Your website has gone from being in the Google search results for several years to not even being included in Google’s index.

What happened?
I generally spend a few hours a week taking part in discussions and lending the occasional helping hand at the Google Webmaster Help group, a forum set up to help address the problems and technical queries of frustrated webmasters, designers and SEOs with regards to anything from site verification to indexing & crawling; in fact, just about any Google related issue imaginable.

Populated by a colourful mix of regular characters and part-time contributors from across the globe as well as more than a few of Google’s own staff, it acts as a kind of front-line support forum which has thus far attracted a membership of over 16,000.

Indeed, this article is the result of one particular discussion thread which caught my eye this afternoon.

What Happened to My Site?
As another user quite rightly pointed out, this is by far the most commonly asked question in the Google webmaster help group.

Which is to say; “My web site was ranking very well up until recently, but has now dropped in the results or disappeared from the Google index altogether.”

Although the comment about this question’s frequency was initially made as part of a post highlighting the need for a properly structured FAQ section, it eventually prompted a heated debate regarding Google’s spam report and penalty system which raised a few interesting points of its own.

Persecuted by Google?
The general stance taken by group members on one side of the discussion was that, if a web site simply disappears from the index without having previously employed ‘black hat’ tactics, the fault must be Google’s for persecuting it as a result of malicious spam reports made by competitors.

Having seen this type of allegation levelled against Google before, I followed the discussion with great interest wondering where things would end up.

After some to and fro involving the usual mix of paranoia, guesses and solid advice, one user pointed out that the issue had been briefly addressed only a short while ago by Google’s Adam Lasnik, stating:

“Spamfighting does not factor in a “popularity of the commons” scheme whereby if [x] people vote a site off the Google Island; it is ceremoniously dumped into /dev/null.

Put more directly: Having someone (or even 42 MILLION people) report a site as spam will not change how we view a site. Our spam report, rather, helps us to become aware of pages violating our guidelines that we might not yet have crawled… enabling us to have another datapoint in our search quality efforts.” Full Post

To quote one user’s interpretation of the above statement: “If it were really this easy to bump your competitor out of the rankings, every site in the world would now be banned and the Google index would be empty. When a spam/abuse report is filed, Google looks at the spam techniques used and investigates ways to improve its algorithm to find these spam techniques in the future on all sites - not one site in particular.”

If a web site loses its rankings or is dropped from the Google index altogether, there is usually a reason; an issue which needs to be addressed in order to regain the lost ground or be re-included in the search results.

Despite the fact that Google’s Judge, Jury and Executioner approach of deleting sites from the index without notice may seem draconian at first glance, one should remember that it has become a search-leviathan, not only having to deal with an almost unfathomable number of indexed pages, but also having to differentiate between relevant and irrelevant resources whilst weeding out black-hat techniques in the process.

Speaking from personal experience, it seems to me that many webmasters are much quicker to level the finger at Google (and other engines) than they are to diagnose their own web sites in order to find out whether something is wrong.

Furthermore, a fair proportion of them still seem to be entirely unfamiliar with Google’s Webmaster Tools or even the Google Webmaster Guidelines.

The fact is that, love it or hate it; Google provides its users with a whole array of applications to aid the monitoring and ongoing promotion of their sites, as well as a host of other resources, including blogs, help pages and even the occasional piece of personal advice via the webmaster help group.

So, whilst Google-bashing is rapidly becoming a favourite pastime for some webmasters whose sites have been caught in the latest algorithm update or are struggling in the face of growing competition, I cannot help but wonder if their time and efforts would not be better spent redeveloping their web sites, addressing W3C Compliance issues and/or generating high-quality content and inbound links to aid their chances of future success. In the immortal words of Henry Ford; “Don’t find fault. Find a remedy.”

If all else fails, take a look through the webmaster help group’s archives and, if you don’t find the answer to your problem there, post a question.

There’s usually someone at hand willing to give advice.

By Sasch Mayer

When you write web site content and design your pages, do you truly act with your target audience in mind? Or do you think global and act local?

I am amazed at the number of web sites I see that claim to target a global market, yet design and write their content for a regionally-specific audience. Not sure what I mean? Take the site I saw yesterday, for example. I won’t embarrass the site owners by pointing to the specific domain, but let’s just say the site is based in the U.S. and sells high quality gold chains throughout North America, Europe and Australia.

Now the owner of this site was complaining loudly in a webmaster forum that his pay-per-click campaign was having no luck converting sales from overseas visitors, particularly in the UK and Australia. He had spent a long time developing and tweaking a landing page for the campaign and he couldn’t work out why hardly anyone outside the U.S. was buying. I took a look at his landing page and could see the problems straight away:

1) He used the American English spelling “jewelry” throughout the page without considering that persons who use British English spell it “jewellery”.

2) He provided a toll-free phone number for persons in the U.S. to call, but did not provide any contact phone number for persons located outside the U.S.

3) He used the word “national” throughout the page, immediately isolating anyone outside the U.S.

