Dust Yourself Off and Try Again!

Good afternoon everyone, today I would like to briefly touch upon a situation I am currently finding myself in.

It is probably every new BANS users biggest nightmare…

• You have built a few sites, and seen some initial success!
• You have tirelessly worked to create a visually pleasing, content-driven site made for users.
• You have put in hours upon hours of link-building and promotional work.
• You have experienced the joy of seeing your sites begin to gain organic traffic.
• You have seen commissions start to pile up and begin to pick up some steam!
• You’re on top of the BANS’ing world!

And then it happens…

The first day or two, you write it off as “a couple of bad days”, as you notice your organic traffic on your sites dips from perhaps 60-80 unique hits a day (not bad for a new site), to 20-30 hits a day.  After all, you have seen plenty of those types of days in the infancy of your site.

After the first couple days, when the traffic levels off even further, you begin to wonder if you have done something wrong, or if your site is somehow being penalized.  You continue checking your website and ePN statistics, hoping desperately that the traffic resumes its climb upward.

Only after all this time do you finally admit it to yourself… You have (most likely) been tossed into the Google Sandbox…

There are many great resources out there which describe the Sandbox in great detail, so I will not go into that here.  But basically, it is Google’s way of “reining in” a new site and not allowing it to get too much traffic too quickly in its life.  I guess, Google figures that if a webmaster and a site are “for real”, they will suck it up and deal with getting no traffic for a matter or weeks, months, or sometimes even over a YEAR.

It is something like a fraternity hazing period I guess you could say…  The big bad brother mercilessly tormenting the new guy, until they finally deem that they have had enough and can join the group for real.

So now what?

We are officially in the Google version of Purgatory, what can we possibly do to get out or improve our site in the meanwhile?

The answer is… Keep doing what you have already been doing!

With a Sandboxed site, your best strategy is to continue building links, adding content, and improving your site.  You need to force Google to take your site seriously, until it finally recognizes that your site is worthy to be included long-term in its index.

So this is what I will be starting in earnest now, and what any of you in a similar position should also be doing.

Do not let Google’s bullying get you down!

Make your Niche Store an authoritative site on its subject, and once it finally emerges from the ever-so-mysterious “Sandbox”, it will be a powerhouse website and your traffic and profits will soar, because you will be one step ahead of the game at that point!

As I always say here on the blog… The Journey is the toughest part!