I’ve read about some people’s Google PRs dropping (some, for no good reason). I guess the Page Rank doesn’t really matter [unless you’re into the whole “status” thing that it supposedly confers onto a blog/website ^^].

What does matter is if your ranking in the search engine itself drops.

In my case, I was on the first page (rank #1 or #2) for search keywords “unique gifts blog” [the site being www.oonique.com] for a while.

In Jan 08, it dropped to page 12, consequently page 14, and 16. Yesterday it was on the second page, and today it happens to be on the first again.

I was fiddling around with some sponsored posts on that blog, partly to see how the reported “Google slash in PR against PayPerPost blogs” would go (damn, what a move!). Most of the posts were provided by PPP — now known as Izea. I’m not sure whether Google specifically went after PPP blogs, but the drop in search engine rankings sure got annoying.

The steps I took to try and rectify the situation were:

1) To remove all such posts

I saved a copy of them though, in case I ever needed any of them for anything. If you’re keeping such posts, I guess it’d be wise to remove the TinyURLs and affiliate links [any advertisement-looking links]. Something that looks like you’re tricking readers/visitor into clicking the link.

For example, http://toplevel.astracker.hop.clickbank.net versus http://erictips.com/adsensegold.html. Which gives the visitor a better idea of where they’re going?

2) Remove PPP Tool/s

I only used one on my blog. It was the line to add in the <body> section.

script screenshot

3) Send an e-mail via Google Webmaster Tools

Some people say that it’s no use sending an e-mail if your site was penalized [because the e-mail feature in Webmaster Tools is supposed to be for reconsideration requests into Google’s index. Basically this means that for some reason, your website/blog got deleted from the search engine itself, because it violated some terms of Google’s Webmaster Guidelines].

However, I thought it’d be alright to just send them a short note. I politely stated that:

  • I figured it was due to the PPP sort posts, which contributed to my blog’s considerably lowered rank in the search engine
  • I had made the changes to my site
  • I would not repeat this again. This shows them that you’re serious about keeping your site in line with their guidelines. And for goodness sake if you say this, stick to it :P.

I also thanked them for “their time and consideration”.

I sent the e-mail on 16 Feb 2008. My blog’s ranking seems to be okay now on 1 May 2008.

References: Cloaking Affiliate Links and Avoiding the Tiny URLs Syndrome

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