Central Perk: 3 dec. 2013

marți, 3 decembrie 2013

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

Bottom in for Detroit?
Pension Battle Shifts to San Jose, San Bernardino, Stockton; Rights of Dinosaurs vs. "Right Thing"
Lesson for Union Dinosaurs: Detroit Bankruptcy Judge Rules Public Pensions Haircuts OK; Unions Whine City Got "Absolutely Everything"
What Will Your Bank Look Like 5 Years From Now? How Will Pizzas Be Delivered? Do You Tip a Drone?

Posted: 03 Dec 2013 08:02 PM PST

I mentioned to my wife Liz tonight, that I thought "the bottom was in for Detroit". She asked "why?"

Here's my lengthy answer.

Unlike Vallejo, California, it is highly likely Detroit will actually shed pension obligations in the first go-around.

A mere 25% of students graduate from high school. Can Detroit schools get any worse?

In 2010 I wrote about Mayor Bing's plan to Cede 20% of the City to gangs

Detroit has been bankrupt for years. It simply refuses to admit it. Detroit's schools are bankrupt as well. A mere 25% of students graduate from high school.

Yet, in spite of hints and threats from mayors and budget commissions, and in spite of common sense talk of bankruptcy, Detroit has not pulled the bankruptcy trigger.

In a futile attempt to stave off the inevitable one last time, Mayor Bing's latest plan is to cutoff city services including road repairs, police patrols, street lights, and garbage collection in 20% of Detroit.

Would you want to live in one of the gang war-zones that his plan would create? Would you want to live in a bordering neighborhood or in a bordering city?

Regardless of your answer, Bing's plan cannot and will not work and I believe Detroit will, sometime in 2011, file for bankruptcy.

Here we are today. The city finally pulled the bankruptcy trigger, but it took two more wasted years.

Here's a picture of Detroit's Michigan Central Train Depot.

Image courtesy of the Journal and the AP.

Also in 2010, Business Insider posted a fantastic set of images of the beautiful 3.5 million square foot Packard property worth $13 million (but no taxes collected for years). Here are a couple of those images.

Bottom Catalyst

Still, things do not bottom until there is a catalyst.

Today we had that catalyst. It came in the form of a Lesson for Union Dinosaurs: Detroit Bankruptcy Judge Rules Public Pensions Haircuts OK.

After discussing the above, I happened to read some comments from the New York Times article Detroit Ruling on Bankruptcy Lifts Pension Protections.

The article itself did not say much more than I said on my blog earlier. But check out this comment by Kathleen Kelly ...

I was born in and grew up in Detroit. My parents moved to Detroit from another country with their three other children, prior to my birth. The city was, at that time, a gleaming jewel, and a global center of manufacturing.

Yes, the city has taken a turn downward for the past several decades. It's been sad, painful, and sobering to watch. The key question is "what now?".

A lot of turnover has occurred on City Council in the past year. The city also has a new mayor and a new police chief. Young artisans, craftsmen and business people are moving into the city, specifically into downtown and midtown, to take full advantage of affordable rents. Business owners like Dan Gilbert are funding revitalization efforts in terms of rehabbing or demolishing empty buildings.

Areas of NYC have been renowned, over my lifetime, for re-gentrification. Detroit may learn something from that. Yes, the tune was called & played, and now the piper must be paid. But for those of us who've stayed close and who love the city, we see a blank slate now, replete with new possibilities. And yes, it won't be like "it was" with auto plants dotting the city landscape. But that doesn't mean it still can't or won't be great in its own way.

Finger-pointing won't help, and I'd have thought we'd moved beyond that. Safe, affordable housing, stable infrastructure, education and jobs. That's where our focus needs to be, and that's what will make Detroit great again.

I was in Ann Arbor, Michigan over Thanksgiving with Liz's family. Jan, a niece of Liz who runs a property management company in Detroit made similar comments about revitalization of Detroit by young artists.

Fresh-Start Proposal

Let's hope Detroit makes the most of this bankruptcy opportunity. But it can only do so if it sheds a huge chunk of pension and bond obligations.

