Hello, everyone. I've created a fan site for a musical artist. I'll substitute the name “Malia Fiori” for her name, “Malia Fiori and the Anomalies” for her band, and maliafiorifans.net for the web site. Gonna do so because I'd rather not put on the web the fact that my site is blacklisted.

Yes, I've inadvertently gotten it blacklisted in Google, Altavista, and probably some other search engines. I think we're probably being penalized for too many occurrences of the phrase “Malia Fiori” or Malia Fiori and the Anomalies.” There has been no deliberate spoofing. I haven't hidden her name repeated over and over in invisible text. Every occurrence of her name I've believed was legitimate.

Issue 1: photos.html
One of the key features of the site is photo albums of the artist taken by various photographers including myself. The photo albums page is a file named photos.html. On it is a collection of tables, each of which contains a thumbnail image of a performance and a name of the performance, for example, “Malia Fiori and the Anomalies at The The Rendezvous Bar, Saint Joseph, Missouri” or “Malia Fiori at The Hub, Cedar Falls, Iowa, solo acoustic.” Since there are 20 such photo albums listed, we've got the phrase, “Malia Fiori” 20 times. But wait, each thumbnail has an alt = command that includes her name. That doubles the count to 40.

Issue 2: Thumbnail pages
Here's where we really get a ton of duplicate phrases. When you click on a thumbnail on the photos.html page, you're brought to a page of thumbnails that each represent a photo in the album. The user can click on whatever photo he wants to see, which pulls up a separate html page with the full-size photo on it. Each photo on the thumbnail page has an alt = tag that includes Malia's name and sometimes also the venue. There's also a logo at the top of the page of “maliafiorifans.net” with the alt tag “Malia Fiori Fans.” Therefore, if the photo shoot yielded 40 photos, her name is on the page 41 times. Some photo shoots are as small as 4 images; others are as large as 100. That's a lot of occurrences of her name.

Issue 3: Full-sized photo pages
Each page with the full-size photo contains the alt = and then her name command. In other words, the photo shoot that had 100 photos has 100 separate html pages, each with an alt = tag that includes Malia's name.

I was not deliberately spoofing. When learning to create pages, I learned that it was better for the user to always include a descriptive alt = tag for people who have images shut off or who are browsing with a blind person's audio browser. In fact, I didn't have to create any of these pages in a traditional html editor like Dreamweaver. I'm a computer programmer and designed my own tool that would automatically generate all my html pages. Once I'm done with a photo shoot and get all the images edited and optimized for the web, I plug in the name of the venue, the date, and the name of the photographer, and – boom – all my pages are created. This has saved me a ton of time. A shoot with 100 images has one thumbnail page, plus 100 html pages, each one with its own photo and “previous” and “next” images with javascript rollovers. However, it looks like my ingenuity has backfired on me with too many occurrences of Malia's name getting the site blacklisted.

Issue 3: Transparent gifs
I've made use of transparent gifs to assist with formatting. In articles I've used them with small dimensions to indent paragraphs like you see in books. I've also used such gifs to push up my site buttons and hold them placed where I want them. In these images I've not included any alt = tags.

Obviously I need to reduce the occurrences of Malia's name on my thumbnail pages and corresponding photo pages. Fortunately, I won't have to go back and edit those pages one by one. Instead, I'll be recoding my html generating program. I intend to change it so that I now have the option of only putting Malia's name into the alt tag of the first thumbnail and then doing the rest of them with no alt tag. I'll also have the option of using no alt tags, and I'll leave in the original option

Question #1:
Will using only one alt = tab on my thumbnail pages be enough to fix the problem? Or do I also need to reduce Malia's name on each full-sized image page? For example, the shoot that has 100 photos has html pages 1.html, 2.html, 3.html and so on up till 100.html. Each of these pages has an alt = tag. Will this keep me blacklisted? Or do I need to change it so that only 1.html has her name and all the rest don't?

Question #2.
Is there a problem with the way I've used transparent gifs? None of these gifs use any alt = tags, so the name repetition isn't a problem here. However, can transparent images be misinterpreted and thus trigger penalization or blacklisting?

Question #3.
Once I get the site fixed up will Google, Altavista, and others scan it again and remove the blacklisting? Or do I need to do something to make sure they're informed?

