There is major speculation that Google has a Sandbox that captures websites and holds them up from being ranked well for search terms. Webmasters around the world started to notice that their new websites that have well optimized pages and full of inbound links were not ranking well for their selected keywords.

The most reported outcome went along these lines the website would appear in the search engine results page for a couple of weeks and then pages would get de indexed or ranked extremely low for the main keywords very odd as some people are extremely good at designing well optimized sites this becomes very annoying. The pattern of this web behavior was tracked down to sites that were created or domains purchased around March 2004 I know that seemed a long time ago now but the sandbox effect started around that time.

So some webmasters had to suffer the sandbox effect were websites are held up from ranking well for the terms until they have had a good delay. The delay is like the aging of the website till it is regarded as stable in terms of how the website develops. This would appear to protect the web from very smart people coming in and just making websites that beat everyone overnight.

Then around February 2005 there was a major shakeup in the Google algorithm for how websites are ranked were many websites saw extreme fluctuations in the way some established sites lost ground while other lower ranked sites gained ground. The best way to describe the effect of the Google sandbox is a time delay. They won’t allow a new site to go from nothing to the top of the tree without aging and steady link building.

This protects their search engine from dubious black hat SEO experts being able to get sites ranked well overnight. This also helps Google maintain a level of quality for the searches produced remember that the most important factor for Google is its customers or was before shareholders got involved. Being able to produce the best website for any given search term is the main goal as well as the policy of don’t be evil bit they like us to consider.

The Google Sandbox is getting smarter and more refined as the years have gone on and nowadays if you want your website to rank well for a given search term you will have to produce an exceptional site with good fresh non duplicate content. The website will have to have an excellent site structure and most important it will have to be relevant and have a build-up of related links over a long period of time.

Getting a website up and running and up the Google tree is now a long term business strategy and the rules are there to be followed. Some short cuts can be made but not many as these are getting closed out with each search algorithm update. Long term strategy of link building is the key to success and there is something you can do to help that by joining link metro.

Link metro is a site that allows you to join and request links from other website partners on that site free to join so check it out. By steady building over a long period and not looking at your web business as a flash in the pan but building trust over time will lead to good reward and stability.

Learn more about Google and its Sandbox algorithm at Digital Marketing Institute in Janakpuri