Google Sand Box etc

[matt1biz]

I don't actually think the 'sandbox' exists as people currently view it.

Any site is perfectly capable of ranking for any phrase in a short space of time given the right links from the right site.

I see it as a trust/authority factor. For competitive search terms the sites that rank obviously have a lot of trust, either through the age of the sites or through the authority of the sites that link to them.

In the short term a new site isn't realistically going to compete with these older sites - this I think is what people view as the sandbox period.

I've seen sites get ranked within 4-6 weeks for fairly competitive terms when they get links from sites the the BBC, The Times etc etc. The effect of these trusted links boost the authority of the new site so it's able to rank much quicker.

[squalid]

I've seen sites get ranked within 4-6 weeks for fairly competitive terms

you say 4-6 weeks, well google can index a site within 1 day - so why would it take 4-6 weeks to get ranked unless it was due the sandbox ?

[fisicx]

The word 'sandbox' is used to describe the process google goes through when deciding where to rank a page within a website. There is no real sandbox, it just describes the process.

When google finds a new site it makes a quick assessment as to the value of each page. It then spends a lot longer checking each page, indexing header information, content, images, links etc. It then looks further afield to see who is linking to each page and after testing over 100 different criteria gives each page an internal pagerank and an equivalent positon in the SERPs.

This is why new sites tend to do really well until google has determined their real worth. The delay between setting the interim rank and the final rank can take months and is the perion google is said to be playing in the sandbox.

The adult/gaming/scam sites all take advantage of this sandbox period - they can score well in the SERPS using all sorts of black-hat techniques until google catches up with them and they dissapear without trace. But they don't really care - they will have made enough money in that period to set up and do the whole thing again using a different domain and slightly different content.

One way to check if you are 'boxed' is to do a search on all the majot SEs for your targeted keywords. If the google rank is considerably below that in the other search engines you could be under review by google. On the other hand, google may just not like your links/content and not give your rank you think you deserve.

Of course, I could be wrong. It has happened before...

[matt1biz]

Originally Posted by squalid

you say 4-6 weeks, well google can index a site within 1 day - so why would it take 4-6 weeks to get ranked unless it was due the sandbox ?

Ranking and indexing are two completely different things.

I guess it would theoretically be possible to get a site ranked in one day if you could pull all of the links needed to rank in place before the site was put live.

In reality it doesn't happen like that, it takes a few weeks for links to get spidered and and the effects of these to be taken into account and the effects of these to filter through the DCs.

[squalid]

In reality it doesn't happen like that, it takes a few weeks for links to get spidered and and the effects of these to be taken into account and the effects of these to filter through the DCs.

and that could be argued as the sandbox process

[fisicx]

If, as you suggest Matt that is does take time to get indexed and ranked, how do all the news site manage?

The search engines manage to have fresh content indexed within minutes in some cases.

The sand box applies (in general) to new sites. Existing sites whose pages have already been indexed and ranked can have their content spidered daily.

[matt1biz]

and that could be argued as the sandbox process

Maybe, but a deliberate 'new-site' penalty is vastly different to Google's technology limitations.

If, as you suggest Matt that is does take time to get indexed and ranked, how do all the news site manage?

Yes exactly, large news sites because of their authority are almost constantly being spidered.

When I was referring to it taking time to get indexed I was referring to a new domain - which people believe the sandbox applied to.

[squalid]

what matt cutts says about sandbox is

Some people have asked, "does this apply to newer sites?" Essentially, the way to think about it is, around 2003 Google switched to a new method of updating its index. Before that we had monthly Google dances. So as a result, new data is always being folded into the index. It's not like there was one pivotal moment when anyone cans say, "Hah! This is the change!" In fact, even at different data centers we have different binaries, different algorithms, different types of data always being tested.

"I think a lot of what's perceived as the sandbox is artefacts where, in our indexing, some data may take longer to be computed than other data

Also, there is a audio version of the interview at -

http://www.clickz.com/showPage.html?page=3605961

at the bottom of the page - mp3 part 2.

so we can carry on debating as to whether the sandbox exists - and if it does - what is it etc as the answer was a bit ambiguous.

But as he also mentioned with regard to new sites the trade off between having fresh information on the internet and trust - that there probably is some sort of 'new site status' which may or may not be called a sandbox.