Hi. I'm new with all this SEO and pagerank so excuse me if my
questions seem dumb and naive. During the recent pagerank update, my
blog: http://natalie1981.blogspot.com increased from zero to four
which was a bit of a surprise for me since most websites dropped in
ranking due to what they call text link selling and I was a member of
payperpost and had some paid post on my site even before the update.
Just yesterday, I noticed that my pagerank dropped from four to zero.
Now I know that maybe Google has just noticed that I'm a member of
payperpost and they just recently noticed my paid posts and decided to
slap me with a penalty but I'm thinking of submitting my website for
reconsideration so I was wondering if I really need to remove the paid
posts or is it okay to just put the rel=nofollow tag? I don't want to
remove my paid posts since some of them brings traffic to my blog and
I've read that it's okay to have paid links just as long as it has the
nofollow tag, so is this true?
I also need help as to what other guidelines my blog may have violated
and how to fix this before I resubmit for reconsideration. I've read
the guidelines but I need some specifics so if anyone could help me I
would really appreciate it. Thanks.
Anyhow, I would just move all the paid posts to a category "paid
reviews", add a disclaimer to each saying, this is a paid review, then
nofollow the link to the company to not share any pagerank.
Do those things and you will avoid future issues, as for today you are
fine!
Can I ask you a question?
Who turned you on to the idea of doing payperpost stuff?
> Hi. I'm new with all this SEO and pagerank so excuse me if my
> questions seem dumb and naive. During the recent pagerank update, my
> blog:http://natalie1981.blogspot.comincreased from zero to four
> which was a bit of a surprise for me since most websites dropped in
> ranking due to what they call text link selling and I was a member of
> payperpost and had some paid post on my site even before the update.
> Just yesterday, I noticed that my pagerank dropped from four to zero.
> Now I know that maybe Google has just noticed that I'm a member of
> payperpost and they just recently noticed my paid posts and decided to
> slap me with a penalty but I'm thinking of submitting my website for
> reconsideration so I was wondering if I really need to remove the paid
> posts or is it okay to just put the rel=nofollow tag? I don't want to
> remove my paid posts since some of them brings traffic to my blog and
> I've read that it's okay to have paid links just as long as it has the
> nofollow tag, so is this true?
> I also need help as to what other guidelines my blog may have violated
> and how to fix this before I resubmit for reconsideration. I've read
> the guidelines but I need some specifics so if anyone could help me I
> would really appreciate it. Thanks.
To answer your question, yes adding nofollow to the links and then
filing a reconsideration request is all that needs to be done, you
don't need to delete the reviews or even the links, just make sure
they don't pass PageRank.
> Hi. I'm new with all this SEO and pagerank so excuse me if my
> questions seem dumb and naive. During the recent pagerank update, my
> blog:http://natalie1981.blogspot.comincreased from zero to four
> which was a bit of a surprise for me since most websites dropped in
> ranking due to what they call text link selling and I was a member of
> payperpost and had some paid post on my site even before the update.
> Just yesterday, I noticed that my pagerank dropped from four to zero.
> Now I know that maybe Google has just noticed that I'm a member of
> payperpost and they just recently noticed my paid posts and decided to
> slap me with a penalty but I'm thinking of submitting my website for
> reconsideration so I was wondering if I really need to remove the paid
> posts or is it okay to just put the rel=nofollow tag? I don't want to
> remove my paid posts since some of them brings traffic to my blog and
> I've read that it's okay to have paid links just as long as it has the
> nofollow tag, so is this true?
> I also need help as to what other guidelines my blog may have violated
> and how to fix this before I resubmit for reconsideration. I've read
> the guidelines but I need some specifics so if anyone could help me I
> would really appreciate it. Thanks.
Excuse me JLH but what reason do you see to file for reconsideration?
I already see nofollows in there and the site appears to be doing
fine. Not seeing PR does not mean a penalty. The site has only been
around since June!
