McDar Experiment

Caryl

Does this all suggest that forum links are worthless now?

They seemed to count at the beginning of the experience but as we all know changes were made since then....

 

This is what we are trying to determine with adding links from webpages located on different websites.

I would NOT speculate (ie. sig links =worthless) at this point what exactly has effected this page. There are too many factors involved lately.

I would say if we start to come back plus some of the new links show up in the next update, we could then have reason to believe it was the addition of the "new" links and NOT the sig links that helped.

 

link added

 

Talking about link to our experimental page, one thing we haven't tried is submitting to directories. I know we haven't got the budget for PFI directories, but there are still lots of free ones.

The problem is that submission is a ton of work. I always have a hell of a time figuring out what category a page belongs in, and then half the time some editor will put it in a different category anyway.

I had an editor move a site I submitted last week some time to a category that has absolutely nothing to do with the site.

In any case I would put together the title, description and keywords that we would need for directory submission if anyone wants to volunteer to do some submissions.

Do we have any DMOZ editors on here who could help us get listed there?

 

Isn't DMOZ a 'sacred site?'

 

Nothing is taboo. If you don't ask the answer is always "no", but if you do ask there is some chance -- maybe slim, but still a chance -- that the answer maybe "yes".

 

I was an editor years ago. But you shouldn't have to be an editor to get listed. Anyway this isn't the place for a DMOZ debate.

 

Caryl I have put up 14 new domain links and PMd you with the IPs etc.

Lets see if what is happening here will make a difference. Thanks everybody

 

Thanks to all those who have contacted me so far!

We have new links from 23 additional IP addresses, as of this AM.

As tracking these new, additional, links will be a bit much to add to the daily report, that information can be found by following the link to the complete report in the daily update.

Keep - em - coming!

Again, if you are interested in helping...
Please copy and paste this link:
<a href="http://www.mcdar.com/camping1/sleeping-bags.htm">sleeping bags</a>

and contact me via Private Message or email to and let me know the url of the link to us and the url and anchor text of the link/s you would like in return.

Caryl

 

Slightly Off-Topic:

Have you noticed any increase in traffic or sales from all this experimenting?

 

To check host affiliation, the IP reporting is a good thing IMO.

I thought of another thing though. We don't know whether G algo actually weighs it in but maybe you could add a column to your excel next to the IP with a 1 - 5 rating of relevancy as assumed by the link-er. With that I mean the source page's semantic relevancy to the linkee's page and chosen anchor text. In a month's time you could check the 'links reported' against their relevancy rating and maybe see something interesting.

Just some ideas in an attempt to further strike out some question marks regarding this experiment although I do realize it adds even more variables to what is already a complex test.

 

Short answer - No!

Long answer - The best position, to date, for this page has been page two in the results. It was there for a total of 6 days in April and then again for about half of May ( as can be seen in the Complete Report ). Other than that it has been page 3 to page 30 and then gone.

It's a competitive Keyword and not too many folks venture past the first page of the results and adsense ads, I'm afraid.

I chose this keyword for the experiment because I had tried since Florida to get it back up i the serps. My main page used to be in position #23 (pre-Fla), the best I could ever recover that page was about position #220.

Since Fla, Google seemed to put a high focus on links and more specifically to ANCHOR TEXT. My main page had too many assorted links to turn the anchor text around. So, I decided to try to attack the keyword with a brand new page.

Making some money would have been GREAT, but this has truely been just pure research.

Caryl

FYI: The page did reach #3 for the keywords in Yahoo! and stayed there for a month or more. For that total time, Yahoo sent about 14 hits my way. Pitiful!!!!!

 

This is an interesting concept BUT would leave too much to speculation and conjecture. We can actually measure, by Googles report, whether a page is reported or not. (that is fact)

There are a great many reasons why a page may not come up in a link:... search on Google. Since many of the pages donating links are of lower PR value, it could simply be that Google had not found the link yet.

We have made every effort to base this experiment on cold hard data we have gathered and not add our biases to the results.

We could have made many claims so far and had data to back it up. But, consideration of Googles state of instability at the time, reduced our evidence to poor at best and any claims would have been pure speculation (if not dead wrong).

Example: Foxy & Bob replaced links in Signatures on 7/21/2004. On 7/26/2004 the page went from position #315 to position #34. Based on those spectacular results, we could have said Signature links lend great weight to your linking strategy! THAT would have been dead wrong!

