An unsolved, perplexing and frustrating google related bungle

[Tyke Tiler]

It's been a wee while since I posted this thread.

Thanks to everyone who helped out and made suggestions. I'm still none the better though and the only solution it seems is to buy another site template :shrug:

So far I've:

Registered and verified my site with google web master tools.
Added a sitemap.
Added a robots .txt.
Added much more key words.
Added a larger description to the .php index page.

Most folk blame my sites disappearance in google searches on my site being a flash site, even though it has a .php index and more to the point, we have at least two members here with the same designers and mechanics (bludomain) that do not have the same problem. I've also spoken with folk in the US who have the identical template and they are doing just fine. No-one can suggest why theirs works and mine doesn't though.

I've also been told that as the background is black and the text is white, google treats this as 'cheating' in some way and will penalize you for it.
Surely if this were true then everyone with the same configuration would disappear?

Also, in theory, if the flash site was to blame then these other members or users with the same design would also have disappeared? :shrug:

Do a search on: Luke Woodford or Colin Greenlees and you'll see what I mean. They have the same designer with the same flash foundations.

Now, I admit, I'm a dunce when it comes to this but it seems that the more I try to find out the more confusing and contradictory the answers get
There also seems to be some battles being raged on SEO, one side fights it being useless/dead and the other fights it being the most effective tactic available :shrug:

Beats the hell outta me either way!

All I know is that I had a flash based site with a HTML index page up until December 2008 and then switched to a flash based site with a php index page.
Around two months ago I was first in the search, now I'm not.

Here are the things that I have options with (other than editing the php index):

My fasthosts control panel

my site control panel

Since the last time I posted, I had filled in both panels with the same data, google re-cached my site on the 27th so I then scrubbed all the data from the fasthosts panel to see if this will make a difference after being advised not to use the same keywords twice.

Now, this is a little paranoid, but would it be possible for anyone and of course myself, to cause some kind of block? Can anyone cause problems or is this kinda thing impossible?

I used to have a facebook photography page that I deleted as I thought that my have effected the results as the titles were the same, but still no change.

As before, if you type in 'tomas whitehouse' or 'tomas whitehouse photography' my site isn't at a low ranking, it simply does not exist but if you type in 'www.tomaswhitehouse.com' then my site is found.

I did post a thread on the google help forum but my site template seemed to cause serious offense to the 'contributors' there, who could only make aggressive/rude responses and continuously blame the flash element despite other users not having the same problems.

Is there anyone out there who isn't offended or likely to respond aggressively with my questions, who can maybe help out or make suggestions?

 

[photon]

Put your name in the site description.

You've gone overboard with the keywords and haven't nearly enough human-readable text on the page. Sell yourself! If necessary, link to an About page, but place all those keywords in a few paragraphs of text. Use www.useit.com for some Web-writing guidelines.

Text of the same colour as the background is the cheat that's frowned upon. You can hide a link with CSS and it'll still get spidered.

The page needs validating.

 

[Tyke Tiler]

Put your name in the site description.

I like that, sounds nice and simple Thanks so much for replying mate, I really appreciate the help

You've gone overboard with the keywords and haven't nearly enough human-readable text on the page.

When you say human readable, do you mean the Finnish keywords? The Finnish stuff is more important than the English y'see. apologies if I'm way off.

Sell yourself! If necessary, link to an About page, but place all those keywords in a few paragraphs of text. Use www.useit.com for some Web-writing guidelines.

Aha, so I should create an about page, maybe a basic html and then link to it from the .php page?

Text of the same colour as the background is the cheat that's frowned upon. You can hide a link with CSS and it'll still get spidered.

Gotcha, it's surprising how many 'contributors' have told me otherwise, it's been very confusing.

The page needs validating.

Now this sounds interesting but alas, goes right over my head, I'll do some reading up on validating then.

I only have the .php index to edit though, the rest of my site is a file that I don't really have the expertise or balls to start messing with though.

