How My Popular Site was Banned by Google • Hacker News Board

Re: How My Popular Site was Banned by Google

#41

Post by OpenAlgorithm » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 10:01 PM UTC

Matt_Cutts wrote: post #39

nirvana wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

http://www.filleritemfinder.com/ is the first hit for "filler item" on google right now. A search for hacker news results in a page full of affiliate links, just as the example you gave above. Only difference is that they didn't re-write the URL. filleritemfinder.com has no robots.txt that I was able to pull up. So, filleritem.com, a google customer, was blocked, but filleritemfinder.com, doing the same thing, is the…

When I do the search [filler item], one of the top results I see is http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/top-5-amazon-filler-item-finder... which shows five different services to fill this information need, and that also has pictures. I do think that's a pretty helpful result. I mentioned filleritemfinder.com as a random example (there are many of these services), but filleritemfinder.com appears to use AJAX to keep results…

Would it be likely that if the site was to use another monetization plan that it would be less likely to be penalized e.g. advertising instead of affiliate links?

Re: How My Popular Site was Banned by Google

#42

Post by heelhook » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 10:04 PM UTC

josefresco wrote: post #38

Amazon probably complained to Google and Google despite already having the rules on the books decided to enforce it on this one site, while also keeping many other low traffic clone sites offering the same service alone. Call me paranoid, or cynical but I've seen much worse from Google on the AdWords side of their offerings.

If that were the case Amazon would have a much simpler solution by stopping the affiliate account altogether, instead of having to ask Google to stop some of the traffic.

Re: How My Popular Site was Banned by Google

#43

Post by kbrower » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 10:05 PM UTC

Matt_Cutts wrote: post #36

gojomo wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Still, when used as intended (with the query a dollar amount, like your 31.69 example), isn't his site useful ? (I've not noticed a similarly straightforward tool for this same purpose at Amazon.com itself.) The non-dollar-amount queries seem like a bug -- triggering a default of listing up from 0.00, unrelated to the query. If this were an intentional manipulative tactic, wouldn't the outlinks be related to the quer…

I'm not saying that the issues aren't fixable. But when the site came up for a review, we saw things that violate our quality guidelines: autogenerated pages with hundreds of affiliate links that consist of lots of keywords, and the links/keywords are duplicate content. If he fixes the issues by e.g. blocking out the autogenerated pages, then I expect his homepage will be found in Google. The autogenerated pages are…

FYI I am aware of the staleness issues. I update items less that cost $2 or less hourly. I update all other items daily.

Re: How My Popular Site was Banned by Google

#44

Post by gojomo » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 10:06 PM UTC

Matt_Cutts wrote: post #36

gojomo wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Still, when used as intended (with the query a dollar amount, like your 31.69 example), isn't his site useful ? (I've not noticed a similarly straightforward tool for this same purpose at Amazon.com itself.) The non-dollar-amount queries seem like a bug -- triggering a default of listing up from 0.00, unrelated to the query. If this were an intentional manipulative tactic, wouldn't the outlinks be related to the quer…

I'm not saying that the issues aren't fixable. But when the site came up for a review, we saw things that violate our quality guidelines: autogenerated pages with hundreds of affiliate links that consist of lots of keywords, and the links/keywords are duplicate content. If he fixes the issues by e.g. blocking out the autogenerated pages, then I expect his homepage will be found in Google. The autogenerated pages are…

Fair enough! Was there a way Brower could have received this clear explanation without appearing on the front page of HN?

Re: How My Popular Site was Banned by Google

#45

Post by Matt_Cutts » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 10:06 PM UTC

kbrower wrote: post #40

Matt_Cutts wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My advice would be to use robots.txt to block out the autogenerated pages; when users search for e.g. a long-tail phrase and then land on a page that's nothing but affiliate links with a lot of keywords, they tend to complain to us. Users would be happier if they landed on the root page of your site or the root page of http://www.superfillers.com/ or http://www.filleritemfinder.com/ than if they landed on a deep page…

Ok, well I am willing to give that a try. Just implemented. Thanks Matt! http://filleritem.com/robots.txt

Cool, I'll send in a reconsideration request. You might want to add http://filleritem.com/iframe.html?q= as a pattern too.

