The Theory
There has been a theory floating around that Google is now imposing some kind of penalty on brand new web sites or sites that seem to acquire a large amount of links from other sites in a relatively short period of time. It is being discussed on all the search engine marketing forums. Many articles have been written about it. Even several live examples have been presented by frustrated web site owners and managers who can't seem to understand why their sites will not rank well in the Google search engine results pages (SERPs).
The so-called "sandbox" theory suggests that new sites will be added to the Google index and may even show up for obscure searches such as the company/web site name but will not show well for other phrases that are relevant to the site. It doesn't matter if the site is optimized for the search engines either. In fact, those who have optimized their sites can drive themselves crazy making change after change but to no positive avail.
This theory also suggests that established sites who all of a sudden obtain hundreds or even thousands of links from other sites can be sent to the Google sandbox. Obtaining links in these type of quantities is typically the result of either participating in some sort of link trading scheme or buying multitudes of text links on other sites for the sole purpose of obtaining some of the PageRank value they might pass. This type of scenario goes against the natural process of people linking their web site to another site because they see it as a valuable resource or a favorite site to visit.
Sandbox or Aging Filter?
So if a site is sent to the sandbox by Google either because it is new or it is participating in mass link building, what is the time frame that must pass before the site is allowed out of the box? Most search engine marketers that have been discussing and analyzing this say about 6-8 months. As for myself, I don't actually believe that Google is sending new sites to a "sandbox" but rather they may be applying some sort of aging filter.
Scottie Claiborne of Right Click Web Consulting recently wrote an excellent article on this subject entitled "Google's Aging Delay for New Sites". In a portion of that article, she talks about why such an aging filter might exist. To quote from the article itself:
"My own theory is that the age factor for new sites is Google's answer to mini-networks and other multi-site strategies intended to artificially inflate link popularity. Many people divide what should be a single site into multiple sites in order to capitalize on the links that are exchanged between them. Others build a series of small sites that are only designed to add link popularity to the main site.
By delaying the ranking of brand new sites, the mini-network strategy becomes more of a long-term strategy than a quick jump to the top. Site owners who might have started new sites are going to be more inclined to build new pages on existing sites in order to avoid that delay."
This is very good analysis in my opinion. If this indeed be true (Google has yet to say anything on the subject), it is yet another strategy Google has employed in its never-ending war with spammers.
How Do I Play?
So now that we have come to the conclusion that this sandbox, aging filter or whatever you want to call it, actually seems to exist, what can one do that has been affected by it? The answer is "absolutely nothing". That surely is not what many people want to hear and possibly even you the reader question the reasoning of writing an article on the subject if there are no solutions. But wait a minute, there is a solution! It is called patience. Sure that might not be a definite solution to getting one's self out of the sandbox or out from underneath an aging filter. However it will allow them to keep their sanity and in doing so, to look at some alternatives to marketing their sites until the time period lapses. Let us take a look at some of those alternatives.
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