Is this good enough?

Thanks again mate. very muchly appreciated!

T.

 

[Forbiddenbiker]

Hi Tom

Firstly imo, google seems a little odd with ranking at the moment, it does that from time to time hopefully things will calm down again as I'm also not ranking well. (Im putting that down to inactivity as well though)

Also, just trying to help here, hope I'm not repeating the good advice on that other thread to much.

If I use the view tab in my browser and go to.... View/page style/no style. (which is a bit like seeing what googles indexing spiders etc, and also mobile phones will see and use to generate pages.)

Your index page says:

TOMAS WHITEHOUSE
PHOTOGRAPHY
Portraits Figure Skating

Tomas Whitehouse Photography, Helsinki, Finland.
Creative, formal, dynamic, conceptual, commercial and corporate portraiture.

please disable any popup blockers
minimum recommended screen resolution: 1024 x 768 px.
this site requires Flash Player 6 or later.

GET FLASH PLAYER

Your Portraits page says:

Nothing.


Your blog page is good:

Loads and loads of words of photographic conversation.
It also ranks eigth down when searching for you in google which is about right at the moment imo.

Your figure skating page says:

Nothing

----

All in all a very poor show of the words google needs to identify your aims and your market.
You need much more info about yourself or your business or both.

Also you have two of the main pages being called /index2a.php & /index2b.php ...by the php code.
Change those to useful photographic website page names.

Also you have two full stops and a capital letter with your meta description ...change those to a coma.
I'm also thinking the indexing spiders needs to be informed of the change of language within your meta keywords. ...not sure about that though, or how to do it.


How do people contact you? can't find anything about that at all!

 

[aligibbs]

Some suggestions from me:

Don't use web forwarding from your domain- google probably doesn't like this
Are you using google webmaster tools on your domain?
In firefox, the 2 links on the homepage don't work for me (they take me to a new page, but nothing loads). Works fine in IE.
I would make a static html version of your site- for both google & accessibilitiy reasons.
Any idea what your page ranking was of the pages? If its decreased, then this might be another reason.
Links from other sites to yours carry great weight (depending on the site)- so its possible another site has removed your link.

Thats all I can think of at the moment

Alistair

 

[Tyke Tiler]

Hi Tom

Firstly imo, google seems a little odd with ranking at the moment, it does that from time to time hopefully things will calm down again as I'm also not ranking well. (Im putting that down to inactivity as well though)

Thanks for all your time here biker, I really appreciate the help. I'm so very confused with it all and after reading your post it it seems like I could be closer to solving the problem, the case is, how to fill in the missing info and make the changes.

Also, just trying to help here, hope I'm not repeating the good advice on that other thread to much.

Not at all mate, I really appreciate your time and advice. It seems the biggest problem or the initial obstacle is determining how to make the changes.

My site or rather the control over my site is similar to signing into an online account, whether it's email, banking or similar: I wanted a simple to update site that required no coding, seems I made a bad move.

and then the cpanelx filemanager:

I'm not sure but would making changes to it outside of the available controls involve having some kind of flash editing software?

If editing the the index pages (.php) is all that is needed then I can do this (just about) by downloading the files and altering it and re-uploading.

If it doesn't involve editing the index pages then it seems my hands are tied. I have no clue how to or if it's advisable or even possible to edit the bludomain template.

If I use the view tab in my browser and go to.... View/page style/no style. (which is a bit like seeing what googles indexing spiders etc, and also mobile phones will see and use to generate pages.)

Your index page says:

TOMAS WHITEHOUSE
PHOTOGRAPHY
Portraits Figure Skating

Tomas Whitehouse Photography, Helsinki, Finland.
Creative, formal, dynamic, conceptual, commercial and corporate portraiture.

please disable any popup blockers
minimum recommended screen resolution: 1024 x 768 px.
this site requires Flash Player 6 or later.

GET FLASH PLAYER

Your Portraits page says:

Nothing.