> To answer your question, yes adding nofollow to the links and then
> filing a reconsideration request is all that needs to be done, you
> don't need to delete the reviews or even the links, just make sure
> they don't pass PageRank.
> On Dec 14, 6:25 pm, natalie1981 wrote:
> > Hi. I'm new with all this SEO and pagerank so excuse me if my
> > questions seem dumb and naive. During the recent pagerank update, my
> > blog:http://natalie1981.blogspot.comincreasedfrom zero to four
> > which was a bit of a surprise for me since most websites dropped in
> > ranking due to what they call text link selling and I was a member of
> > payperpost and had some paid post on my site even before the update.
> > Just yesterday, I noticed that my pagerank dropped from four to zero.
> > Now I know that maybe Google has just noticed that I'm a member of
> > payperpost and they just recently noticed my paid posts and decided to
> > slap me with a penalty but I'm thinking of submitting my website for
> > reconsideration so I was wondering if I really need to remove the paid
> > posts or is it okay to just put the rel=nofollow tag? I don't want to
> > remove my paid posts since some of them brings traffic to my blog and
> > I've read that it's okay to have paid links just as long as it has the
> > nofollow tag, so is this true?
> > I also need help as to what other guidelines my blog may have violated
> > and how to fix this before I resubmit for reconsideration. I've read
> > the guidelines but I need some specifics so if anyone could help me I
> > would really appreciate it. Thanks.
She said her pagerank dropped. Ranking penalties for paid links
haven't been widely reported yet, but PageRank penalties are quite
regular lately. Her nofollows are a recent addition to the site, and
Google won't notice it until someone looks at it. You know that the
paid link penalties are hand-jobs, so just fixing it won't make the
site's get unpenalized automatically.
> Excuse me JLH but what reason do you see to file for reconsideration?
> I already see nofollows in there and the site appears to be doing
> fine. Not seeing PR does not mean a penalty. The site has only been
> around since June!
> On Dec 14, 10:08 pm, JLH wrote:
> > To answer your question, yes adding nofollow to the links and then
> > filing a reconsideration request is all that needs to be done, you
> > don't need to delete the reviews or even the links, just make sure
> > they don't pass PageRank.
> > On Dec 14, 6:25 pm, natalie1981 wrote:
> > > Hi. I'm new with all this SEO and pagerank so excuse me if my
> > > questions seem dumb and naive. During the recent pagerank update, my
> > > blog:http://natalie1981.blogspot.comincreasedfromzero to four
> > > which was a bit of a surprise for me since most websites dropped in
> > > ranking due to what they call text link selling and I was a member of
> > > payperpost and had some paid post on my site even before the update.
> > > Just yesterday, I noticed that my pagerank dropped from four to zero.
> > > Now I know that maybe Google has just noticed that I'm a member of
> > > payperpost and they just recently noticed my paid posts and decided to
> > > slap me with a penalty but I'm thinking of submitting my website for
> > > reconsideration so I was wondering if I really need to remove the paid
> > > posts or is it okay to just put the rel=nofollow tag? I don't want to
> > > remove my paid posts since some of them brings traffic to my blog and
> > > I've read that it's okay to have paid links just as long as it has the
> > > nofollow tag, so is this true?
> > > I also need help as to what other guidelines my blog may have violated
> > > and how to fix this before I resubmit for reconsideration. I've read
> > > the guidelines but I need some specifics so if anyone could help me I
> > > would really appreciate it. Thanks.
Maybe she is not passing pagerank but her reviews are ranking fine,
she is almost outranking the companies she reviewed which is a funny
righteous payback for those who are trying to pay their way into
Google search. :)
On the other hand it is pretty lame the company being reviewed here:
> She said her pagerank dropped. Ranking penalties for paid links
> haven't been widely reported yet, but PageRank penalties are quite
> regular lately. Her nofollows are a recent addition to the site, and
> Google won't notice it until someone looks at it. You know that the
> paid link penalties are hand-jobs, so just fixing it won't make the
> site's get unpenalized automatically.