Here is my six point fresh-start proposal.

An agreement to end collective bargaining for all city workers
An end to defined benefit pension plans for new workers and also for workers with less than 10 years of service
A sustainable benefit model for existing workers with over 10 years of service, with pension plan assumptions equal to the long-term treasury rate
Automatic provisions for further pension cuts if plan assumptions were not met
An end to the right to strike for public safety workers
An end to all prevailing wage laws

It may take years, if ever, for Detroit to be "great" again. But for the first time in decades, Detroit actually has a chance.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

Pension Battle Shifts to San Jose, San Bernardino, Stockton; Rights of Dinosaurs vs. "Right Thing"

Posted: 03 Dec 2013 01:28 PM PST

Now that a federal judge properly ruled pension obligations are not sacrosanct (see Lesson for Union Dinosaurs) the spotlight is once again on union dinosaurs in California.

Bankrupt San Bernardino foolishly did not attempt to shed pension obligations in bankruptcy, but perhaps it can now reconsider.

What about Stockton and Vallejo?

On April 1, 2013 Judge Rules Stockton CA Bankruptcy is Valid, City Acted in Good Faith. Hopefully Stockton will follow inevitable pension cuts in Detroit.

Second Chance for Vallejo

Vallejo had a golden opportunity to shed pension obligations in its first bankruptcy. When the city failed to do so, I made an easy prediction: Within years, Vallejo would be back in bankruptcy court.

That prediction appears well-founded. On October 20, 2013 I penned Vallejo, Mired in Pension Debt Again; Lesson for Stockton and Detroit - Shed Those Pension Obligations Now!

My comment from above: "Stockton and Detroit have a choice. They can cut pensions now, or cut them later in a second bankruptcy, just like Vallejo will."

Will Stockton get it right? Hopefully, but some things will depend on Detroit. We have not yet seen the final ruling, but steep haircuts on pension promises and unsecured general bonds should be forthcoming.

Battle in San Jose

The battle in San Jose, population 983,000 and California's third-largest city, is of a similar nature.

San Jose spends 33% of its general fund revenue on pensions, the highest among the 25 most populous U.S. cities.

Mayor Chuck Reed wants to make changes to the pension plan. Specifically, Reed, a 65-year-old Democrat, is leading a statewide voter initiative to allow changes in future benefits for existing employees.

Union Dinosaurs Part II

Of course union dinosaurs are fighting the initiative, which means unions would rather see San Jose go bankrupt than negotiate.

Bloomberg reports San Jose Pension Crush Spurs Bid to Ease California Pacts.

San Jose, a city of 983,000 that is California's third-largest, has been forced to make deep cuts in basic services as its retirement costs soared to $245 million in 2012 from $73 million in 2002. The city's pension and retiree health-care liability is almost $3 billion, according to Reed, who was first elected in 2006.

San Jose voters last year approved retirement changes requiring new employees to pay 50 percent of the plan's total cost, or about twice as much as current employees. Workers already on the city's payroll could keep their existing plans by increasing their contributions or keep their costs steady by choosing a plan with more modest benefits.

Unions including the San Jose Police Officers' Association and the San Jose Retired Employees Association sued to block the change. The case is pending.

Reed's ballot initiative would amend the California constitution to give local governments the power to negotiate changes to existing employees' future pension or retiree health care, while protecting benefits they've already earned.

"What they're trying to do is overturn decades of case law, Supreme Court decisions and change the California constitution to allow public employers to either change, cut or eliminate public employees' pensions in the middle of their career," said Dave Low, executive director of the California School Employees Association and chairman of Californians for Retirement Security, a coalition of public employees and retirees.

"It's a vested right," Low said.

"In talking with other mayors around the state, everybody would benefit from having clear authority to be able to negotiate changes for future benefits for work yet to be performed for current employees," Reed said of his ballot measure.

Mayors Pat Morris of bankrupt San Bernardino, Tom Tait of Anaheim and Bill Kampe of Pacific Grove are backing the plan. Santa Ana Mayor Miguel Pulido dropped out as a formal supporter and was replaced by Vallejo Vice Mayor Stephanie Gomes. Opponents include Oakland Mayor Jean Quan and San Francisco Board of Supervisors President David Chiu.

