Lesson Learned And The Reasons For My PageRank Hit
As I stated in the last post, I pretty much expected my blog to take a PageRank hit with the latest update and as of right now, it looks like I am back to square 1 with a PR0. (Have had it as high as PR3)
I have a number of theories and reasons I believe this happened and will be working to rectify those over the next few weeks and months.
The first thing I had going against me was the hosting move. I moved this blog which had been in existence for two years from one host to a more reliable webhost. By the same token, I made the mistake of not doing 301 redirects for all of the old pages that I did not include here when I rebuilt the blog. This has resulted in a TON of 404 errors and we all know that Google does not like 404's. This was strike one and two against me.
Then, in a brilliant moment of stupidity, I decided to make this a do follow blog along with installing CommentLuv and KeywordLuv so that whoever commented here would gain maximum benefit. At first, this was great for the regular readers of my blog. However, about a month and a half after I announced it, I started getting a ton of spam comments as well as found out my blog got listed on several DoFollow lists. Now in addition to apparently linking out to some bad neighborhoods, I have quite a few pointing to me.
I have been debating on how best to handle this and after considering several different solutions, I have finally reached a decision. I really cannot do anything about the sites linking to me, but I am going back to nofollow. However, you will still have a chance to gain a dofollow backlink as well as a couple of more links in your comments.
I will be installing the Top Commentators plugin later today and I will leave those links DoFollow. So if you comment often, your link will be followed from the list. Even though I will be nofollow, I am going to leave CommentLuv and KeywordLuv enabled. This is still a benefit for you as a commentor. CommentLuv will show your last blog post and KeywordLuv gives you the anchored keyword text in the name field of your comment. Do not forget that Yahoo, MSN and others really do not pay attention to the nofollow attribute so the links will still count on those engines. Sorry folks, but this was Strike 3.
Strike 4 came with upgrading my template to this one. Even though I had the All In One SEO Pack plugin installed, my template was still overriding the plugin. So once it was updated in the index, it was using the meta information and description called from the php code in the template. When I checked Webmaster Tools, I had over 43 errors for duplicate meta description content. I removed that bit of code from the template last week so now the plugin is functioning as it should and the duplicate meta errors are disappearing.
The lesson here is if you are running a blog, check that your meta info and descriptions are not all the same once your blog is indexed.
Something else I have not taken the time to do is edit my .htaccess file to not index my archives, tags and other pages that would result in the same content getting indexed twice. Yes, not doing this can result in yet another duplicate content penalty with Google. This is another item I will have to rectify.
One more item I have not actively pursued is building backlinks to the site. This is also something that I will need to work on over the next couple of months.
So these are the lessons I have learned and mistakes I have made over the last 3-5 months. I hope you learn from them as well and can avoid a PageRank reduction happening to you. I will revisit this with the next PR update and we will see if making these changes have an effect.
Best of luck and happy building!
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Hicham (1 comments.) | Oct 1, 2008 | Reply
Hello Melissa,
I think the problem existed because of what you’ve mentioned not because of the ‘DoFollow’ thing because you can easily moderate your comments and never display the spam comments, right?
Yan from Blog for Beginners (2 comments.) | Oct 2, 2008 | Reply
Personally, the dofollow isn’t an issue heres o does sharing your PR juice. I hate to disagree but I don’t think that’s the case.
I could safely presume that the biggest problem has got to be the 404 errors but were you changing your permalink while moving the new host? I have moved my host twice but I wasn’t having the same problem.
On the other hand, why are using .htaccess to block search engines index, aren’t you using robots. txt file?
Thank you for allowing me to share my thoughts… I’m enjoying your blog but I’m afraid I could easily miss your response to comment. Do you plan to install ’subscribe to comment’ here?
Yan
Yans last blog post..The Best 15 SEO Tools At Your Disposal
Melissa | Oct 2, 2008 | Reply
@ Hicham,
I am tending to agree. I moderate my comments anyway but am testing a few other theories out as well. I will post on those at a later time.
@ Yan,
Don’t worry a thing about disagreeing. That is what this is all about. Developing a community type atmosphere where anyone can post their thoughts. Whether they agree or disagree.
I really struggled with removing dofollow for the time being. I do plan to go back to dofollow in the near future, but as I said above, I am sort of experimenting with a few theories right now.
