Found Agency Tumbles in Google Rankings

Found Agency Tumbles in Google Rankings

The Found Agency’s website has tumbled down the Google rankings for key phrases it used to dominate after the search giant apparently invalidated the vast majority of the site’s inbound links.

“The site has taken a big hit, that’s for sure, although we were surprised it lasted so long where it was – it should have happened a long time ago,” said Found co-Founder Zak Asani. 

Why? “Because we had just started our business on a shoestring budget and we pushed the boundaries a little bit on that site with linking” to rank highly in the Australian market for phrases such as Search Engine Optimisation and Search Engine Marketing.

They shot straight to the top of the charts, dominating the Google splash page on both counts. Some in the industry estimate that www.foundagency.com.au has up to 50,000 inbound links from all sorts of sites.

Asani didn’t dispute this but denied industry talk that the website has been blacklisted by Google.

“What’s happened is that Google is not counting all the site links (so) we’re still indexed but just ranking poorly at the moment.

“We’re not really that concerned.

“We’ve got three backup sites with good age and good links. I think they will be breaking into the top 10 (for key phrases) in the next six months.”

News of Google’s action, which it declined to comment on, has become something of an industry sensation and rival companies have been quick to call Found Agency’s clients with the news.

But Asani said no clients had defected or were perturbed by the developments.

“I don’t believe our reputation will take a hit,” he said.

“You have to go to the boundaries to find out where they are. We’ve got between 1500 and 2000 websites running at any one time that we use to test the boundaries.

“Our clients understand we would not do that with their site.”

The site’s Google tumble comes at a pivotal time in the evolution of the company.

In early March, Asani and co-founder Tim Macdonald sold 51% of the Found Agency to the Photon Group for A$1.6 million. Photon has an option to acquire the remaining 49% by September with performance incentives through to 2010.

The Found Agency has 15 staff and is based in Sydney. Its clients include realestate.com.au, travel.com.au, Last Minute, Wotif, ABN-AMRO and Club Med.

Search Engine Room
May 9, 2007

 

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