Hmmm, this is where I get a little more confused and must seem very stupid to those more in the know.

Where do I input the data?
The two images provided in my first post are the only places other than the .php so I think this could be where the problem originates, it doesn't seem like I have anywhere to change or rectify this to make it better.

Your blog page is good:

Loads and loads of words of photographic conversation.
It also ranks eigth down when searching for you in google which is about right at the moment imo.

It's a different set up over at blogger it seems, the site itself is very text based whereas my website is image based with very little text other then the about, info, services and wedding package sections.

Your figure skating page says:

Nothing

All in all a very poor show of the words google needs to identify your aims and your market.
You need much more info about yourself or your business or both.

Again, I'm struggling to find where to put the info to make it better.

Also you have two of the main pages being called /index2a.php & /index2b.php ...by the php code.
Change those to useful photographic website page names.

Hmm, interesting, could there be any problems in changing the filenames? Would it effect the .swf files at all?

Also you have two full stops and a capital letter with your meta description ...change those to a coma.
I'm also thinking the indexing spiders needs to be informed of the change of language within your meta keywords. ...not sure about that though, or how to do it.

Ok, will change the full stops As for the the Finnish words, I have no clue either, Looks I may have to employ someone to help out here maybe

How do people contact you? can't find anything about that at all!

Well I would hope they would visit the contacts page, all my details are there, should they be somewhere else too?

Again, thanks tremendously for your time mate. I am very grateful to you , I apologize profusely if it seems like I am a dumbass, or providing bad or too much info, I'm really trying my best to understand how to make it better

T.

 

[Tyke Tiler]

Some suggestions from me:

Don't use web forwarding from your domain- google probably doesn't like this

So the alternative would be to have bludomain do my web forwarding?

Are you using google webmaster tools on your domain?

Yes.

In firefox, the 2 links on the homepage don't work for me (they take me to a new page, but nothing loads). Works fine in IE.

Pop up blockers or ad blockers maybe enabled with firefox, I made this same misatke and bludomain told me to disable them. I have no idea what this means but it worked.

I would make a static html version of your site- for both google & accessibilitiy reasons.

This is why I stopped trying to do the web stuff myself as I am **** poor at it and haven't the time or the budget to school myself, I need the simplest templates and hence why I bought a bludomain site.
If this would indeed be the answer then it seems that I need a new web designer who can fashion me up a more compatible site.

Any idea what your page ranking was of the pages? If its decreased, then this might be another reason.

I was first and then I disappeared around two months ago.

Links from other sites to yours carry great weight (depending on the site)- so its possible another site has removed your link.

Interesting, thanks alot for your points mate. Appreciated.

Any further thoughts would also be appreciated when you have the time

 

[aligibbs]

So the alternative would be to have bludomain do my web forwarding?

Depends if they support it. You could point the A Record of the domain directly at the bludomain server- this would be preferable.

Does the webmaster tools give any errors or suggestions of things to fix? (I assume the site has been verified etc)

The page pops up in a new page for me, but then the flash itself doesn't load (maybe its being blocked, I will look into it further).

I would keep your flash site, as it does look quite nice, but I would have a seperate html site as well- so that google will index this as well- as Forbiddenbiker mentions, having content that google can read is very important.

When I said Pagerank, I didn't mean where you appeared in google, but the actual pagerank itself. Google has a complex algorithm, which uses page rank itself (its a number 0-7 i think, 7 Being best).

Oh, and I would love to know how you do multiple quotes....

 

[photon]

Your keywords we can call machine-readable. They're really for the benefit of Google etc. They should match the content that we mere mortals can read on your page (the human-readable content), otherwise Google may think you're spamming. Anything on the page that's there to be read by your visitors is the the human-readable content.

An About page (or any other with plenty of text) should be linked from all other pages. As well as helping to get you found, you should use it to answer any pre-sales queries that are likely to arise, including prices (you're OK on that score).

