This my second week of research and beginning to think what might have caused changed in my site.
1) the blog url changed
2) the links name(s) changed
3) there’s a good chance i have broken links
4) all the “hits” i had before with “tag” paths are gone
this is an interestng google sitemap opinion = http://support.blog-city.com/hits_explained2.htm
i am just thinking out loud if the forum does not mind while possibly other input can come in. it is just a pain to build up content and links and then the rank goes away.
Hi ronchicago,
from the Sitemaps FAQ:
Q: I’ve heard about people who submitted a Sitemap and got penalized shortly afterward. Can a Sitemap hurt you?
A: Only if it falls on you from a great height. (Seriously, though: if it ever happened that someone was penalized after submitting a Sitemap, it would have been purely coincidental. Google does not penalize you for submitting a Sitemap.)
See http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2008/01/sitemaps-faqs.html
I don’t think that a drop of visitors or of the ranking has anything to do with submitting or providing a XML sitemap.
Do you redirect all your old URLs to the new ones (Header 301 Moved Permanently)? This is the absolutely most important step if you change your blog url or the search engines will have to build their indexed of your site from scratch…
arnee, redirecting all urls = external ones, i.e., am telling relationships to change their links = a little at a time.
internal urls = i am trying to move as much as i can. the only way i can tell is if a link = 404 = right? btw, i am not getting header 301’s. did i misunderstand you?
i did find an old reliable link on google images and it threw up the totally wrong image and when i clicked on the blog url link i only get the very latest page/post, not the respective page the search was requesting.
is this a permalink thing? what a mess?!
one other thing. i found a tool that shows stats on indexing etc. according to this tool, no one is indexed by google. not even google/blog. here is the tool. is this a faulty tool?
if this tool is right it means google indexing, validation, technorati really does not determine how successful a site is regarding activity. dial in any url and see for yourself. there is no pattern that i can see of on this tool. the tool = http://mich.in/tools/xinu/ (i found it via research, not per a recommendation)
OMG. seriously, i have been neglecting everything to figure this out. here comes the first “tag” link in two weeks, something i had every couple of minutes. maybe someone is listening! maybe things are not broken but with the aforementioned changes i have to wait three months? arnee i agree there is may surely be a url problem… here is the tag link maybe it will shed some light. an unusual search which delivers the tag “barking” = http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rls=TSHB,TSHB:2006-47,TSHB:en&q=%22she%20asks%20me%20to%20watch%20her%20puppy%20Oscar.%22
I am getting different link results from domain.com vs domain.com/
So it appears the bots do in fact see two different urls. I don’t know if in the big scheme of things this makes a “big” difference.
If one was to stick to one url any thoughts on what is best practice =
1) domain.com
2) domain.com/
