Webmasters in online forums reported an unusual Google behavior. New web pages of some sites are indexed with a longer delay. Is it a new Google penalty? Or is it just a bug that affects only certain websites?

What is the exact problem?

The websites that reported the problem were used to immediate inclusion of their pages in Google’s search results.

If your website has a certain number of inbound links and if it has been indexed by Google, Google usually indexes new pages very quickly. That does not mean that the new pages get high rankings for any keyword but that the new pages can be found in Google’s results if you search for the exact web page title or other unique elements that appear on the new web page.

These websites that were used to immediate inclusion now observed a 7 day delay for new website content:

“My blog has been afloat for almost 1.5 years, was always indexed by Google fast and smooth, and was ranked pretty high by main keywords in its niche. However, it’s been several weeks that Google seems to have stopped indexing my new posts. [...]

It seems as if [Google is] applying an algorithm like ‘posting day + 7 days’ or something when indexing my new posts.”

Is this really a new Google penalty? What can you do against it?

Many of the web pages that have the 7 day indexing problem are Wordpress blogs. There are several theories why these blogs aren’t indexed as quickly as before:

1. The affected websites all seem to use the same SEO plugin for Wordpress that screws up the code and prevents Google from indexing the website pages correctly.

   If you use an SEO plugin, consider if you really need it. These plugins don’t do real SEO. They hide certain pages on your website from search engine spiders and they allow you to edit the header information of your web pages. This can also be done through the regular Wordpress interface.

2. Although the new blog post wasn’t listed for 7 days on Google, the index page of the blog was listed in Google’s search results.

   As the index page of a blog often shows the latest blog posts, it is likely that Google uses the 7 day delay for the blog page because the post can only be found on the blog index page during that time.

3. Some of the affected blogs publish press releases on their websites. As the same press release can also be found on many other websites, Google might return the first publisher of the press release in the search results and discard all other pages with the same content.
4. Other affected websites seem to be AdSense scraper websites. These websites have very little unique content and they have been built to attract visitors that then click on the AdSense ads on the website.
5. Some of the affected websites installed user agent sniffers on their server. These programs return different pages to different user agents (human web surfers, Googlebot and other bots).

   Using such a script on your server can easily prevent Google’s indexing robot from indexing your website and it can be misinterpreted as a spamming (cloaking) attempt. This is very similar to the SEO plugin problem above.

It looks as if the 7 day delay might be related to two different website types: websites that use server scripts that return different pages to different user agents and websites that contain little or no unique content.

The 7 day delay for blogs that display the content both on the blog index page and the blog posting page is not a penalty but a Google feature that prevents duplicate results.

If your website is a Made-For-AdSense scraper website then it’s probably time to think about a new business model. Google might give these websites lower rankings in the future.

If you use bot blocking scripts or other server scripts that change the content that is delivered to visitors of your website then you should make sure that you’re not accidentally blocking Google. It’s better not to use these scripts at all.

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Google Images has indexed billions of images. If your image can be found for the right keyword, then you will get targeted visitors to your website.

Why images can help you to get more visitors

Depending on the search query, Google displays several images above the regular search results. For example, try this search for German Shepherd Dog:

The images can be found at the top of the search results and they are linked with web pages. If someone clicks on the image, the person will be taken to the web page that shows the image.

How to optimize your images so that they can be found

If you have a website about German Shepherd dogs, then wouldn’t it be great if an image from your website was listed above the regular results? You’d get many additional website visitors then.

There are several things that you can do to improve the position of your images in Google Image Search:

1. Use a file name that contains the keywords for which you want to be found. In this example, the file name german-shepherd-dog.jpg would be a good idea. Separate the words with a hyphen.
2. Use a descriptive Image Alt attribute text. It usually makes sense to use the same keywords that have been used for the file name. In this example, the Image Alt Attribute would be “German Shepherd Dog”:

   <img src=”german-shepherd-dog.jpg” alt=”German Shepherd Dog”>

3. In the same way, you should use the Image Title attribute:

   <img src=”german-shepherd-dog.jpg” alt=”German Shepherd Dog” title=”German Shepherd Dog”>

4. The textual content on the web page before and after the image also impacts the position of your image in Google’s Image Search. In this example, the text “German Shepherd Dog” should appear close to the image.
5. Bigger images seem to get featured more often on Google’s first result page. The bigger your image, the easier it is to get at the top of Google’s regular result page. Include the Width and Height attributes in your image tag to show search engines the size of the image:

   <img src=”german-shepherd-dog.jpg” alt=”German Shepherd Dog” title=”German Shepherd Dog” width=”600″ height=”400″>

6. If the complete web page has been optimized for a keyword then it is easier to get good listings for images that are on the page.