Truth is, looking at Googles condition at the time, reports on other forum posts, and rank pulse it was very obvious that the results we witness were Googles doing and NOT the signature links.

If I have learned anything from this experiment, it would be to look at every report of anyones experiment with very critical eyes. It is easy to imply cause and effect IF you eliminate or neglect many variables.

Caryl

 

NEW PAGE UPDATE:
*Google PR/Backlink update
**29 DCs are NOT responding**
***27 DCs are NOT responding**
****32 DCs are NOT responding**

The "New Page" sleeping-bags.htm
04/07/2004 "New Page" went live

Search for "Sleeping Bags"
_____________
NOTE: Due to size constraints, the entire report can no longer appear in a post.
You can view the entire report here... Complete Report
________________
Last 10 days

Postion #Not Found allinanchor: #8 - 08/03/2004 [15 DCs #Not Found, 2 DCs #49, 10 DCs #50, 7 DCs #52] ***
Postion #Not Found allinanchor: #8 - 08/04/2004 [14 DCs #Not Found, 4 DCs #45, 7 DCs #46, 2 DCs #49, 2 DCs #51] ****
Postion #Not Found allinanchor: #8 - 08/05/2004 [14 DCs #Not Found, 2 DCs #47, 11 DCs #48, 2 DCs #53] ****
Postion #Not Found allinanchor: #8 - 08/06/2004 [12 DCs #Not Found, 6 DCs #47, 5 DCs #48, 2 DCs #50, 5 DCs #51] ****
Postion #Not Found allinanchor: #8 - 08/07/2004 [14 DCs #Not Found, 2 DCs #46, 11 DCs #47, 4 DCs #48] ****
Postion #Not Found allinanchor: #8 - 08/08/2004 [14 DCs #Not Found, 2 DCs #48, 11 DCs #50, 4 DCs #51] ****
Postion #Not Found allinanchor: #8 - 08/09/2004 [14 DCs #Not Found, 2 DCs #48, 11 DCs #50, 4 DCs #51] ****
Unchanged from previous date
Postion #Not Found allinanchor: #8 - 08/11/2004 [16 DCs #Not Found, 2 DCs #47, 9 DCs #49, 4 DCs #50] ****
Postion #Not Found allinanchor: #9 - 08/12/2004 [18 DCs #Not Found, 2 DCs #54, 7 DCs #57, 4 DCs #58] ****
Postion #Not Found allinanchor: #9 - 08/13/2004 [18 DCs #Not Found, 2 DCs #53, 8 DCs #54, 3 DCs #55] ****
Postion #Not Found allinanchor: #9 - 08/14/2004 [18 DCs #Not Found, 2 DCs #52, 9 DCs #54, 2 DCs #55] ****
Postion #Not Found allinanchor: #9 - 08/15/2004 [#Not Found - In ALL Datacenters, ] ****
Postion #Not Found allinanchor: #10 - 08/16/2004 [#Not Found - In ALL Datacenters, ] ****
Unchanged from previous date

_____________________________________________________
note: these pages are found using ( site:www.compar.com +sleeping Bags )
number of Bob's PR6 and PR5 links found:

83 - 7/29/2004
Unchanged from previous date
81 - 8/07/2004
80 - 8/08/2004
Unchanged from previous date
79 - 8/12/2004
Unchanged from previous date
75 - 8/15/2004
Unchanged from previous date
76 - 8/17/2004
Unchanged from previous date
78 - 8/20/2004
__________________
note: this page is found using ( site:www.komar.org +sleeping Bags )
Alek's PR 7 Link:
Not reported by Google 4/17/2004
Reported by Google 4/18/2004 (all datacenters)
Unchanged from previous date
Link removed / no longer pointing to page 6/2/2004
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note: this page is found using ( site:www.ski-france-ok.com +sleeping Bags )
Foxy's PR5 and two PR4s
0 - 4/20/2004
3 - 5/04/2004
Unchanged from previous date
2 - 6/17/2004
Unchanged from previous date
__________________
Bob and Foxy added link Sleeping Bags to their sig files on this forum 5/06/2004
Results for - ( site:forums.digitalpoint.com +sleeping bags )
Note:Foxy & Bob removed links from Signatures - 6/11/2004
4060 - highest links reported 6/12/2004
Note:Foxy & Bob replaced links in Signatures - 7/21/2004