The validation you'll want to leave to someone else. Sites still work with plenty of errors, but let's say it's an indicator of the care with which the page was constructed, and it should be right, as a matter of pride (or anal fixation).

As suggested, changing page and image names to something descriptive helps. Also a good thing to use ALT and TITLE tags for the images.

 

[Tyke Tiler]

Depends if they support it. You could point the A Record of the domain directly at the bludomain server- this would be preferable.

They do support it but I don't think I'd be comfortable with it to be fair, I doubt that I'll be using bludomain (the web designer) next year.

Does the webmaster tools give any errors or suggestions of things to fix? (I assume the site has been verified etc)

No errors and the site is verified.

The page pops up in a new page for me, but then the flash itself doesn't load (maybe its being blocked, I will look into it further).

Yeah, thats the adblocker in firefox.

I would keep your flash site, as it does look quite nice, but I would have a seperate html site as well- so that google will index this as well- as Forbiddenbiker mentions, having content that google can read is very important.

Hmm, sounds like a logical plan, just don't know how to go abouts it, I'll do some reading.

When I said Pagerank, I didn't mean where you appeared in google, but the actual pagerank itself. Google has a complex algorithm, which uses page rank itself (its a number 0-7 i think, 7 Being best).

Oh, gotcha, whereabouts would I find the page rank?

Oh, and I would love to know how you do multiple quotes....

Make sure you have the opening quote code, then the text you wish to quote, followed by the closing quote code, seen here:

cheers for your time Ali

 

[aligibbs]

Oh, gotcha, whereabouts would I find the page rank?

either use google toolbar, or just found this page does it:
http://www.top25web.com/pagerank.php

 

[Forbiddenbiker]

.... other stuff... I'm not sure but would making changes to it outside of the available controls involve having some kind of flash editing software? If editing the the index pages (.php) is all that is needed then I can do this (just about) by downloading the files and altering it and re-uploading. If it doesn't involve editing the index pages then it seems my hands are tied. I have no clue how to or if it's advisable or even possible to edit the bludomain template.

Yes I'm not sure either, unless there’s a editing entrance of some sort, I think your stuffed with editing the flash code. Probably the best solution, as suggested, is to make a new 'about you' page and link it as obviously as you can from those two flash coded pages. (that will help google understand how to log your site )

On the editing front, well just about anything html can be edited its the access that the problem. I'm guessing your not using an ftp loader of any sort (search for cute FTP) File transfer protocol….try ‘free FTP loader’ or something.

Once you gain access of your actual files you can edit what you like, obviously you need to be very careful not to edit any structure, flash or database coding etc, but you should be able to find ways to add words/text, change file names and even change the style a little.

Editing the php page names should be easy once you get access..
You need to understand two things. First your pages are built by the php code as the page is called for by the viewer... so the php code collates what it is instructed to collate for each page when the page is called. The whole pages are not built individually before ...only each necessary section is built, and the sections are collated to be shown depending on which page the viewer clicks on.

So...you need to change the index2b.php's in two places.(and again for index2a.php) One on a main index page which calls for the php sections to be collated (called header sometimes, because its often at the top of all pages called) .., and the other change the two actual php page sections that are being called for.(the file names being called)... in your case the flash based pages.


Its a nice site Tom, I don't think you should be so quick to move on it just needs a little polishing ...inevitably with any site, paid for or built oneself there’s a million ways to improve it. Some of the paid ones can be atrocious yet still cost a fortune so you may just find yourself in the same place again which ever direction you choose I feel..

Both php, and html are mark up languages (Think that labels right) rather than actual coding so get yourself a FTP up-loader and some sort of html editor and have a look at your pages ... there just compositions suspended with the code ...bit like photography.

Unfortunately you’ll have to save and load any php changes back onto your hosting provider via your ftp tool, (always back up your good pages before editing) before you can see if the changes have worked or messed up.