> On Dec 14, 9:11 pm, Admin Aaron wrote:
> > Excuse me JLH but what reason do you see to file for reconsideration?
> > I already see nofollows in there and the site appears to be doing
> > fine. Not seeing PR does not mean a penalty. The site has only been
> > around since June!
> > On Dec 14, 10:08 pm, JLH wrote:
> > > To answer your question, yes adding nofollow to the links and then
> > > filing a reconsideration request is all that needs to be done, you
> > > don't need to delete the reviews or even the links, just make sure
> > > they don't pass PageRank.
> > > On Dec 14, 6:25 pm, natalie1981 wrote:
> > > > Hi. I'm new with all this SEO and pagerank so excuse me if my
> > > > questions seem dumb and naive. During the recent pagerank update, my
> > > > blog:http://natalie1981.blogspot.comincreasedfromzeroto four
> > > > which was a bit of a surprise for me since most websites dropped in
> > > > ranking due to what they call text link selling and I was a member of
> > > > payperpost and had some paid post on my site even before the update.
> > > > Just yesterday, I noticed that my pagerank dropped from four to zero.
> > > > Now I know that maybe Google has just noticed that I'm a member of
> > > > payperpost and they just recently noticed my paid posts and decided to
> > > > slap me with a penalty but I'm thinking of submitting my website for
> > > > reconsideration so I was wondering if I really need to remove the paid
> > > > posts or is it okay to just put the rel=nofollow tag? I don't want to
> > > > remove my paid posts since some of them brings traffic to my blog and
> > > > I've read that it's okay to have paid links just as long as it has the
> > > > nofollow tag, so is this true?
> > > > I also need help as to what other guidelines my blog may have violated
> > > > and how to fix this before I resubmit for reconsideration. I've read
> > > > the guidelines but I need some specifics so if anyone could help me I
> > > > would really appreciate it. Thanks.
*sheepish grin* I actually got into blogging because of payperpost.
I've heard about it during my "making money out of the internet"
research and I love gadgets so I thought it would be a great fun to do
a gadget blog. I've read some stuff about site optimization, google
ranking, etc and tried to do a bit of those things so I was REALLY
surprised that I got a PR4 in just 3 months (blog started in june,
october update got pr4), I installed statcounter on my site and now
it's fun seeing some of my posts rank first in Google search even
though I don't know squat about SEO or being a webmaster.
I was just wondering why the sudden drop? Does it mean that my
previous PR4 was a mistake? Anyways, like JHL noticed, I am in the
process of adding the "nofollow" tags to the sponsored posts, still
have a lot to add. Another question, since I get most of my content
from PR releases, I link to most of them and I do not add the
"nofollow" tag, is this okay? So Google is against passing pagerank
for money but it's okay to link to other sites so long as its free?
If most of my posts have outgoing links (I link to my sources) would
it drain my pagerank? Thanks again for the help.
> Anyhow, I would just move all the paid posts to a category "paid
> reviews", add a disclaimer to each saying, this is a paid review, then
> nofollow the link to the company to not share any pagerank.
> Do those things and you will avoid future issues, as for today you are
> fine!
> Can I ask you a question?
> Who turned you on to the idea of doing payperpost stuff?
> Good luck,
> Aaron
> On Dec 14, 7:25 pm, natalie1981 wrote:
> > Hi. I'm new with all this SEO and pagerank so excuse me if my
> > questions seem dumb and naive. During the recent pagerank update, my
> > blog:http://natalie1981.blogspot.comincreasedfrom zero to four
> > which was a bit of a surprise for me since most websites dropped in
> > ranking due to what they call text link selling and I was a member of
> > payperpost and had some paid post on my site even before the update.
> > Just yesterday, I noticed that my pagerank dropped from four to zero.
> > Now I know that maybe Google has just noticed that I'm a member of
> > payperpost and they just recently noticed my paid posts and decided to
> > slap me with a penalty but I'm thinking of submitting my website for
> > reconsideration so I was wondering if I really need to remove the paid
> > posts or is it okay to just put the rel=nofollow tag? I don't want to
> > remove my paid posts since some of them brings traffic to my blog and
> > I've read that it's okay to have paid links just as long as it has the
> > nofollow tag, so is this true?