Question #4.
Right now the (fictitious substitution) name of the site is maliafiorifans.net. However, I own the rights to maliafiorifans.com and originally published it under that URL. Last September the site went down when my subscription to my web host went down. I brought the site back last month under the new dot net URL without the dot com one. Would it help to unblacklist the site if I brought back the dot com one in its place while nixing the dot net one?

Final Comment
I like using the program I've written and intend to keep using it. I don't wish to move to any of the flash or php-based utilities for photo albums. I like using mine because I can keep the pages very simple but good looking without their being tedious to create.

Yes, I've inadvertently gotten it blacklisted in Google, Altavista, and probably some other search engines. I think we're probably being penalized for too many occurrences of the phrase “Malia Fiori” or Malia Fiori and the Anomalies.” There has been no deliberate spoofing. I haven't hidden her name repeated over and over in invisible text. Every occurrence of her name I've believed was legitimate.

Very simple:
You DON'T get banned for repeating a phrase "too much"

BTW
alts != tags
http://www.candsdesign.co.uk/article...es-and-values/

PM the site URL and I'll see if I can find a real problem

Originally Posted by chrishirst

Very simple:
You DON'T get banned for repeating a phrase "too much"

BTW
alts != tags
http://www.candsdesign.co.uk/article...es-and-values/

PM the site URL and I'll see if I can find a real problem

Thanks, I appreciate your answering. I just tried to PM you, but got this message:

Sorry, you cannot send new private messages until you have 5 posts. Read our Forum Rules for more information.

I also tried to send you an e-mail via the board, but it wouldn't let me do it. If it's not too much trouble, PM me an e-mail address and I'll get the URL to you, or just e-mail me [e-mail address deleted -- I'm going to be able to PM you].

Tom, Chris is right that you won't get banned if all you did was use certain words too many times. You may not rank well, but you probably won't get banned.

How do you know the site was banned? Is it a matter of it not ranking for phrases? That wouldn't be a ban? Are you sure it's been banned? I ask because the majority of times someone thinks their site has been banned it hasn't been. It's simply not ranking as well as they'd like.

You are welcome to post a link to the site here and we'll be happy to take a look and see if we can find any problems. I understand if you prefer not to post the link.

You need to make 5 posts before you can send a PM. Just reply in a few other threads, though please make the posts meaningful. It's not that hard to or time consuming to post a few times.

How do you know the site was banned? Is it a matter of it not ranking for phrases? That wouldn't be a ban? Are you sure it's been banned? I ask because the majority of times someone thinks their site has been banned it hasn't been. It's simply not ranking as well as they'd like.

I think it's banned because whenever I search with Google the artist's name and my last name, my page doesn't show up at all, not even with a last place ranking. I checked every single link that came up. However, the band's official page comes up, as does my photography page. The band's official page has my name on it twice because they used a couple of my photos. My photography page has her name on it because I put up a couple of my favorite pictures I've taken of her.

Same thing with Altavista. But now that you mention it, I suppose it's possible that I'm not banned, but that the search engines simply haven't found it yet. I was thinking I put the page up on March 1, '08. However, after I looked back through my e-mails, I realized it actually didn't go up until March 31. March 1 is the date when the networking guy got our FTP stuff set up. However, there was a glitch in which I could upload files, but the generic page stayed up instead of what I had uploaded. So maybe Google and Altavista simply haven't found it yet. If that's the case, that's actually good news. Maybe I can get the multitude of over-occurrences of her name down before Google or any engine sees my site. On the other hand, my photography page went up the same day as the fan page and it's in the engines.

You are welcome to post a link to the site here and we'll be happy to take a look and see if we can find any problems. I understand if you prefer not to post the link.

I'd rather not post the link because it could hurt me professionally. Although this site is not a paid venture -- I'm just doing it because I like a local band -- I do have a couple sites I get paid to create. It would be better of those clients didn't get scared that their sites could be blacklisted. Neither of them are anywhere close to a blacklisting, but I still don't want to spook them.

You need to make 5 posts before you can send a PM. Just reply in a few other threads, though please make the posts meaningful. It's not that hard to or time consuming to post a few times.