Re: How My Popular Site was Banned by Google

#46

Post by thematt » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 10:06 PM UTC

kposehn wrote: post #11

kbrower wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I included an image of my adwords account. The ad had been running for years(albeit infrequently due to very low budget), and I had not touched it since creating it. I checked after this all happened, and there were several warnings from adwords, but nothing from webmaster tools. I simply ignored the adwords warnings as I was not actively using the account and figured they were just disabling ads. If I had know these…

Unfortunately, deleting an AdWords account won't remove the violation; it may actually make it worse. Google will look back several years and disable ads that haven't run for a very long time. Sometimes they even ban accounts that are inactive or deleted! It is very important to remember: when dealing with Google AdWords, the definition of a violation changes with time. If you violated the current policies in the pas…

That said, seeing an exclusion from organic based on an AdWords suspension is extremely alarming. That may be exactly what the DoJ is looking for in terms of violations by Google.

According to Matt Cutts, it was the exact opposite: he got the organic suspension then the AdWords suspension.

Re: How My Popular Site was Banned by Google

#47

Post by Matt_Cutts » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 10:07 PM UTC

josefresco wrote: post #38

Amazon probably complained to Google and Google despite already having the rules on the books decided to enforce it on this one site, while also keeping many other low traffic clone sites offering the same service alone. Call me paranoid, or cynical but I've seen much worse from Google on the AdWords side of their offerings.

Nope, that didn't happen.

Re: How My Popular Site was Banned by Google

#48

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 10:10 PM UTC

kbrower wrote: post #17

Matt_Cutts wrote: post #15

You have an autogenerated web site that consists of practically nothing other than affiliate links to Amazon. You can make an infinite number of autogenerated pages on your site, e.g. http://www.filleritem.com/index.html?q=hacker+news http://www.filleritem.com/index.html?q=31.69 http://www.filleritem.com/index.html?q=teen+sex and each autogenerated page consists of literally hundreds of affiliate links stuffed with k…

Hi Matt, Thanks for responding. The point of the site is to find items of a particular price that qualify for free shipping on Amazon.com. If you want I will give you access to my google analytics to show you that this is a site people want and use. I guess I should not let people link to the search results page? http://www.filleritem.com/index.html?q=hacker+news and http://www.filleritem.com/index.html?q=anything+th…

[deleted]

Re: How My Popular Site was Banned by Google

#49

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 10:11 PM UTC

mc32 wrote: post #26

dangrossman wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A filler item is something with a specific (low) price used to make an order near the free shipping minimum reach that minimum. A search for the words "filler item" is not at all related and not at all helpful.

Sorry, try this instead: http://www.amazon.com/Shipping-Filler-items-under-shipping/l...

[deleted]

Re: How My Popular Site was Banned by Google

#50

Post by kbrower » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 10:12 PM UTC

Matt_Cutts wrote: post #22

kbrower wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi Matt, Thanks for responding. The point of the site is to find items of a particular price that qualify for free shipping on Amazon.com. If you want I will give you access to my google analytics to show you that this is a site people want and use. I guess I should not let people link to the search results page? http://www.filleritem.com/index.html?q=hacker+news and http://www.filleritem.com/index.html?q=anything+th…

My advice would be to use robots.txt to block out the autogenerated pages; when users search for e.g. a long-tail phrase and then land on a page that's nothing but affiliate links with a lot of keywords, they tend to complain to us. Users would be happier if they landed on the root page of your site or the root page of http://www.superfillers.com/ or http://www.filleritemfinder.com/ than if they landed on a deep page…

Your comment to my response is too deep for me to reply, so I will reply again here.

Thanks for submitting the reconsideration request. I just added Disallow: /iframe.html?q= as suggested.