Make sure that the image that you optimize for your keyword also looks attractive. If no-one wants to click on the image then it won’t help your website if the image can be found on Google’s first result page.

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Are you sure that your website visitors understand the text on your web pages? If your web pages are difficult to understand, you might not earn as much as you could with your website.

The readability of your web pages influences your sales

Many websites use technical language that is very difficult to understand for the average web surfer. In addition, some webmasters like long and complicated sentences.

Long and complicated sentences are not a sign of professionalism. They just show that the author of the sentences doesn’t care about the readers.

The more complicated the text on your web pages, the more likely it is that a web surfer leaves your website. Web surfers are impatient people. If they have to labor to understand your web pages, web surfers will go away to find an easier site than yours.

How to check the readability of your web pages

There is an official standard that you can use to specify the readability of your web pages. The Flesch Reading Ease test is a United States governmental standard to determine how easy a text is to read. It measures the approximate level of education necessary to understand the web page content.

Higher scores indicate that the text is easier to read, and lower numbers mark harder-to-read texts.

A high Reading Easy Score means that a text is easy to understand. The Grade Level shows the number of years of education that are required to understand the text.

Make sure that your web pages are easy to understand. Do not require too much work from your website visitors.

Make it easy to understand your web pages, make it easy to navigate them, make it easy to buy on your website. The easier your website is to use, the more you will sell.

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Does Google use the bounce rate of a web page to specify the position of that page in the search results? What does this mean for your website rankings and what can you do to get a better bounce rate?

What is the bounce rate?

There are two definitions: the bounce rate of your website is the percentage of visitors who see just one page of your website or the percentage of visitors who stay on your site for a small amount of time (only a few seconds).

The bounce rate helps you to measure the quality of traffic that your website gets and it also helps you to find out where your web pages could be improved.

Google’s definition of the bounce rate

The Google Analytics documentation defines the bounce rate as follows:

“Bounce rate is the percentage of single-page visits (i.e. visits in which the person left your site from the entrance page). Bounce rate is a measure of visit quality and a high bounce rate generally indicates that site entrance (landing) pages aren’t relevant to your visitors.”

This Google definition already indicates that Google thinks that web pages with a high bounce rate aren’t relevant to website visitors. If your web pages have a high bounce rate for a search term, Google might lower the rankings of your website for that search term.

Does Google use the bounce rate as a ranking factor?

Google has the ability to collect the bounce rate with the Google toolbar and Google Analytics. In addition, Google can measure the time between visits to their search engine by the same user and they can use the Google Chrome browser to measure the complete surfing behavior of users.

Last month, a webmaster performed a test that showed a significant ranking change as a result of a significant bounce rate change. The test is not very conclusive but chances are that Google really uses the bounce rate as a ranking factor.

The bounce rate alone might not be used by Google but combined with other factors, it could have an effect on the rankings. For example, Google could measure how many people start a new search for the same topic after visiting your web page. That would be an indicator that your website is not suitable for the chosen keyword.

What can you do to lower the bounce rate of your web pages?

A high bounce rate is usually a sign of a low quality web page. This means that your web page either doesn’t offer what the visitor is searching for or the usability of your web page isn’t good.

If you improved the contents and the usability of your web pages, you might lower your bounce rate from 75% to 65%. This would lead to a remarkable 40% increase in conversions (35 out of 100 visitors now stay on your website instead of 25 out of 100 visitors).

In addition to improving the usability of your web pages, you can lower your bounce rate by tailoring your landing pages to the keywords and ads that you run. If your landing pages offer the information that the searchers are looking for then you will get a lower bounce rate.

Lowering the bounce rate of your web pages has two major benefits: it’s likely that you will get more visitors from search engines and you will get a higher conversion rate. The only exceptions to the scenario above are one page websites and web pages that offer very compelling content on a single web page (for example Wikipedia pages).

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