9 replies to this topic

[patrickh]

Just sent the following issue to both PositionTech (Inktomi, Fast, Ask) and InfoSpider (AltaVista) support, as the problem is occuring on both. Approximently two months ago, we signed up a clients site for paid inclusion in Inktomi, FAST, Ask & AltaVista. What appears to be a immediate result of the paid inclusion has been a drop in rank on queries for many of our targetted keywords on both Inktomi, AltaVista and FAST (we were previously not indexed by Ask).

While I understand that paid inclusion should have no effect on ones ranking, I find it odd that this happened so soon to our submission to paid inclusion, as the site itself has had no changes made to it during this period of time. Anyone have any idea what other things to look for in a case like this? It is not in a super competitive field, and generally there is not a lot of movement in the SERPS for these turms from what I've seen.

Tad confused.

[projectphp]

Barry mentioned a similiar thing in Jill's first ever newsletter. http://www.highranki...om/issue001.htm

Basically, if you rank well, don't go for PFI, as while they don't help or hurt rankings, it does CHANGE the way pages are ranked, and may possibly "reset" parts of the SE, e.g. Inktomi etc, algo. This includes factors such as age of pages, time in index etc ad nausem. I can't tell you exactly or positively how this happens and occurs or why, I just know PFI changes something.

Sorry that no one ever made that clear to you, but I am not sure everyone knows about it. I didn't until I read that newsletter. Essentially, PFI is only good to get pages launched, up and running, and when pages are frequently changed, such as during an active optimisation campaign of fidling with pages. After that, changing could actually be harmful, especially if the site is doing really well.

[MakeMeTop]

Well remembered, projectphp!

But it is so true. PFI re-evaluates the page and may result in falls as well as rises. Leave well enough alone is always a good maxim.

[patrickh]

So if I were to go and cancel the PFI today, even though I would be back to free inclusion I would probly not go back to my old rankings, would you agree? Basicly an unforgiving goofup

[MakeMeTop]

I would actually do just that and switch the PFI to new or previously unindexed pages on the same domain if the page is no longer on the first page for your required phrases. If it is still there, just with a lower rank - then leave it be.

However, be warned, if you do decide to remove it from PFI! The page you have in PFI will disappear until the next "natural" update - which could be a few weeks away. But when it re-appears there is a strong possibility that it may be in a higher position if the "natural" algo rates it as a worthy page (as it obviously did in the past).

[patrickh]

Thanks a lot for the info guys, I am going to change it this afternoon to some pages that are not in the index yet and see if that does anything -- can't hurt to try.

[patrickh]

Just a update, like I posted earlier I contacted both PositionTech and InfoSpider about this problem and am learning which places will get my long term loyalty in the process.

PositionTech has not replied to my e-mail yet, so they are really not impressing me with their customer service at the moment :learn:, their website says 24-48 hour turnaround on e-mail, and we are going on 5 days now.

However, InfoSpider is really wowwing me. They replied to my e-mail within a day or so, and while the majority of it was canned response it did have some good tips on how they rank their pages. Anyways, they have customer support via a online chat, so I went there to cancel my problematic URL's. Instead of just canceling me, they took the time to ask me what my problem was and helped me trouble shoot what was going on, and we ended up finding a solution to my problem. I really can't reccommend InfoSpider enough now, A+ support IMO.

The problem with the site in question was that there were three domain names pointing to the same site, and AV saw them as three sites with duplicate content. So I assume that when it first indexed the site there was just the one domain, and it got a fair ranking -- then when it reassessed it for PFI, it caught the fact that there was three domains and it got a drop because of it... all makes sense really. This site is not one I have been managing, so I unfortunantly did not know a whole about this site and its history on the internet. If all goes well when the other domains are deleted from the index, I will follow suit and try to do the same with Inktomi and Fast.

I'm a happy camper for the moment, things are looking up.

Edited by patrickh, 26 August 2003 - 09:15 AM.

[Newtron]

HI, Patrick...glad you're now a happy camper. Actually, MakeMeTop's comment makes me curious and a bit nervous.

I recently signed a new client's site up for PFI at Inktomi and Fast...the first time I've done this but the client was in a huge hurry and I cound think of no other way.

So, now what happens when my one year expires? Will this site be dropped at the end of the year and not picked back up until the next 'natural go-around?'

Do we now have to resign each year to prevent losing the ~2 months traffic? It's not like it's a lot of money and I would much rather spend it than risk having my clients site drop off the face of the earth even for a short period of time. But, I don't want to spend it if I don't have to.

Does anyone know?

Larry

[patrickh]

Newtron, theoreticly yes you will have to resubscribe to avoid the delay between dropped from PFI and added back via naturally, but from my experience that is not always the case. One site I work with had a lot of pages in Inktomi, and we paid to get about 8 of them in PFI -- during its PFI inclusion, there were still natural pages floating around also; when we decided to drop PFI we did not suffer any delay. Might of just been a good old dose of luck, who knows.

[Newtron]

Thanks Patrick!

Hey, I'd rather be lucky than good. (actually, I'd settle for either)


Larry