Also assailing the plan are the California Public Employees' Retirement System, the largest U.S. public pension, and the California State Teachers' Retirement System, the second-biggest U.S. public pension contending with a $70 billion unfunded liability.

The proposal "threatens the retirement security of existing and future educators, who have provided many years of service to California's students," Jack Ehnes, the teacher pension's chief executive officer, said in a statement.

Reed said cities can continue to cut services and raise taxes, make employees pay more, cut benefit payments to retirees or cut benefits for current employees.

"None of those is fair, so it is better to talk about changing expectations of future accruals for future work," Reed said.

CalPERS, Oakland Mayor Against Reed's Plan

It's not yet official, but Oakland is as bankrupt as bankrupt can be. Why its mayor would not want to back Reed's initiative has three possibilities: reelection motives, sheer stupidity, or to preserve her own ill-gotten pension.

Rights of Dinosaurs vs. "Right Thing"

Dave Low, executive director of the California School Employees Association and chairman of Californians for Retirement Security, a coalition of public employees and retirees, whines "It's a vested right".

Low can whine all he wants, but bankruptcy is a "right" as well. And rights in bankruptcy overrule alleged rights of unions.

Speaking of which, those alleged rights were primarily obtained via a process of coercion, threats, bribery, and back-room deals with crooked politicians willing to give unions what unions want so the politicians can get elected.

What's "right" about that?

From a taxpayer perspective, the "right thing" to do is end collective bargaining of all public unions, after-which public unions, like dinosaurs, will become rightfully extinct.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

Lesson for Union Dinosaurs: Detroit Bankruptcy Judge Rules Public Pensions Haircuts OK; Unions Whine City Got "Absolutely Everything"

Posted: 03 Dec 2013 10:21 AM PST

At long last, beleaguered taxpayers will not have to put up with nonsense from public unions about the sanctity of pensions.

In spite of Michigan constitutional provisions, the federal judge presiding over the Detroit bankruptcy filing ruled the city filed in good faith. More importantly, the judge ruled the provision in the Michigan Constitution protecting public pensions isn't a bulletproof shield in a bankruptcy.

Yahoo!Finance reports Judge says Detroit Eligible for Bankruptcy

Detroit is eligible to shed billions in debt in the largest public bankruptcy in U.S. history, a judge said Tuesday in a long-awaited decision that now shifts the case toward how the city will accomplish that task.

Judge Steven Rhodes turned down objections from unions, pension funds and retirees, which, like other creditors, could lose under any plan to solve $18 billion in long-term liabilities.

"This once proud and prosperous city can't pay its debts. It's insolvent. It's eligible for bankruptcy," Rhodes said in announcing his decision. "At the same time, it also has an opportunity for a fresh start."

Rhodes' decision is a critical milestone. He said pensions, like any contract, can be cut, adding that a provision in the Michigan Constitution protecting public pensions isn't a bulletproof shield in a bankruptcy.

The city says pension funds are short by $3.5 billion. Anxious retirees drawing less than $20,000 a year have appeared in court and put an anguished face on the case. Despite his finding, Rhodes cautioned everyone that he won't automatically approve pension cuts that could be part of Detroit's eventual plan to get out of bankruptcy.

Emergency manager Kevyn Orr, who had testified the city's current conditions are "unacceptable," release a statement praising the judge's ruling and pledging to "press ahead with the ongoing revitalization of Detroit."

Behind closed doors, mediators, led by another judge, have been meeting with Orr's team and creditors for weeks to explore possible settlements.

Huge "Fresh Start" Win for Detroit

This was a huge, fresh-start win for the city of Detroit and its residents. The unions disagree.

Minutes after the ruling, a lawyer for the city's largest union, said she would pursue an appeal at the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati. City officials got "absolutely everything" in Rhodes' decision, she told reporters.

"It's a huge loss for the city of Detroit," said Sharon Levine, an attorney for the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, which represents half the city's workers.