4) He promoted “free shipping throughout the U.S.” but did not specify shipping costs for persons outside the U.S.

The owner of this site had not even considered that persons outside the U.S. might search for keywords in anything other than American English. It didn’t even occur to him that there may be an alternative spelling of his main keyword and he didn’t think about the logistics for purchasers outside his country. No wonder the page wasn’t converting outside the U.S.! He had made the classic mistake of isolating a large chunk of his audience by sending everyone to a one-size-fits-some page.

What he should have done was to create a separate landing page using British English spelling and shipping/contact information applicable to persons overseas. He could then have set up a unique PPC campaign targeting only UK/Australian searchers with regional keywords and ads leading to the British English landing page.

I see similar problems occur quite often in the online travel industry where you not only have to deal with regional spelling options, but also regional jargon. Think about the word “accommodation”. Apart from the fact the word is commonly misspelled, it is used most often in the UK, Australia and New Zealand to describe places to stay while traveling. In the U.S., the words “accommodations” and “lodging” are more commonly used. Same goes for “holiday” and “vacation”, with the latter being more common in the U.S. The word “traveling” itself is spelled “travelling” in British English! So you can imagine the minefield of problems webmasters must face promoting their travel sites online to a worldwide audience.

I don’t mean to single out a particular country, but Americans seem to find it especially difficult to step outside their regional mindset. I am always receiving emails from the U.S. with helpful suggestions for fixing my “spelling mistakes”.

The funniest email exchange I ever had in relation to this was from an American web designer. She had seen our Australian-based web site (with a .com.au domain) and emailed me to tell me it was “full of errors” and that if I wanted to present a professional business to site visitors, I should correct them. So condescending! I asked her to elaborate and she pointed me to these words she felt were spelled incorrectly:

• optimisation
• counselling
• organised
• enrolment
• colour
• catalogue
• favourite
• centre 

Resisting the urge to use a few offensive words I’m sure she would recognize, I tactfully explained that our site was only targeting the Australian market and that we use British English spelling in Australia. Her response? Perhaps if we wanted to be taken seriously by an international audience, we should consider using the “more proper” American English. Flabbergasted, I pointed out the fact that American English was a derivative of British English and was not widely used outside her own country. Wikipedia has more about the differences between the two here. And let’s not forget that although it is the most common language used on the web, English is used by less than 30 percent of the world’s total Internet users.

The point of this story is that you absolutely have to think outside your market if you are going to advertise on the web. As ignorant as she was, my email friend did make me realize that many of her compatriots might also think our site was full of errors. American English is more common on the web and I’ve since learned to cater to that trend. I try to remember that in all writing I do for the web now, whether it’s in my daily blog, the syndicated articles I write regularly or web page content.

Whenever you design or write for a web site that has an international audience, make sure you address each market. It pays to undertake detailed keyword research into your markets you are targeting so you can capture the correct regional jargon and spelling that people are searching for. Remember it’s not enough to think global, you’ve got to act global too.

By Kalena Jordan

Your business success depends on your ability to communicate effectively to an interested audience. Driving appropriate traffic to your site is important, but the tactics that generate visitors are not the same tactics that get visitors to stay on your site.

Websites that consistently under perform and that don’t meet business expectations generally suffer because they are not designed to hold viewers attention long enough to communicate a clear concise marketing message.

Web-communication is a series of elaborate multi-sensory sign languages; signs being the words, images, audio and videos that constitute the range of presentation vehicles that like all forms of communication have their own grammar, context, and relevance as interpreted from personal experience by each member of your customer-audience.

When Words Lose Their Meaning
Marketing is one of those words that has lost its currency because it has been tossed about with little respect for its meaning. To many, it’s merely just another word for advertising, which of course it is not. To the more sophisticated it takes in all the disciplines of branding, positioning, identity, advertising, and more. Above all marketing implies a strategic approach to implementing these tactics.

For companies interested in using the Web to further their business objectives, Web-marketing is the execution of a communication strategy through the creative implementation of multi-sensory signature presentations.

Semiotics: The Study of Signs
“Sign, Sign, everywhere a sign,
Blocking out the scenery breaking my mind,
Do this, don’t do that, can’t you read the sign.”
- Five Man Electrical Band

Like the lyrics of the song, ‘Signs,’ by the Five Man Electrical Band’ suggests, we are surrounded by signs, the interpretation of which creates our reality. The study of signs and how meaning is derived from them is called ’semiotics.’

We are bombarded by signs, not just images, but the words, voicing, gestures, posture, attire, and movements of the messengers, as well as the music and sound effects that accompany the presentation; not to mention the chosen media itself.

Each of these elements is a language all its own. And like all forms of language if you don’t learn the rules, the grammar and syntax, you can’t communicate coherently.

Fear of Meaning
Most business communication is shrouded in a haze of protective ambiguity caused by the fear of making a decisive statement of who you are, and what you stand for. This kind of defensive thinking may protect your company from some criticism, but it also distances you from your real audience, people and businesses that could be responsive to what you have to offer.

