The Google Keyword Sandbox – Biggest Source of Paranoia Since Y2K?

The Google Sandbox keeps new websites from rising through the Search Engine Results Page, because it is biased against new sites that it has not yet come to trust. It has created ruckus throughout the Internet community. This is a pretty impressive accomplishment for a phantom that may only lurk in the minds of SEO geeks.

Those who believe in the Google Sandbox protest that there are many pieces of evidence to support their belief. They argue that newer websites have a hard time with their SERPs, therefore Google has a bias against them. This is a dangerous conclusion to draw, because it is based on evidence that could easily support another explanation.

The reason that smaller sites struggle with their SERPs could more likely be supported with the fact that it simply takes time for Google to become acquainted with a website or blog. When a new page or site is published, Google does not immediately index it. First, a crawler must find the site.

The search engine also cannot know how relevant a webpage is to SERPs for a keyword until it has had time to visit it frequently and become familiar with its context. Obviously this takes time. As more backlinks are created, spiders are able to find the site more often and the indexing rate increases substantially. All sites are discouraged from building links too quickly so it is impossible for a site to appear at the top of Google’s ranking page for a keyword right after it was launched.

In a sense, new sites are penalized by Google. Most likely, not because of a deliberate Sandbox on the part of the search engine developers, but because of the constraints of indexing technology itself.

Google itself has stated that the Sandbox does not exist. Many people still refuse to believe this, insisting that Google is most likely lying. They have even made statements referring to the politicians in their home state lying about scandalous affairs.

The question these people must be asking themselves is why Google would lie about the sandbox at all. If Google did create it and told the truth they would not suffer from it. Just like the controversy that was created after the institution of the “nofollow” attribute, the sandbox would only create a few angry developers at the beginning of their site’s life.

Of course, older sites would love the idea because they would not have to risk having their keyword rankings stolen from newer sites on blackhat compaigns. If Google created a sandbox to add credibility to their search rankings, then it would add credibility to them as well. Why would they deny it?

The problem with the sandbox idea is that many sites are extremely paranoid with how they are developing their SEO campaigns. Many claim that because of the sandbox they limit their link-building campaign to a couple links a day for the first three months. Obviously, such caution will probably keep a developer their own sandbox for a lot more than three months.

Major topics on the Internet create a lot of hype. SEO is a topic that has created a lot of concern and conjecture. It is important to be skeptical about SEO advice you receive that is open for interpretation and become part of the circus.

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Image Credit:Mr Blixit