Opponents want to go directly to a federal appeals court in Cincinnati, bypassing the usual procedure of having a U.S. District Court judge hear the case.

Definition of "Absolutely Everything"

Levine whines, city officials got "absolutely everything". No, not yet, but taxpayers can hope.

I propose the final settlement should include ...

An agreement to end collective bargaining for all city workers
An end to defined benefit pension plans for new workers and also for workers with less than 10 years of service
A sustainable benefit model for existing workers with over 10 years of service, with pension plan assumptions equal to the long-term treasury rate
Automatic provisions for further pension cuts if plan assumptions were not met
An end to the right to strike for public safety workers
An end to all prevailing wage laws

That would be "nearly everything", and it would provide the fresh start that Detroit desperately needs.

Lesson for Union Dinosaurs

Something along those lines would also send a signal to unions everywhere that they can and should expect the same treatment in bankruptcy court.

Hopefully this would get unions to the bargaining table before bankruptcy, but don't count on dinosaurs to learn much from history.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

What Will Your Bank Look Like 5 Years From Now? How Will Pizzas Be Delivered? Do You Tip a Drone?

Posted: 03 Dec 2013 12:58 AM PST

Every time I walk into my bank, I typically notice several offices in plain view of customers, each with a manager or loan office sitting doing nothing.

On other occasions, there may be a wait to see an officer, perhaps even a long wait.

What if there were queues of bankers at all times, and a no-wait policy? What might that cost?

Actually, it would be far cheaper.

Express Banking

The Telegraph reports computers lined up to replace humans in bank branches.

Several major banks are understood to be in talks to introduce "express" branches, which would be similar to self-service checkouts in supermarkets. These smaller outlets would be almost completely devoid of human interaction.

If trials are successful, the new format is likely to be adopted across Britain, sources said, with larger branches slimmed down and staff numbers reduced in branches.

Martin Shires of banking technology firm NCR said: "As early as next year, you could see one of the major high street banks buying a convenience store location and fitting it out with ATMs that mean you can do 95pc of your transactions through self-service. Within five years this will be a common sight."

The new branches would be smaller and fitted with screens and telephones so that customers could call a specialist department for assistance. This might include a video link similar to the Skype internet telephone service.

Ed Salvesen, a researcher at Brewin Dolphin, the investment manager, said while it is likely that some staff will retained in branches, in-person banking could become a rarity. "Face-to-face communication is slowly being faded out," he said.

Mr Shires said the technology would allow banks to open for longer, as machine-led branches would be significantly cheaper to run. He said a pilot scheme of express branches in the US had reduced operating costs by up to 50pc, with some staff redeployed from branches to video call centres.

Drone for Deliveries

Amazon made a big splash last week with news of using drones for deliveries.

Amazon, the world's largest online retailer, is testing unmanned drones to deliver goods to customers, Chief Executive Jeff Bezos says. The drones, called Octocopters, could deliver packages weighing up to 2.3kg to customers within 30 minutes of them placing the order, he said.

However, he added that it could take up to five years for the service to start. The US Federal Aviation Administration is yet to approve the use of unmanned drones for civilian purposes. "I know this looks like science fiction, but it's not," Mr Bezos told CBS television's 60 Minutes programme.

Amazon Prime Air

On it's website, Amazon is excited about Prime Air.

The goal of this new delivery system is to get packages into customers' hands in 30 minutes or less using unmanned aerial vehicles.

Putting Prime Air into commercial use will take some number of years as we advance the technology and wait for the necessary FAA rules and regulations.

Amazon Test Flight

Do You Tip a Drone?

Dominos does not deliver to my area. Nor Does Pizza hut. Yet, I am less distance away from their stores than many places they will deliver to. I am just in a different town. A drone with a GPS would have no problems whatsoever delivering to my address.

And it would be cheaper and faster, for me, as well as the pizza place to not have to bother with human carriers or tips.

Like Amazon, Domino's Tests Delivery of Pizza by Remote-Controlled Drone.