Advertisements, videos, images and copy designed to not offend, will fail to communicate meaning and if what you have to say is not meaningful, how can you expect your audience to respond? Bland royalty-free images, stock video clips, and talking-head presentations of statistics and specifications will guarantee all the money you spent on generating traffic will go down the drain as visitors leave faster than they arrive.

Instead of just looking at how many hits your website is getting each week, take a look at how long they are staying on your site. If people are leaving within a few seconds of arriving, then they have determined you have nothing to offer them, which may or may not be true. You need your website visitors to stay long enough to get the essence of your marketing message and if they aren’t, then maybe it’s time to rethink the message and how it’s being delivered.

A Little Yiddish May Help
Yiddish is a language of idiom, of colloquial metaphor, a series of expressions that by strict interpretation of the words mean little, but through the common experience and relevance of the listener mean more than mere words can imply.

In Yiddish there are many ways to tell somebody to ‘drop dead,’ not a very nice thing to say to someone, but a sentiment that is often expressed anyway.

So how then do you tell someone how you feel without resorting to the crude direct approach? In Yiddish you would use one of the many expressions available such as, “zolst vaksn vi a tzibele mitn kop in dr’erd!” which literally means “may you grow like an onion with your head in the ground,” a far more colorful, poetic turn of phrase with humorous undertones that softens the intensity of the raw meaning.

Our everyday language is full of idiom and metaphor and for the most part we don’t even notice. If we want to outwit our competition, we instruct our staff to “take no prisoners” and if we are successful we ‘blew them away;’ business often resorts to war metaphors to emphasize the enormity of the stakes involved in business initiatives, or should I say ‘campaigns.’

And it is not just written and verbal communication that is perpetually encased in a cocoon of evocative metaphor. Visual communication, including images and video, has its own idiomatic metaphorical sign language that helps communicate a message in meaningful short-hand. The producers of 30-second TV commercials are expert in this style of communication, how else can a complete marketing story be told in 30 seconds?

Relevance of Character and Situation
When we create Web-video commercials we need to tell a story that the audience can relate to. This story should be a metaphor that draws upon the audience’s own experiences, and if done properly it should allow the viewer to let down their natural sales defense mechanism and let the humanity of the characters and situation penetrate on a meaningful human level. This style of presentation makes the point and delivers the message in a much more effective manner than a hit-you-over-the-head, hard sell style commercial, or a meaningless exhortation of business platitudes.

Dr. Satoshi Kanazawa, a sociology professor at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand, in the ‘Psychology Today’ article, ‘Friends In Cerebral Places’ by Kaja Perina states: “The human brain is hardwired to respond to stimuli as it did in its ancestral environment, where television and movies didn’t exist. Kanazawa says that we have evolved to believe that ‘all realistic images of people you encounter repeatedly are friends and family.’

In the environment of evolutionary adaptedness there was no one-way acquaintance, as there is today with celebrities.”

The implication of Kanazawa’s research for the Web-marketer is significant. If you as marketers can create websites and webmedia presentations populated with ongoing characters to which your Web-audience can relate, then you have solved the biggest obstacle in the Web-sales process: lack of trust.

People buy things from people they trust, people they know and like, and people to whom they can relate. You can establish this relationship with a continuous campaign of audio and video presentations delivered by characters representing your company’s personality, delivering a message that improves your audience’s lives or business interests.

The Familiarity of Presentation Genres
An effective Web-commercial must touch your audience in some way. One method that we use to make this connection is through the exploitation of genres.

Genres are storytelling formats with built-in conventions, rules and guidelines. These conventions provide a communication-shorthand allowing Web-storytellers to deliver rich content in an economical use of time and space.

Since the audience already understands what the conventions of the recognizable genre are, resources need not be wasted establishing a frame-of-reference that is built into the genre itself.

It is here that the Web-commercial producer must expand the concept of genres beyond that which is normally understood. Everyone understands the western, detective, romance, and sitcom styles of storytelling genres, but genres exist beyond the confines of literature, movies, and television series. Genres also exist in the truncated world of television commercial storytelling. Take for instance the current ubiquitous series of Macintosh television commercials that have been copied numerous times by many people on the Web and even on television itself.

The use of genres as a method of presenting Web-commercials provides a set of expectations for the viewer or what has been referred to as ‘cultural capital.’ While the recognition of the familiar provides a connection, its creative manipulation provides enjoyment and more importantly aids memory and enhances recall. You can see an example of this genre manipulation at http://www.mrpwebmedia.com/ads.

The Bottom Line
If real estate is about, ‘location, location, location’ then websites are about, ‘communication, communication, communication.’ The skillful Web-marketer will understand this and use their website the way it was always supposed to be used, as a means of communication; but that communication no longer has to be delivered in mere text form, but rather it can now be delivered using all the multi-sensory media tools available. The caveat, of course, is knowing how to use these tools properly.

By Jerry Bader