> > I also need help as to what other guidelines my blog may have violated
> > and how to fix this before I resubmit for reconsideration. I've read
> > the guidelines but I need some specifics so if anyone could help me I
> > would really appreciate it. Thanks.
> *sheepish grin* I actually got into blogging because of payperpost.
> I've heard about it during my "making money out of the internet"
> research and I love gadgets so I thought it would be a great fun to do
> a gadget blog. I've read some stuff about site optimization, google
> ranking, etc and tried to do a bit of those things so I was REALLY
> surprised that I got a PR4 in just 3 months (blog started in june,
> october update got pr4), I installed statcounter on my site and now
> it's fun seeing some of my posts rank first in Google search even
> though I don't know squat about SEO or being a webmaster.
> I was just wondering why the sudden drop? Does it mean that my
> previous PR4 was a mistake? Anyways, like JHL noticed, I am in the
> process of adding the "nofollow" tags to the sponsored posts, still
> have a lot to add. Another question, since I get most of my content
> from PR releases, I link to most of them and I do not add the
> "nofollow" tag, is this okay? So Google is against passing pagerank
> for money but it's okay to link to other sites so long as its free?
> If most of my posts have outgoing links (I link to my sources) would
> it drain my pagerank? Thanks again for the help.
> On Dec 15, 10:30 am, Admin Aaron wrote:
> > You are not getting hit with any penalty currently:
> > Anyhow, I would just move all the paid posts to a category "paid
> > reviews", add a disclaimer to each saying, this is a paid review, then
> > nofollow the link to the company to not share any pagerank.
> > Do those things and you will avoid future issues, as for today you are
> > fine!
> > Can I ask you a question?
> > Who turned you on to the idea of doing payperpost stuff?
> > Good luck,
> > Aaron
> > On Dec 14, 7:25 pm, natalie1981 wrote:
> > > Hi. I'm new with all this SEO and pagerank so excuse me if my
> > > questions seem dumb and naive. During the recent pagerank update, my
> > > blog:http://natalie1981.blogspot.comincreasedfromzero to four
> > > which was a bit of a surprise for me since most websites dropped in
> > > ranking due to what they call text link selling and I was a member of
> > > payperpost and had some paid post on my site even before the update.
> > > Just yesterday, I noticed that my pagerank dropped from four to zero.
> > > Now I know that maybe Google has just noticed that I'm a member of
> > > payperpost and they just recently noticed my paid posts and decided to
> > > slap me with a penalty but I'm thinking of submitting my website for
> > > reconsideration so I was wondering if I really need to remove the paid
> > > posts or is it okay to just put the rel=nofollow tag? I don't want to
> > > remove my paid posts since some of them brings traffic to my blog and
> > > I've read that it's okay to have paid links just as long as it has the
> > > nofollow tag, so is this true?
> > > I also need help as to what other guidelines my blog may have violated
> > > and how to fix this before I resubmit for reconsideration. I've read
> > > the guidelines but I need some specifics so if anyone could help me I
> > > would really appreciate it. Thanks.
Good to see that your publishing efforts are doing pretty well! For
a usful website, well-presented and with some good quality relevant
inbound links, I do not think that published PR of 4 was necessarily
"wrong" in the first place, even if the site is only a few months old.
I would however draw your attention to something that I don't
understand. In the Google SERPs I see that the cached image of your
homepage is about 188K which seems quite heavy. Even though your
visible page is quite long, I could not at first see how it got to be
188K.
Then I found sections of HTML coding that I could not see as visible
on the page surface. For example, I cannot see [Samsung] or [Suzuki]
or [appraisal] or [devel] or [Barbie] or [Fortwo] on the page surface
so I am wondering what is the purpose of the following lines in the
HTML source:
Motoricerca does report some minor hidden text, unnatural text and
tendency to stuff keywords but does NOT report the above.
