Google Sandbox

Google Sandbox is the name which has been given to Google’s new site filter.

It is believed that Google introduced the new site filter to discourage spam sites from adding vast quantities of bought links to a new site to improve page ranking.

Google regard new sites which have masses of links pointing to them from their launch as highly suspicious as the links are oftentimes considered not to be natural.

It is also believed that Google introduced Sandbox to prevent spam sites using a variety of tactics to get high rankings, which could potentially lead to increasing sales, before being banned for violating their webmaster guidelines.

The Sandbox is also used to help Google provide more accurate results in their Search Engine Results Pages (SERPS) by enabling them to effectively monitor new sites. However, not all new sites are automatically placed in the Sandbox.

Those which are low competition niches usually escape being ‘Sandboxed’ as they are not seen as a real threat in terms of ever being highly ranked.

Sites which have been placed in the Sandbox can remain there for many months, however, being in Google’s sandbox does not mean that a site cannot receive traffic from other search engines like Yahoo!, MSN or Alta Vista which do not appear to have any type of Sandbox at present.

At present, there appears to be no predetermined time which a site remains in Google’s Sandbox. If a site has highly competitive keywords and search phrases, the longer the site seems to remain in the Sandbox.

Some SEO specialists say six to eight months seems to be the average for sites with competitive keywords.

Google locates new sites by following inbound links (IBL) from other sites which the Googlebot crawls. The website may be seen in the usual Google SERPS under the domain name, however, it is unlikely the site will be listed for any keywords, nor will Google show any other websites linking to the site or display pages which are related.

By tracking the website’s visitor statistics while it is in the Sandbox will show that Googlebot does crawl the ’sandboxed’ sites and by cataloguing all of the pages, Google know that pages exist and what the content is.

If being in the Sandbox is seen in a positive way, further SEO work can be continued. Especially, adding fresh keywords, rich content and new inbound links.

Adding quality links also provides the assurance that any new link damp filtering which may come into effect will not adversely affecting the site, especially if the links contain keyword rich anchor text.

A site in Google’s Sandbox could possibly be compared to storing fine wine, while it is in there it is ageing and maturing all the time. When released it will be full bodied and ready to achieve good search engine results.