In this post, I was also ranting a little when it came to comment spam, however I believe I finally have that under control and will post about how I have eliminated that problem soon.
I am positive as well that the drop had more to do with 404 errors than anything. No, I did not change permalink structure, but when I migrated to the new host, I did not bring about 110 posts with me.
It was mostly outdated information and a lot of it had no relevance here for the direction I was going so I chose not to re-post them. This resulted in around 4000 404 errors during the first month.
From an SEO standpoint, Google despises 404 errors. According to what I hear, if you remove a page and do not do a 301 redirect to another page, Google will punish you. I did not take the time to do this and fear this is the biggest reason for my drop.
I do use robots. txt, but not to its fullest. I will use that to block the indexing of certain areas of the site.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts and you’re welcome back anytime. I had not installed the “subscribe to comments” plugin here, but will do so if you wish it. Also, if you look right above the post above yours, where it says Comments, Post a Comment,etc. there is an RSS button located there that should be for comments. Don’t know if that helps, but thought I would point it out.
Thank you both for stopping by.
All the best,
Melissa
Sam from Austin Real Estate (2 comments.) | Oct 6, 2008 | Reply
The 404 must have really hit you hard. When I was learning about SEO a few years ago I had a .info url. I really wanted a .com and finally saw an opportunity. I vanished for around 6 months. There are some very basic things you just can’t do after you have an established and respected site. What a tough way to learn.
Melissa | Oct 9, 2008 | Reply
Hi Sam,
Yes, I believe it was mainly the 404’s that reduced the ranking. It was a pretty hard hit.
I can understand where you are coming from on the domain move. I’ve had that happen in the past myself. As you said, it is definitely a tough way to learn.
All the best to you.
Justin Wright (3 comments.) | Oct 30, 2008 | Reply
It’s really interesting if the reason for the drop was in fact to being “Dofollow.” I think it is pretty sad on Google if they would downgrade a PageRank simply because your giving your readers a fair backlink.
I have been DoFollow now for a few months but I am yet to see what will happen when the next PR update takes place. I really hope it does not affect me.
If it does, I guess PageRank isn’t so important after all.
Justin Wrights last blog post..An Interview With Darren Rowse
Melissa | Oct 30, 2008 | Reply
Hi Justin,
Well, that’s the million dollar question.
I have done what I can to rectify everything I believe Google might not have liked and am letting it roll until the next PR update.
Once it comes around, I will be going back to DoFollow and we will see what happens on the following update.
Honestly, I’m not so much concerned with PR anymore. In a way, I never was. It’s just a hard knock when you once had it and then it gets taken away.
As I’ve said before, I will take traffic over PR any day of the week.
david from Promotional Codes (2 comments.) | Jan 8, 2009 | Reply
Been reading a few of your articles tonight and make very pleasant reading.
I see that you have got back to 2 on the latest page rank so have you finally concluded what caused the drop previously? sorry if you have already answered this elsewhere as i did do a search but could not find anything.
Melissa | Jan 8, 2009 | Reply
Hi David,
Thanks for the question and no, I had not yet answered this elsewhere. No worries.
In all honesty, I believe it to be the server move and the resulting 404 errors that came along with it. There were many posts on the old blog that I did not move to this one, and I did not point those posts anywhere to the new blog.
That may not have been all of it, but I know that it was a good portion of it. I am waiting until Saturday to switch DoFollow back on. Reason why is that some are still reporting that their PR is still fluctuating. I think by Saturday, it should have settled out.
Then we get to wait for the next PR update to see what happens by being DoFollow.
david from Promotional Codes (2 comments.) | Feb 5, 2009 | Reply
Thanks for the reply Melissa. When the next update happens will certainly be visting your website Melissa to see if it made a difference. Also agree re PR v Traffic as content gets traffic while PR seems for many to be vanity!!!
Car Body Kit (1 comments.) | Mar 9, 2009 | Reply
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Ruri from Free article directory (8 comments.) | Aug 13, 2009 | Reply
So basically your blog is nofollow? or do follow with X number of comments?
Seriously this should be mention honestly because I don’t like to post in NoFollow blog.
Keywordluv and commentluv is useless without DoFollow.
Well I also don’t see top commentators in your blog.