3440 - 8/02/2004
3460 - 8/03/2004
3960 - 8/04/2004
3910 - 8/05/2004
Unchanged from previous date
3840 - 8/07/2004
3720 - 8/08/2004
Unchanged from previous date
3750 - 8/12/2004
Unchanged from previous date
3730[/COLOR] - 8/14/2004
Unchanged from previous date
3690 - 8/16/2004
3710- 8/17/2004
3830 - 8/18/2004
3840 - 8/19/2004
Unchanged from previous date
__________________

Caryl and Foxy added link Sleeping Bags to their sig files on the SEO Chat forum 5/11/2004
Results for - ( site:forums.seochat.com +sleeping bags )

167 - 8/02/2004
161 - 8/03/2004
158 - 8/04/2004
154 - 8/05/2004
Unchanged from previous date
156 - 8/07/2004
155 - 8/08/2004
Unchanged from previous date
173 - 8/12/2004
207 - 8/13/2004
220 - 8/14/2004
Unchanged from previous date
226- 8/17/2004
234 - 8/18/2004
233 - 8/19/2004
Unchanged from previous date
__________________

"Sandbox" info - this search theoretically removes "sandbox" link filter
Results for - ( sleeping bags -dsa -dsa -dsa -dsa -dsa -das -das -dsa )

#244 - 07/18/2004
#251 - 07/19/2004
#246 - 07/20/2004
Unchanged from previous date
#43 - 07/26/2004
Unchanged from previous date
#418 - 08/16/2004
Unchanged from previous date
__________________

*August 18, 2004 - (10) Project Supporters donated a total of 51 Links from 13 different IP addresses to page. Additional info will be added as it comes in.
__________________
PR/Backlink info

~ August 9 Update ~ (only Backlinks updated in this update)
sleeping-bags.htm has PR6
85 Backlinks
(backlinks reported in 84 of 85)
13 of Caryl's links
13 of Bob's Links
0 of Foxy's Links
20 for Digitalpoint forums
28 for SEO Chat forums
___________

~ July 16 Update ~ (only Backlinks updated in this update)
sleeping-bags.htm has PR6
129 Backlinks
(backlinks reported in 113 of 129)
14 of Caryl's links
11 of Bob's Links
1 of Foxy's Links
49 for Digitalpoint forums
38 for SEO Chat forums
___________

~ June 22 Update ~
sleeping-bags.htm has PR6
325 Backlinks
(backlinks reported in the 325)
50 of Caryl's links
56 of Bob's Links
1 of Foxy's Links
149 for Digitalpoint forums
70 for SEO Chat forums
1 for Alek's Link
___________

~ May 31 Update ~
sleeping-bags.htm has PR6
170 Backlinks
(backlinks reported in the 170)
37 of Caryl's links
46 of Bob's Links
1 of Foxy's Links
85 for Digitalpoint forums
1 for Alek's Link
___________

~ April 23 Update ~
sleeping-bags.htm has PR5
49 Backlinks
(backlinks reported in the 49)
5 of Caryl's links
42 of Bob's Links
1 of Foxy's Links
2 for Digitalpoint forums
Nothing for Alek's PR7 link(the link on Alek's page is 53rd link - may validate the 50 link/page theory)
__________________

~ Highest Position Attained ~

Position #15 allinanchor: #5 - 05/15/2004 [12 datacenters #19] Note: Allinanchor #6 on 12 DCs
(No signature links had been used at this point - may have been "honeymoon period")

__________________
Note:Google API has page at #N/A

 

Googlebot spidered the experiment page this AM:

2004-08-20 03:45:12 64.68.82.189 - 208.184.21.219 80 GET /camping1/sleeping-bags.htm - 200 20698 237 261 HTTP/1.0 www.mcdar.com Googlebot/2.1+(+http://www.google.com/bot.html)

Time will tell if the cache gets updated from June 22nd as a result.

 

Caryl, all links are up.

Twenty links from a single domain, non-relevant site. Home page is a PR6.

Will send PM regarding URLs.

Thanks.

 

The Cached date showing for the experimental page is now 20 Aug 2004 03:45:12 GMT.

Let's hope this is a sign of the page being on the road back.

 

Well, I checked earlier this AM and everything was the same. I just varified the cache and indeed it had been updated!

SO - I checked the position in the search results and...

GUESS WHAT.....

POSITION for the page is now is back i the 40s - 50s range!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I will do a daily report now.

Caryl