I'm noticing that URL that were once indexed by Google are suddenly getting dropped without any error messages in Webmasters Tools, has anyone seen issues like this before?
-
I'm noticing that URLs that were once indexed by Google are suddenly getting dropped without any error messages in Webmasters Tools, has anyone seen issues like this before?
Here's an example:
http://www.thefader.com/2017/01/11/the-carter-documentary-lil-wayne-black-lives-matter -
I tried your exact search and it's still not coming up for me.
I also used the GWT fetching and rendering tool on some other links that were once indexed and then removed- and what I noticed is that they would get reindexed for short time, and then will get removed from the index again.
We are submitting a sitemap through GWT and no errors are getting returned.
We must be having an issue with Google crawling our site, but I haven't been able to find anyone who has had a similar experience- do you know of any other things I can try to fix this issue. The main problem is that it's intermittent and there is no consistency as to why some of our links are indexed and some aren't.
-
With the site search, are you including "site:" in the search query before the URL, like in my example? You shouldn't be getting this thread in a site search if you're doing it right.
If the pages are indexed, then you just need to get them ranking in a better position. In which case, you should form an SEO strategy.
For sites that are no longer indexed, try fetching and rendering the URL in Google's Search Console to see if there's any issue. You can also request Google submit the URL to index through this tool.
If you haven't already, it would also be beneficial for you to submit your sitemap through Google's Search Console to improve Google's crawling of your site. It might just be that Google is having a hard time crawling your site, and that's why you're dropping links.
-
Neither one is showing as indexed for me, actually this messageboard thread is what I'm getting in my SERP.
I am noticing this randomly with a lot of our URLs, with no error messages in Webmasters Tools, any suggestions on how to fix this?
-
If you do a site search for the URL (just search in Google: "site:http://www.thefader.com/2017/01/09/lil-wayne-best-rapper-alive-rap-millennial-grows-up-essay" - without quotation marks), you can see if it's indexed in Google.
The first URL you gave was indexed for me. But the second one doesn't appear to be.
-
Hi Ria,
How are you determining that this URL has been indexed? When I search our page title, keywords that should return this result, or even the direct URL- this page doesn't show in any of the search results.
Here's another example that doesn't seem to be indexed:
http://www.thefader.com/2017/01/09/lil-wayne-best-rapper-alive-rap-millennial-grows-up-essayAm I missing something obvious?
-
I'm seeing that URL as being indexed in Google. Do you have any other examples?
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Google Only Indexing Canonical Root URL Instead of Specified URL Parameters
We just launched a website about 1 month ago and noticed that Google was indexing, but not displaying, URLs with "?location=" parameters such as: http://www.castlemap.com/local-house-values/?location=great-falls-virginia and http://www.castlemap.com/local-house-values/?location=mclean-virginia. Instead, Google has only been displaying our root URL http://www.castlemap.com/local-house-values/ in its search results -- which we don't want as the URLs with specific locations are more important and each has its own unique list of houses for sale. We have Yoast setup with all of these ?location values added in our sitemap that has successfully been submitted to Google's Sitemaps: http://www.castlemap.com/buy-location-sitemap.xml I also tried going into the old Google Search Console and setting the "location" URL Parameter to Crawl Every URL with the Specifies Effect enabled... and I even see the two URLs I mentioned above in Google's list of Parameter Samples... but the pages are still not being added to Google. Even after Requesting Indexing again after making all of these changes a few days ago, these URLs are still displaying as Allowing Indexing, but Not On Google in the Search Console and not showing up on Google when I manually search for the entire URL. Why are these pages not showing up on Google and how can we get them to display? Only solution I can think of would be to set our main /local-house-values/ page to noindex in order to have Google favor all of our other URL parameter versions... but I'm guessing that's probably not a good solution for multiple reasons.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Nitruc0 -
The images on site are not found/indexed, it's been recommended we change their presentation to Google Bot - could this create a cloaking issue?
