadian Toy Shows and Toy Collections For Sale
