SE Update Nov 15 2013 - 102 Degrees

[edgarf76]

I just read an article about a possible search engine update on November 15 2013. I have seen a little bit of ups and downs but nothing major. Has anyone else noticed changes?

The source is below, It says that the mozcast was 102 degrees as well as the amount of discussions that took place in the SE forums. He said that there was less chatter than normal, particularly in webmaster tools forum.



seroundtable.com/google-update-nov15-17689.html

[justbookies]

I saw some changes for us sites but not uk sites - it was to the extent I did search for articles on whether there had been an update.

[-Shay-]

We saw a slight adjustment, but nothing major. The ones historically branded "0.1% of all queries" seem to be more significant than this one. There was an update though from what I've seen.

[Christiaan]

I got a huge fall on 15 november. I got 23% less visitors. Since the fall the number of visitors slightly grow again and I'm almost back at normal level now.
This website is for Belgium.

[edgarf76]

I got a huge fall on 15 november. I got 23% less visitors. Since the fall the number of visitors slightly grow again and I'm almost back at normal level now.
This website is for Belgium.

Did you get hit with any negative SEO?

[Christiaan]

Did you get hit with any negative SEO?

No. I don't see any reason why I got the big drop

[Rostick]

I am experiencing some problems with google, I can see a drop of about 20-25% in SE visitors in the last 2 weeks for no apparent reason.

Strangely, since the drop happened, google has also failed to update my sitemap (submitted via xml).

This is for an english-language website operated from Romania.

[TravG]

I have seen small movements - nothing to big. But like someone said above, all of the sudden my sitemaps are not updating in GWT either - it is a little weird.

I wish they would update PR. I know it relatively meaningless anymore but I still like to see how my sites progress as far as PR.

[Rostick]

My decrease in google visitors has started EXACTLY when they stopped updating my sitemap (around Nov13). I know sitemaps are just orientative, but I found it weird and even changed my sitemap generator, but still for nothing.

I`ll give some clear examples, 3 weeks ago in a Champions League day I was getting about 500 visitors from google, while in the latest International matchday I was barely getting half (250). A few days ago I got my lowest number of google visitors in 3 months. Overall I can say google visitors have decreased by about 30% in the past 3 weeks and seem to be decreasing even more every day. At the moment I`m getting more direct visitors than from google.

I don`t want to be a drama queen, as I know these variations happen, but I`m a little bit concerned since I was steadily improving in google after launching a website 5 months ago and I was actually expecting a big growth around this time, with implications in revenue. I can`t say I did anything wrong, on the contrary - I built even more often quality content, got a couple of natural backlinks, and cleaned up my sitemap. I only practice white hat SEO and do not overuse it, I consider myself a medium-level SEO and I`m bugged that I can`t figure out what`s going wrong. I see a lot of people on different threads are experiencing problems, but nobody has an answer. I hope things take a turn for the best or I can at least find out if a google update has occured (and what kind of update).

[justbookies]

I am no expert but I have found new sites will get a good position early on before dropping back. They sometimes get an initial boost from google - and I have read this from other webmasters too. Maybe your site got a good initial boost and is now just dropping back to where google thinks it belongs. As for the sitemap, I assume you are using webmaster tools to resubmit it after you publish fresh copy (just to help prompt google to index the new content).

[Rostick]

I am no expert but I have found new sites will get a good position early on before dropping back. They sometimes get an initial boost from google - and I have read this from other webmasters too. Maybe your site got a good initial boost and is now just dropping back to where google thinks it belongs. As for the sitemap, I assume you are using webmaster tools to resubmit it after you publish fresh copy (just to help prompt google to index the new content).

Honestly I had no idea about this. Thanks for the input. Don`t know if this is the case but it makes sense, because I was ranking so high (according to my expectations - which may have been to low) after 2-3 months without being a SEO expert, I was surprised myself.

Yea, I`m submitting the sitemap via webmaster tools, pages are counted as being submitted but they are not appearing as indexed. They ARE indexed in google, just not via sitemap. I don`t view this as a big problem, but it seems strange to me.

[justbookies]

I find same thing on one of my sites - my new pages are indexed by google before they show as indexed via the sitemap option within webmaster tools. There is a time lag. I am guessing that is what you mean. I don't think this matters.

[-Shay-]

I read somewhere there is a bug within webmaster tools regarding sitemaps or indexing pages. When I find the link to the story, I'll post.

[Rostick]

@justbookies - nope. for me, the pages were always indexed before they showed up as indexed in web. tools. now they do not show to be indexed via sitemap since Nov 13.

@-Shay- - please do post it if you rember it.

[Rostick]

Two days ago my google traffic reverted to previous values - i checked the sitemap in webmaster and not surprising, it was finally updated. weird situation

[GaryTheScubaGuy]

Did you get hit with any negative SEO?

After Penguin 2.0 negative SEO just isn't working at all. I have tested Neg SEO for years on sacrificial lamb sites and currently have a couple dozen I am testing just about everything, from SENuke, HRefer, XRumer and link directories as well as on-page no-no's and multiple combinations.

The only results I am seeing is with brand keywords.