Is your site relatively new? Have you applied all of the best SEO advice you can find, but you're still not ranking? Do you think you may have done something wrong? It might not be anything you've done; it might be the Google sandbox. Keep reading to find out what it is, and how to get out of it.
The Google sandbox or "sandbox effect" is a filter that Google applies to new websites that want to rank in the search results for specific phrases. The filter exists to prevent SEOs and spammers from easily manipulating search results by satisfying all of Google's major offsite and onsite factors.
There is an important difference between the sandbox and deletion from Google's search results. While the sandbox and a Google ban can seem to be very similar, they are not. The sandbox is a filter (or so SEOs say) used by Google to prevent new websites from taking top spots on search results, while a Google ban is a complete exclusion of the website from the search results. To find out whether your website was banned or was placed in the sandbox, simply search using the following command:
site:www.yourwebsite.com
If Google shows pages from your website, it means you were sandboxed.
If you get the following message: "Your search - site:www.yourwebsite.com - did not match any documents." - then you're banned. If you've been banned, contact Google with an inclusion request, but make sure to clear out all the elements that might have caused you to get banned first.
site:www.yourwebsite.com
If Google shows pages from your website, it means you were sandboxed.
If you get the following message: "Your search - site:www.yourwebsite.com - did not match any documents." - then you're banned. If you've been banned, contact Google with an inclusion request, but make sure to clear out all the elements that might have caused you to get banned first.
Google Sandbox Effect - What Can I Do to Get Out of the Sandbox?
You are not going to like the answer. Nothing. The only way out of the sandbox is to wait, however long it takes Google to release your website. How long? The answer varies, depending on who you listen to. On average you will spend six months in the sandbox. The only thing you can and should do in the meantime is develop your website.
Use this time to create content, add pages, tweak your site's design and add in all the elements that constitute a high value destination. Look at the sandbox as the opportunity to take a website to the next level before it takes competitive spots on search results. Research your customers, find out what they value in the website and what they want to see, then take the time to develop it - be it content, tools or resources.
Use this time to create content, add pages, tweak your site's design and add in all the elements that constitute a high value destination. Look at the sandbox as the opportunity to take a website to the next level before it takes competitive spots on search results. Research your customers, find out what they value in the website and what they want to see, then take the time to develop it - be it content, tools or resources.
Why Does the Google Sandbox Exist?
Many spammers and SEOs create perfectly optimized websites, place links on those websites, and match the titles, content and other elements. In many cases those websites do not contain anything that searchers would consider helpful and useful; in fact, in most cases such websites contain nothing useful and are created for the sole purpose of taking top search spots.
If Google allowed those websites reach the top of the SERPs, the quality of its search results would go down, and user experience with it. Thus it came up with an artificial filter, which we now know as the sandbox.
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