The company's DomiCopter—a joint effort by U.K. drone specialist AeroSight, Big Communications and creative agency T + Biscuits—is an eco-friendly machine capable of carrying pizzas in heatwave bags for impressive distances without refueling. Sadly, it's also a threat to the labor force of guys who get stoned in their cars and forget where you live.

Jamba Juice Vending Machines

Bloomberg reports As Smoothie Store Sales Slow, Jamba Juice Turns to Machines

McDonald's (MCD) is in the smoothie market, and others like Dairy Queen and Panera (PNRA) spent the summer promoting their rival drinks.

But the smoothie chain is hoping to see improvement from something it calls "JambaGo," a self-serve machine that can be installed in cafeterias, schools, and convenience stores. Jamba Juice makes money by selling the prepackaged, pre-blended smoothie ingredients to JambaGo vendors, like a soda maker selling syrup to the owner of a soda fountain. The advantages: Jamba doesn't need to build a store and the labor costs are much lower compared with hiring staff to concoct made-to-order drinks.

About that $15 an Hour Minimum Wage

I received hundreds of emails and comments to my post Battle for $15 minimum Wage; Should Companies Pay Workers More? Wal-Mart a Savior or a Pariah?

But as I reflect on what is on the horizon at Amazon, at Dominos, at banks, and with Jamba Juice Vending machines, it seems the $7.25 an hour minimum wage is far too high already.

Regardless, every increase in minimum wage will further encourage businesses to seek alternatives to human employment.

Obamacare does the same thing.

More Questions to Consider

Does Jamba Juice even need stores?
Why can't McDonald's drive-up windows have a central dispatch (in India)?
What about touch screen fast-food service robots? Might they not even take on a human form?

I can certainly envision McDonald's paying $15 an hour, but with 75% fewer human employees. The same applies to every fast-food company in the world.

You can force fast food and other places to pay a higher minimum wage, but you cannot force them to hire someone.

And the higher the minimum wage, and the higher the costs of Obamacare, the greater incentive to seek alternatives.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

Damn Cool Pics

Christmas Spending – An Infographic Insight
Zombie Survival Сontest in Spain
North Korean Officials Get Photoshop Totally Wrong
Fun Facts About Man’s Best Friend [Infographic]

Christmas Spending – An Infographic Insight

Posted: 03 Dec 2013 12:55 PM PST

Christmas Spending Infographic – An infographic by the team at Amara

Zombie Survival Сontest in Spain

Posted: 03 Dec 2013 11:37 AM PST

Zombies walk the streets during Zombie Survival contest on December 1, 2013 in Alameda de la Sagra, near Toledo, Spain.

North Korean Officials Get Photoshop Totally Wrong

Posted: 03 Dec 2013 11:21 AM PST

A photo from the Nov. 18 issue of North Korea's labor magazine forgot to give these soldiers shadows. It wasn't the first time Photoshop failed the officials of Pyongyang.

GHOST THIGHS.

Kim Jong-un visits a children's hospital construction site and abides by different light sources.

The terrain changes in two photos taken at the same day, in the same location.

A 2008 photo of Kim Jong-il with the troops.

Clone-stamped sheep from a 2010 article on flourishing North Korean farms.

Either they're very meticulous with stacking bread ziggurats or they're not covering their Photoshop tracks.

Clone-stamped crowds frolicking in the ocean.

Tallest dude on Earth (though our readers point out this could be a legit photo of Ri Myung Hun, a 7'8" basketball player).

In 1995, official press releases memorialized Kim Il-sung's death with this doctored photo of father and son standing on a mountaintop.

Via 163 News

Fun Facts About Man’s Best Friend [Infographic]

Posted: 03 Dec 2013 10:08 AM PST

Are you crazy for canines? Can't get enough cuddles from your pooch? Is "Must Love Dogs" your go-to DVD rentals on Saturday night? You're not alone if you're more than mildly-gaga for your pup. In fact, it appears America is land of the free, home of the brave…and apparent lover of man's best friend!

Click on Image to Enlarge.