Hi We have an issue with images on our site not being found or indexed by Google. We have an image sitemap but the images are served on the Sitecore powered site within <divs>which Google can't read. The developers have suggested the below solution:</divs> Googlebot class="header-banner__image" _src="/~/media/images/accommodation/arctic-canada/arctic-safari-camp/arctic-cafari-camp-david-briggs.ashx"/>_Non Googlebot <noscript class="noscript-image"><br /></span></em><em><span><div role="img"<br /></span></em><em><span>aria-label="Arctic Safari Camp, Arctic Canada"<br /></span></em><em><span>title="Arctic Safari Camp, Arctic Canada"<br /></span></em><em><span>class="header-banner__image"<br /></span></em><em><span>style="background-image: url('/~/media/images/accommodation/arctic-canada/arctic-safari-camp/arctic-cafari-camp-david-briggs.ashx?mw=1024&hash=D65B0DE9B311166B0FB767201DAADA9A4ADA4AC4');"></div><br /></span></em><em><span></noscript> aria-label="Arctic Safari Camp, Arctic Canada" title="Arctic Safari Camp, Arctic Canada" class="header-banner__image image" data-src="/~/media/images/accommodation/arctic-canada/arctic-safari-camp/arctic-cafari-camp-david-briggs.ashx" data-max-width="1919" data-viewport="0.80" data-aspect="1.78" data-aspect-target="1.00" > Is this something that could be flagged as potential cloaking though, as we are effectively then showing code looking just for the user agent Googlebot?The devs have said that via their contacts Google has advised them that the original way we set up the site is the most efficient and considered way for the end user. However they have acknowledged the Googlebot software is not sophisticated enough to recognise this. Is the above solution the most suitable?Many thanksKate
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | KateWaite0 -
Google Penalties not in Webmaster tools?
Hi everybody, I have a client that used to rank very well in 2014. They launched an updated URL structure early January 2015, and since they rank very low on most of the keywords (except the brand keywords). I started working with them early this year, tried to understand what happened, but they have no access to their old website and I cant really compare. I tried the started optimisation methods but nothing seems to work. I have a feeling they have been penalised by Google, probably a Panda penalty, but their Webmaster tools account does not show any penalties under manual actions. Do people impose penalties that are not added to Webmaster tools? If so, is there away I can find out what penalties and what is wrong exactly so we can start fixing it? The website is for a recruitment agency and they have around 400 jobs listed on it. I would love to share the link to the website but I don't believe the client will be happy with that. Thank you in advance.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | iQi0 -
Should I include URLs that are 301'd or only include 200 status URLs in my sitemap.xml?
I'm not sure if I should be including old URLs (content) that are being redirected (301) to new URLs (content) in my sitemap.xml. Does anyone know if it is best to include or leave out 301ed URLs in a xml sitemap?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Jonathan.Smith0 -
URL Parameter Setting Recommendation - Webmaster Tools, Breadcrumbs & 404s
Hi All, We use a parameter called "breadCrumb" to drive the breadcrumbs on our ecommerce product pages that are categorized in multiple places. For example, our "Blue Widget" product may have the following URLs: http://www.oursite.com/item3332/blue-widget
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Doug_G
http://www.oursite.com/item3332/blue-widget_?breadCrumb=BrandTree_
http://www.oursite.com/item3332/blue-widget_?breadCrumb=CategoryTree1_
http://www.oursite.com/item3332/blue-widget_?breadCrumb=CategoryTree2_ We use a canonical tag pointing back to the base product URL. The parameter only changes the breadcrumbs. Which of the following, if any, settings would you recommend for such a parameter in GWT: Does this parameter change page content seen by the user? Options: Yes/No
How does this parameter affect page content? Options: Narrows/Specifies/Other Currently, google decided to automatically assign the parameter as "Yes/Other/Let Googlebot Decide" without notifying us. We noticed a drop in rankings around the suspected time of the assignment. Lastly, we have a consistent flow of products that are discontinued that we 404. As a result of the breadcrumb parameter, our 404s increase significantly (one for each path). Would 800 404 crawl errors out of 18k products cause a penalty on a young site? We got an "Increase in '404' pages' email from GWT, shortly after our rankings seemed to drop. Thank you for any advice or suggestions! Doug0 -
Is it dangerous to use "Fetch as Google" too much in Webmaster Tools?
I saw some people freaking out about this on some forums and thought I would ask. Are you aware of there being any downside to use "Fetch as Google" often? Is it a bad thing to do when you create a new page or blog post, for example?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | BlueLinkERP0 -
How does Google index pagination variables in Ajax snapshots? We're seeing random huge variables.
We're using the Google snapshot method to index dynamic Ajax content. Some of this content is from tables using pagination. The pagination is tracked with a var in the hash, something like: #!home/?view_3_page=1 We're seeing all sorts of calls from Google now with huge numbers for these URL variables that we are not generating with our snapshots. Like this: #!home/?view_3_page=10099089 These aren't trivial since each snapshot represents a server load, so we'd like these vars to only represent what's returned by the snapshots. Is Google generating random numbers going fishing for content? If so, is this something we can control or minimize?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | sitestrux0 -
Quicksimpleinsurance.com is not getting any visibility in Bing/Yahoo! Any idea why? It's doing alright on Google.
I have a insurance wordpress blog that is not getting any visibility in Bing/Yahoo! It's roughly 2 years old and has been indexed in all three major search engines. It's doing alright in Google and actually showing some promising rankings. But it's nowhere to be seen on Yahoo!/Bing for any insurance related phrases. Any ideas what's wrong?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Chadwickc20