Okay, I'm going to surf around the boards and see if I have anything to say. I'm not going to post just to post, but I will if I can contribute something relevant. Then I'll PM the URL to you and Chris.

Many thanks to you both for responding.

Type site:yourdomain.com in Google to see if you're banned. If you don't rank, it doesn't mean that you're banned.

Is it a new site? You could be in the Google sandbox. I created a brand new site in December. It's already a PR4 but it's too new to rank well for my key phrases. It's slowly making its way to the top, but the trust builds up over time (typically ~9 months).

definitely not penalised. Penalties are extremely rare AND the site operator/owner would KNOW why a site had been penalised.

ok at first look over,

First off is the usual canonical issue of both www . hostname and non-www . hostname responding which creates duplicate content.
You also link internally to the index page name which creates the same issue only moreso.
You now have 4 URLs showing the exact same page.
hostname.tld
hostname.tld/index.html
www . hostname.tld
www . hostname.tld/index.html

You do the same with the gallery page. Always link to the root of the site or folder Never to the index page name.

The site is VERY new, reg date 28 Feb 2008 it takes several months for any realistic results to show.

Actually, posting a link to the site or having the site linked in your signature would go a long way to alleviating your concerns about being "penalised".

Get some decent links. Do NOT obsess about (or get involved in) link exchanges, forum link dropping, "Social media" optimising and the usual crud that is being bandied about.
However this is one of the cases where the "social media" sites can be of HUGE potential.
Music IS a very social thing. Everybody loves talking about their likes and dislikes, so music and musicians are one group that can benefit from the enormous promotional potential that the networking sites can offer. It's not about link building. (and if the Usual Suspects begin posting in this thread I WILL delete the posts) It's about REAL promotion.

You have the right idea with your links page in linking to other places that the visitors to your site may also be interested in.
Expand on that by linking to other musicians in the same genre, see if some of those will link to you. It's called Mutual Linking
And what could be better than having the official band site link to yours?

So get out there in the "blue nowhere" and find other fan sites and blogs in the same genre and tell them about the band that YOU admire so much.
Your site is one that you should find relatively easy to promote, simply because it's something you are interested in and care about.

Thanks for the feedback. I appreciate it very much. It's a relief to know the site isn't penalized. Thanks to your feedback, I have some specific ways I can dig in with my heels for improvements.

Do you think I should remove the occurrences of her name in the alt = tags in the thumbnails? Or would Google consider those legitimate since only one per photo is used? Or are there just too many of them?

Getting a link to the band's official and their Myspace pages will be no problem. They know me and linked to the page before when it was up as a dot com instead of a dot net.

I hadn't thought of requesting links to other band pages and band fan pages. That's a great idea. Thanks.

I haven't decided whether to add a link to my sig here. Now that I know the site isn't blacklisted, maybe my clients won't get spooked. They may not even come to this forum. I'll think this over. I'm definitely adding a sig link on other forums where I post if that doesn't clash with their TOS.

Once again, I very much appreciate all the help offered.

So why the change from .com to .net ?

alt attributes!!

Just as long as the alt attribute text describes the image adequately for non-image capable user agents it will be fine.
It will only becomes a real issue when there is half a page of text rammed in each of them.

Originally Posted by Setembrini

Issue 3: Transparent gifs
I've made use of transparent gifs to assist with formatting. In articles I've used them with small dimensions to indent paragraphs like you see in books. I've also used such gifs to push up my site buttons and hold them placed where I want them. In these images I've not included any alt = tags.


Question #2.
Is there a problem with the way I've used transparent gifs? None of these gifs use any alt = tags, so the name repetition isn't a problem here. However, can transparent images be misinterpreted and thus trigger penalization or blacklisting?

Setembrini I would like to take a stab at the above issue - I have not seen your site but am presuming you are trying to indent the first line of a paragraph - in this case with a transparent gif.

The following code should help with this:

Since paragraph tags will indent the whole paragraph – You can use created style tags in the head of the page, for example:

<style type="text/css">
<!--
p {
text-indent: 30px;
}

The <P> tag at the beginning of a paragraph will now indent just the first line of the paragraph by 30 pixels

I am not a coder - nor do I play one on TV - Hope this helps.