I see numerous occurrences of [display: none] in your CSS but almost
all of that is to do with handhelds and quite OK.
I wonder if you could take a look at the above and tell me what I am
missing? It's probably my lack of knowledge in this area. I just want
to understand things better.
You just competely lost me with all the html talk. LOL. I honestly
don't know. Like I said, I don't know anything about being a webmaster
or html, etc. The layout I am using came straight from blogger though
I did modify it to be a bit wider, which I did by experimenting and
just seeing what works. All I can say is that those are my old posts
which you can find on the left side on the archive though I don't know
what those html tags mean.
> Good to see that your publishing efforts are doing pretty well! For
> a usful website, well-presented and with some good quality relevant
> inbound links, I do not think that published PR of 4 was necessarily
> "wrong" in the first place, even if the site is only a few months old.
> I would however draw your attention to something that I don't
> understand. In the Google SERPs I see that the cached image of your
> homepage is about 188K which seems quite heavy. Even though your
> visible page is quite long, I could not at first see how it got to be
> 188K.
> Then I found sections of HTML coding that I could not see as visible
> on the page surface. For example, I cannot see [Samsung] or [Suzuki]
> or [appraisal] or [devel] or [Barbie] or [Fortwo] on the page surface
> so I am wondering what is the purpose of the following lines in the
> HTML source:
> Motoricerca does report some minor hidden text, unnatural text and
> tendency to stuff keywords but does NOT report the above.
> I see numerous occurrences of [display: none] in your CSS but almost
> all of that is to do with handhelds and quite OK.
> I wonder if you could take a look at the above and tell me what I am
> missing? It's probably my lack of knowledge in this area. I just want
> to understand things better.
As Admin Aaron suggests, one good way to handle sponsored links is to
disclose them to your visitors by adding a "sponsored" label, and to
search engines using the rel="nofollow" attribute. It looks like
you've already implemented this with your "blatant advertising
(sponsored reviews)" label and the nofollowed links, so good work!
As always, like JLH mentioned, if your site has previously violated
our Webmaster Guidelines and and you've made changes to it so that it
now meets our guidelines, feel free to file a reconsideration request
in Webmaster Tools.
> You just competely lost me with all the html talk. LOL. I honestly
> don't know. Like I said, I don't know anything about being a webmaster
> or html, etc. The layout I am using came straight from blogger though
> I did modify it to be a bit wider, which I did by experimenting and
> just seeing what works. All I can say is that those are my old posts
> which you can find on the left side on the archive though I don't know
> what those html tags mean.
> On Dec 16, 1:54 am, Robbo wrote:
> > Natalie
> > Good to see that your publishing efforts are doing pretty well! For
> > a usful website, well-presented and with some good quality relevant
> > inbound links, I do not think that published PR of 4 was necessarily
> > "wrong" in the first place, even if the site is only a few months old.
> > I would however draw your attention to something that I don't
> > understand. In the Google SERPs I see that the cached image of your
> > homepage is about 188K which seems quite heavy. Even though your
> > visible page is quite long, I could not at first see how it got to be
> > 188K.
> > Then I found sections of HTML coding that I could not see as visible
> > on the page surface. For example, I cannot see [Samsung] or [Suzuki]
> > or [appraisal] or [devel] or [Barbie] or [Fortwo] on the page surface
> > so I am wondering what is the purpose of the following lines in the
> > HTML source:
> > Motoricerca does report some minor hidden text, unnatural text and
> > tendency to stuff keywords but does NOT report the above.
> > I see numerous occurrences of [display: none] in your CSS but almost
> > all of that is to do with handhelds and quite OK.
> > I wonder if you could take a look at the above and tell me what I am
> > missing? It's probably my lack of knowledge in this area. I just want
> > to understand things better.
We've had our site for over two years now, and experienced a similar
issue going from a PR 6 to 0. We haven't really bothered to figure out
what the issue is though since no traffic or anything has been
affected.
