Doorway pages

[Coley]

Hi All,

Naive me thought that most people were starting to get the 'picture' and that all these tricks etc. were just not worth the effort but have a look at this technique being used by a well-known Aus. company.

The following are all doorway sites leading through to the 'real' website(s).

Their is also a 'directory' that links to all these doorway pages.

http://www.searchzone.com.au
================================
There are hundreds more - this is just a few related to the travel industry which seems to be where they are focusing where they are using the town/location name combined with accommodation.

I came across one of them quite a while ago as I have a small site competing for one of the keyword phrases used and thought it wouldn't last long, but that doesn't seem to be the case and the technique is growing and Google seems to think they are OK as they are holding their positions and not getting dumped.

http://www.brightaccommodation.net.au/

http://www.brightaccommodation.com.au/

http://www.bright-accommodation.com.au/

http://www.portcampbellaccommodation.com.au/

http://www.rosebudaccommodation.com.au/

http://www.warrnamboolcaravanpark.com/

http://www.accommodationbrightvictoria.com.au/

http://www.accommodationbright.com.au/

http://www.bright-caravanpark.com.au/

http://www.greatoceanroadaccommodation.net.au/

Do you think they will be able to weed these out - it seems blatant spam to me?

Cheers,
Coley

[WebSavvy]

Thanks for posting the URLs. I'll have to look in our Temp Queue at my directory and make sure none of those sites have submitted to us. If they have, they'll be visiting the decline bin. :D

[Coley]

Savvy,
The 'directory' site will give you 100's or do a link:www.melbourneit.com.au as they are all linked back to them.

I noticed they are also doing real estate agent sites by purchasing the 'town' name for the doorway page that then redirects to a real estate agent that operates in that town/region.

www.highton.com.au
www.runawaybay.com.au

I now remember that they released the town names a while ago - I think at one stage in Aus. we couldn't purchase a domain that was an actual town name but MelbourneIT as a registrar would have been able to scoop up all these domains I suppose.

I find it depressing as this has got to be shortlived - or I hope it is but this company has such a high profile in Aus.

Cheers,
Coley

[ihelpyou]

Hi Coley, Are those domains in any main search engine indexes?

Yes, pure spam.

[Coley]

Google definitely is listing these domains. That's how I found them last year when I was doing some research for one of my clients.

The search phrases they are going for are not all that competitive in Aus. with only about 250,000 in the results but I have found whilst they don't bring a lot of visitors it's easier for the small B&B sites to target specifically for their town/accomm.type they can get on page 1 and the visitors are highly targetted rather than going broader and not getting anything. The site I did has got to page 1 #7 for this term and I am happy but it is annoying to see this spam sitting there at #4.

But Doug you would think Google would be able to pick this type of thing up with all the links together on their directory plus all that I have seen have at the bottom of each page a link back to MelbourneIT, which as I said, is a highly regarded (by the general public) IT domain registrar that is now pushing spammy SEO techniques by the look of it.

Cheers,
Vicki

[Coley]

Doug,
Just did a check and ninemsn.com.au (The Aus. version of MSN) they weren't on the home page for the term I am competing with .... oh, but I am #1, didn't know that.

But Yahoo7.com.au (our recently launched NEW Yahoo Au version) has them at #1.

Google has them at #4

Cheers,
Vicki

[Coley]

Yes, it's definitely a scam and one that I would have thought that Google would have squashed long ago.

They call these domain names "golden domain names" and have a special page on their site explaining how they use them.

You buy the domain name e.g. adelaideplumbers.com.au sydneybuilders.com.au brightonaccommodation.com.au etc. etc. and they provide you with a one-page fully SEO'd page targetted to these words and hosting wrapped into the package with a link to your original website or they offer to redirect it to your current domain ...what bollocks!!!!

Cheers,
Coley

[ihelpyou]

You may want to make this thread "public". It's pure spam and not very original spam either.

[Coley]

Don't know how to make it public - perhaps one of the mods would do this.

I posted in here originally as I am hesitant about putting URL's in posts so thought here might be best to start.

Cheers,
Coley

[Connie]

As long as you don't mind I think any MOD can move the thread. I'm hesitant because sometimes I loose them.

I think the main thing is to know if it is OK with you.

[WebSavvy]

OK, it's moved now. :)

[Coley]

Yep, that's fine.

Cheers,
Coley

[ihelpyou]

You can report all those domains to the se's Coley. Use the "report spam" feature that each one has on their sites.

[Coley]

Done that Doug. Or I did it with one of them a couple of times as I discovered this about 8 months ago.

I did report them about 6 weeks ago but I also realise that these spam reports are not 'eyeballed' so don't hold much chance of just my single complaint getting through. I did add the words "Big Daddy" to the report in the hope that it would be 'eyeballed' ... but so far no joy.

Other suggestions welcome :-)
Google must be having problems with this as I have also come across sites ranking well for phrases such as these where all that is there is the server holding page or a 'domain for sale' notice.

Cheers,
Coley

[excell]

Sorry to bump an old thread, just looking into these little microsites...

Interesting - they must add links on obscure directories (whether they are creating themselves or not - I don't know):

viewaustralia.com/australia/index.php?list=latest

What gets me is that they are charging decent fees for these microsites and seem to be quite heavily targeting small accommodation operators who with a little education would be far better off optimising their existing websites by adding great content etc...

a lower risk and more cost effective long term exercise - in my opinion.

[ihelpyou]

It's a case of the naive being taken for a ride by fraudsters out to take their money for a HUGE risk.

[excell]

I wouldn't care so much if they were just some fly by night cowboy outfit...but they are a "trusted name" here with "credibility" as an original domain name registration company.

:mad: Taking the lambs to slaughter...it's amazing that the likes of Google cannot pick up their little template style escapades and other unsavory tactics.