Bit confusing at first but after a play or three you should find yourself getting something back.

Good luck, hope that’s not too flawed advice.

Adam

 

[Just Dave]

I just did a search google.co.uk, for Tomas Whitehouse and your site was at the top http://tomaswhitehouse.blogspot.com/

 

[Tyke Tiler]

Good luck, hope that’s not too flawed advice.

Adam

Thanks very, very, very much Adam. I am eternally grateful for you taking the time to make all the guidances and advices.

I'm going to have a good look into making the changes you have suggested.

Right now I'm a little cautious as I'm such a novice when it comes to stuff like this.
Already it's kinda defeating the object of me spending the money to have an 'easier' to maintain template. Before I bought it, I was doing my own flash site that had a single html title page, this worked for over a year, maybe if I see if I still have the page and I could put it back and then link the entire bludomain site from that?

Thanks again Adam! I sincerely appreciate it.

 

[Tyke Tiler]

I just did a search google.co.uk, for Tomas Whitehouse and your site was at the top http://tomaswhitehouse.blogspot.com/

Hi Dave!

Yeah, that's me blog, it's my website that doesn't exist anymore as far as google is concerned, thankfully the blog still coming up roses.

The page I need folk to see first is this one

Thanks for letting me know though mate, I hadn't checked google.co.uk, just the .com and .fi versions

 

[Tyke Tiler]

Update.

My other half's Mom kindly informed me that I had returned to the top of the pile on a Google search, I was flabber ghasted and quite relieved!

BUT!

After five days of everything being as it should be, I disappear again! :bang:

Bugger all has changed since this thread in terms of me fiddling and I'm more confused then ever.

 

[pxl8]

Clearly it's an issue at Google's end so there's little you can do about it other than drop them an email and ask nicely if they can provide any further information or fix it somehow.

 

[Tyke Tiler]

Clearly it's an issue at Google's end so there's little you can do about it other than drop them an email and ask nicely if they can provide any further information or fix it somehow.

Cheers for that bud!
Any idea where I'd find the contact details? I'm having a little trouble finding an email address.

I've posted on the help forum but that was a useless and well, let's just say an experience void of manners .

 

[Forbiddenbiker]

Try using this add url to google link and in the comments box Tom, say 'Hi, finished site please fully index.'

...or something similar... not sure if their isn’t a larger comments page somewhere, where you can explain what happening, used to be I thought.

I did it one once for a re-furbished site and said ‘New site, redirects in place, please index’ and it was done in less than 24hrs.

may help.

Edit, working now.

 

[Tyke Tiler]

Try using this add url to google link and in the comments box Tom, say 'Hi, finished site please fully index.'

...or something similar... not sure if their isn’t a larger comments page somewhere, where you can explain what happening, used to be I thought.

I did it one once for a re-furbished site and said ‘New site, redirects in place, please index’ and it was done in less than 24hrs.

may help.

Edit, working now.

Cheers very muchly mate, all done and dusted, let's see if that makes a difference.

As for finding a way to contact Google, I seem to have two options, call them at Silicon Valley or use the help forum

 

[pxl8]

Cheers for that bud!
Any idea where I'd find the contact details? I'm having a little trouble finding an email address.

I've posted on the help forum but that was a useless and well, let's just say an experience void of manners .

Damn, I didn't realise how hard it is to get hold of anyone.

As an experiment I'm going to post a short mention and link to your site on my blog which google normally picks up and indexes within the hour - maybe it will help kick start something???

 

[pxl8]

Another thought, get yourself added in the google local business listings and also on dmoz.

 

[Tyke Tiler]

Damn, I didn't realise how hard it is to get hold of anyone.

As an experiment I'm going to post a short mention and link to your site on my blog which google normally picks up and indexes within the hour - maybe it will help kick start something???

That's immensely kind of you Sir, very much appreciated

Another thought, get yourself added in the google local business listings and also on dmoz.

Will do, thanks a million mate