Tom, everyone beat me to it, but I also noticed the site wasn't banned. Part of the ranking problem is you're competing with some big authority sites like MySpace and YouTube.

I agree with Chris about the canonical issues and adding a sig link. The site is fine and shouldn't hurt any future relationships with other clients. Nothing for them to worry about.

I see the site is relatively new so part of the advice is accept that it takes a little time to rank especially when you're competing against big name site. You should in time rank well for your domain name, which I would think will be a pretty good phrase for the site.

I haven't had time to look through the site in depth, but I promise I will when I get a chance and see if I can come up with more ideas for you.

Many, many thanks to everyone who replied. I'm glad to know I didn't get blacklisted and that this site isn't a professional liability. I've decided to add it to my sig along with my photography page. My photography page is very much in its infancy, but I did post some of the favorite photos I've done.

yankees51, I'm looking forward to trying your paragraph indentation code. Looks way simpler than the way I've been doing it. And many thanks to Christ for your exhaustive analysis. I've got stuff to work on to make this thing better and to improve my skills. Thanks to everyone.

It's a long story why I changed the site from dot com to dot net. Essentially, I had it parked and hosted by my former web host and the subscription ran out and the site went down. Then a friend of mine who works as a networking engineer and likes the band offered server space. He couldn't get the dot com one to release to him, so he (per my instructions) used dot net. I still own the rights to the dot com one, but haven't figured out how to set it up for the new server. Do I need to? Maybe I should just stick with dot net.

Now, anyone who can guess where my handle came from gets a gold star.

I see you're no longer shy about posting the link to the site.

You might as well point the .com to the .net. Some people will remember the name of the site, but assume .com so may as well direct them to the right place.

Definitely follow Chris' advice above about the canonical issue. If you're not sure how do a search for 301 redirects apache. It's a couple of lines in your .htaccess file.

You are competing with some very well known and authority sites, but in time you should be ranking #1 for 'sarah benck fans' since it is your domain. It might just be a little time since the site is still new.

One thing you might add to the site if you can easily get the information is a list of where she'll be playing. I live in Boulder. I see you're in Denver and I'm guessing Sarah plays a lot between here and Nebraska. Tell me where I can go see her.

Since the site is for fans why not set up either a blog or forum or both to let the fans speak. It'll build up content on the site and should also help attract fans to the site. The more fans creating content for the site, the more fans telling other people about the site and linking to it.

If ever a site calls for community and social options it's yours.

Normally I don't care for sites that autoplay music or video, but my one exception is always sites for musicians. Even if you don't autoplay something make it very obvious how I can play a song. Make an obvious button on every page to listen to some of Sarah's music. You're right it is infectious.

You should write unique page titles for every page of the site. Right now you're using the same title Sarah Benck Fans on every page. Pick a couple of phrases for each page and build the title around them.

For example you have a page with a few images of her from The Walnut Room in Denver. You might try a title like:

Sarah Benck Pictures from The Walnut Room, Denver Colorado.

Not necessarily the best title, but it has a better chance of being in the results if someone searches 'sarah bench walnut room'

Your interview page might use:

Pacific Street Blues Interview with Sarah Benck

Can you see how both of those titles are better than simply repeating the site name on every page?

Since the interviews are audio files why not offer a text description on the page to give both people and search spiders something to feed on.

I think the Fans Speak section will work really well as either blog, forum or both depending on how many fans you can attract to it. You can set up the blog to let other people post if you don't have the time to write.

I hope some of that helps.

[On it is a collection of tables, each of which contains a thumbnail image of a performance and a name of the performance, for example, “Malia Fiori and the Anomalies at The The Rendezvous Bar, Saint Joseph, Missouri” or “Malia Fiori at The Hub, Cedar Falls, Iowa, solo acoustic.” Since there are 20 such photo albums listed, we've got the phrase, “Malia Fiori” 20 times. But wait, each thumbnail has an alt = command that includes her name. That doubles the count to 40. [/quote]

1. Don't use tables. That's something you want to change slowly and gradually as your skills and time allow, not an immediate problem preventing you from ranking.
2. Alt="???" isn't a command, it's an attribute (and a data value