[ihelpyou]

Fill out the spam report form. They really do read them and try to filter the stuff automatically. Sometimes they will manually remove them.

[Coley]

This company has been doing this for a long time now and yesterday I saw they announced record profits for the quarter!!!

It is mainly small accommodation/tourism websites that I see everywhere using these micro-sites as most of my clients are in same industry but I have seen also tradesmen, plumbers, electricians etc. where they combined www.townname-trade.com.au again small businesses without a clue go to the big company and get sold this - but it is working for them as I have reported many of these sites when I come across them and haven't seen a single one disappear yet in over a year - could be nearly 2 years since I first came across these.

The same with companies that have multiple domain/sub-domains that use a single database. Many searches in accommodation at Google show up to 8 listings which are identical in every respect except they are from sub-domains or different domains but they all use the same database, just top and tail them with different header/footer.

Coley

[Dave Hawley]

Why do you assume the spammy stuff is THE reason for anything? I really think Google would be well aware of this type of spam.

[nuthin]

The way they spin there service is laughable. But unfortunately they have the brand name and customers will sign up with them no matter what. I see alot of there 'golden web domain names' or 'micro-sites' or whatever they like to call it today in some of the areas that I monitor and they certainly are becoming more common in Google's SERPS as they get more customers.

I'm suprised Google hasn't hosed them down yet as some have been sitting pretty for quite some time now.

I think what it is showing alot of us is that Google can be worked hard if you have one specific focus and target keyword in mind and you stick to only hitting that.

Really does come down to perception with what your trying to do and there micro-site model as it currently stands would no doubt fall under the classifcation as 'doorway pages'.

Really does make you wonder how easily Google can be worked. From my research they just give these micro-sites one anchor text link from an internal authority domain that they operate.. then poof, over-time because the sites are so focused they rank.

Do what I did.. take this model of theres and adjust it in a way that you won't get into trouble if Google ever comes knocking. Fight fire with fire. heh

[Blue]

Originally posted by nuthin
...

Do what I did.. take this model of theres and adjust it in a way that you won't get into trouble if Google ever comes knocking. Fight fire with fire. heh That sounds like the ticket to me!!! :cheers:

[excell]

becomes a little difficult when under some competitive key phrases 4 of your own clients 2 of their doorways and 4 of the other multiple domain heavy weight appear...

I mean - there is only room for 10 in the top 10....:3:

[nuthin]

Oh I hear you! At the moment I'm sure you have come up against them over the years "homeone" and there elite sub-domain setup is irritating me, as it's not uncommon that in there particular niche market that they target (ever increasing might I add) that they simply dominate the SERP's and it's hard to even have room to get listed because of the authority score that Google has dumped on them. ;)

One reason why I was complaining about how Google clusters sub-domains.. last week on this forum. :)

[Dave Hawley]

Dissatisfied with your search results? (http://www.google.com/quality_form?) ;)

[nuthin]

Bit late in the day for jokes isn't it? :)
Let me tap into my direct line with me old pen-pals Larry and Sergey and we will get these results cleaned up right away. :D

[Dave Hawley]

Not really a joke, there's a reason for that form, your mission is to find out what :D

[nuthin]

What makes you think that I and others in the au namespace wouldn't haven't done that? Approximately 3 years ago! Maybe a reminder note that there still getting worked?? :)

[Dave Hawley]

What makes you think that I and others in the au namespace wouldn't haven't done that?Cause you didn't say you had.

[nuthin]

Point taken. Picky bugger. :p

[Dave Hawley]

Just trying to help :)

[nuthin]

Leave Room For Others Please! Sub-domain Saturation Example (http://www.searchengineoptimization.com.au/domination.GIF)

Talk about domination.

[Coley]

It's the same with a site(s) in accommodation - they have a sub-domain for virtually every town in Aus ... town.domain.com.au and as well they then have sub-domains such as pet.domain.com.au, pensioner.domain.com.au, romantic.domain.com.au, bedandbreakfast.domain.com.au, self-contained.domain.com.au .... any word that can be used to describe types of accommodation and then also have many TLC domains covering misspellings etc. and more.... literally thousands of domains/sub-domains all running from a single database.

I have come across instances where they hold 8 out of the top 10 placements for certain search phrases.

Coley

[nuthin]

Exactly.

That's the reason why Google needs to implement a new policy and procedure on sub-domain clustering. Like the example I showed in this thread if someone was to lay out there web site structure with a combination of sub-folders and sub-domains it's entirely possible that they can corner there market quite well.

The interesting thing to note is that you will see with my example that the sub-folders actually get clustered correctly as they only show 2 sub-folder pages grouped together in the SERP'S, but the sub-domains appear to have no clustering at all, thus... open to domination.

Can't really blame the site owners though for using these type of setups.. there just getting past a potential hole in there algo.. for now.

[nuthin]

I bet you find it rather frustrating. :D

What I say is if you can't beat em, join em. One of my new projects I am working on is using a sub-domain structure as it's likely we will be getting more than 1 company listed in the same sort of industry. Plus I needed individual comprehensive stand-alone stats for each page so sub-domains was probably the ideal solution!

What's the worst that can happen is that Google will eventually work out some sort of clustering for sub-domains and what's the best thing that could happen is in the mean-time we could take up the first 10 listings. :) Ok.. 9 then, don't want to be too greedy? haha.

[Dave Hawley]

I have 3 listing on some SERPs without using any sub domains or any trickery at all :)

[nuthin]

Yes it's not entirely unheard of. It's just usually that Google's domain name clustering would group 2 pages from the same domain together if the same sort of keywords are listed on both pages and if both warrant a ranking. You must be one of the lucky few Dave. :)