The word sandbox means a sandbox where children play so that they cannot hurt anything. But what does sandbox mean in SEO? When we talk about the sandbox in SEO, it means that Google considers a period for the sites during which it monitors them well and bypasses all the filters to know if this site is from. Does Google follow the rules, or is it breaking the rules?
Many people believe that Google has a problem with newly established sites and does not allow them to appear on the first pages of Google until they prove their worth; this is called the sandbox algorithm.
If you have a newly established site or want to know more about Google Sandbox, don’t miss this article because in this article, we will talk about how this algorithm works. Be with us
What is Google Sandbox?
When you set up a domain in Google, Google puts this domain in the sandbox for 1 to 4 months, and during this time, it evaluates the quality of your content and determines the main field of your work. As we said, this algorithm is active for new and young domains.
It was in 2004 that SEO experts realized that new and fledgling sites could not climb higher than the second page of results and concluded that this happened because of Google’s new algorithm. Until 2010, there was a lot of talk about this algorithm in the forums trying to prove the existence of this algorithm, but now experts use this term when sites have poor rankings, not to define a specific algorithm.
What does Google Sandbox do?
As we said, Google’s sandbox algorithm is for Google to make sure that the new domain will not use spam and black hat SEO methods to get high rankings (to learn about black hat SEO, read the article on SEO What is black, read us).
During all this time, Google fully and accurately monitors all the site’s activities and evaluates it to see if it deserves to be on the first pages of the search.
The Google sandbox algorithm has specific instructions and factors for this work; if the newly established site cannot pass the filter of these rules, it will remain in the sandbox.
In simpler words, websites must prove to Google that they have no sand in their shoes and deserve to be ranked high in Google. Many factors can cause you to be placed in the Google sandbox, but if you write quality content and get natural links, you will not be penalized and quickly get indexed and out of the Google sandbox.
Do not forget that it takes a lot of time to get indexed in Google and receive input. Maybe in the past, it was possible to bypass this algorithm with black hat methods, but now you can only use white hat SEO methods (if you want to know what white hat SEO is, Check out our article.)
Do not forget that the purpose of the sandbox is to exclude spam, worthless and illegal sites from the competition so that users do not visit such sites.
How long does Google sandbox last for sites?
Based on the experiences of SEO specialists, this period varies from a few weeks to a year, and this variability is related to the site’s subject; For example, sites that are active in the field of finance and health stay in the Google sandbox and Google is more sensitive on them.
Regardless of the Google sandbox algorithm, the time it takes to improve a site’s position in Google depends on your competitors, and your SEO strategy.
How do we know we are in the Google sandbox?
If you see the following, it could be a sign that you are in the Google sandbox:
If you search for the same title, Google won’t show the site pages.
First, your site is placed in a competitive position on the results page, and then it randomly loses its position and ranks between 30 and 500.
To find out if this is due to Google’s penalties or the sandbox algorithm, you should find out if you have a bad and inappropriate position in all keywords or only in some specific words.
You can enter your site’s address as site: URL in the Google search bar. If it doesn’t show you any results, it means that Google has not yet indexed your site, and you still have no chance to attract users except by direct entry to the site. When you can see several entries in the search console of your site, you can know that you have left the Google sandbox.
If Google has indexed your site but still doesn’t rank well in the results, you may find yourself in the Google sandbox.
Google regularly reviews the site based on criteria and other factors and ranks it regularly.
Which sites are known as spam?
One of the characteristics of a spam site is that it uses keyword stuffing (i.e., excessive use of keywords) without having useful content. The goal of spam sites is to rank high in search engines. Search engines like Google are strongly against these sites because they cannot give the user what he is looking for; Because of this, it quickly penalizes these sites and may never show up in the results again.
Other features of spam sites are the following:
- They are created only for advertising and without any useful effect
- Sites that do not have quality content and do not respect the rights of users that Google has considered
- Sites that want to rank high by overusing keywords
- (Of course, we have fully explained this in the Black Hat SEO article.)
How can we get out of the Google sandbox faster?
For a site placed in the Google sandbox, any action, even link building, can be dangerous (you can read the SEO backlink article on our site); the only thing you can do in the meantime is to Produce useful and user-friendly content and be patient.
The following methods can reduce the time spent in the Google sandbox:
- Do not use black hat methods for link building.
- Try to produce SEO content.
- Register sitemap and Google robot in webmaster tools.
- If there is a problem with your site structure, fix it.
- Increase your activity on social networks.
- Do not have any spamming activity.
- Have a basic internal and external linking strategy.
- Use long tail keywords.
- Use the mentioned method without links.
- Increase the time the user stays on your site.
- Do not rely on Google!
Does Google sandbox exist?
There are different answers to this question; if we want to answer it, we must examine it from different perspectives.
The opinion of SEO experts
From the perspective of SEO experts, such as Neil Patel, an SEO expert and blogger, believe that the Google sandbox is a myth. Some other experts don’t even talk about it. There is no single answer to this question.
With one action, a research team in the field of search engines proved that Google sandbox does not exist! Only by creating a blog in 2018 were they able to reach the first page of Google results within 4 months.
Between 2005 and 2099, various articles about Google’s sandbox were published on the MOZ site, which eventually changed Maz’s opinion from “yes, the sandbox exists” to “no, it’s a myth.”
Rand Fishkin, one of the founders and former director of MOZ, announced in a blog that the company’s official site was sandboxed for 9 months before it was finally released.
Google’s own opinion about sandbox
During this period of 16 years, Google has never admitted to the existence of a sandbox, but in 2005, Google representatives rejected the legend of Google’s sandbox several times!
Conclusion
In this article, we talked about the Google sandbox and explained how it works, and we also explained the ways to reduce the time spent in the sandbox.
Although there is still a difference of opinion on the existence or not of this algorithm, there are conflicting experiences in this regard, including the existence of the Honeymoon algorithm or Google’s honeymoon algorithm.
If you have any experience in this field, we will be happy to share it with us; If you have any questions in this regard, you can ask in the comments section so that we can answer as soon as possible.