Via puppywire

The Vice President's 2013 Asia Trip

Featured

The Vice President's 2013 Asia Trip

The Vice President is on a six-day trip to Japan, China and the Republic of Korea. In each country, the Vice President will meet with key leaders to discuss a full range of bilateral, regional, and global issues. The trip will reaffirm our enduring presence as a Pacific power, promote our economic and trade interests, and underscore our commitment to rebalancing U.S. foreign policy towards the Asia-Pacific.

Click here to follow the Vice President's journey.

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How to Build Your Own Mass Keyword Difficulty Tool

Posted: 02 Dec 2013 03:15 PM PST

Posted by MartinMacDonald

Despite keywords being slightly out of fashion, thanks to the whole (not provided) debacle, it remains the case that a large part of an SEO's work revolves around discovering opportunity and filling that same opportunity with content to rank.

When you are focusing on smaller groups of terms, there are plenty of tools to help; the Moz Keyword Difficulty Tool being a great example.

These tools function by checking the top results for a given keyword, and looking at various strength metrics to give you a snapshot as to how tough they are to rank for.

The problem is, though, that these tools operate on the fly, and generally only allow you to search for a small amount of keywords at any one time. The Moz tool, for instance, limits you to 20 keywords.

But I need to check 100,000 keywords!

By the end of this tutorial you will be able to visualize keyword difficulty data in a couple of ways, either by keyword:

Or by keyword type:

Or by category of keyword, spliced by specific position in the results:

So what do we need to do?

All keyword difficulty tools work in the same way when you break them down.

They look at ranking factors for each result in a keyword set, and sort them. It's that simple.

The only thing we need to do is work out how to perform each step at scale:

Step 1: Get URLs

My preference for scraping Google is using Advanced Web Ranking to get the ranking results for large sets of keywords.

Quite a few companies offer software for this service (including Moz), but the problem with this approach is that costs spiral out of control when you are looking at hundreds of thousands of keywords.

Once you have added your keyword set, run a ranking report of the top 10 results for the search engine of your choice. Once it's complete you should see a screen something like this:

The next step is to get this data out of Advanced Web Ranking and into Excel, using a "Top Sites" report, in CSV format (The format is important! If you choose any other format it makes manipulating the data much tougher):

This presents us with a list of of keywords, positions, and result URLs:

So now we can start harvesting some SEO data on each one of those results!

My preference is to use the fantastic Niels Bosma Excel Plugin and the MajesticSEO API to access their Citation Score metric.

Equally, though, you could use the SEOgadget Excel tool alongside the Moz API. I haven't tested that thoroughly enough, but it should give you pretty similar results if you are more used to using them.

Step 2: Analyze results

Now that we have a nice result set of the top 10 results for your keyword list, its time to start pulling in SEO metrics for each of those to build some actionable data!

My preference is to use the Niels Bosma Excel Plugin, as its super easy and quick to pull the data you need directly into Excel where you can start analyzing the information and building charts.

If you haven't already done so, you should start by downloading and installing the plugin available here (note: It's for Windows only, so if you are a Mac user like me, you'll need to use Parallels or another virtual machine).

In the column adjacent to your list of URLs you simply need to use the formula:

=MajesticSEOIndexItemInfo(C2,"CitationFlow","fresh",TRUE)

This formula gives you the CitationFlow number for the URL in cell C2. Obviously, if your sheet is formatted differently, then you'll need to update the cell reference number.

Once you see the CitationFlow appear in that cell, just copy it down to fill the entire list, and if you have lots of keywords right now would be a great time to go grab a coffee, as it can take some time depending on your connection and the number of results you want.

Now you should be looking at a list something like this:

Which allows us to start doing some pretty incredible keyword research!

Step 3: Find opportunity

The first thing that you probably want to do is look at individual keywords and find the ranking opportunity in those. This is trivially easy to do as long as you are familiar with Excel pivot tables.

For a simple look, just create a pivot of the average citation score of each keyword, the resulting table creator wizard will look something like this:

Of course you can now visualize the data just by creating a simple chart, if we apply the above data to a standard bar chart you will begin to see the kind of actionable data we can build:

This is just the beginning, though! If you create a pivot chart across a large dataset and look at the average citation score for each position, you can see interesting patterns develop.

This example is looking at a dataset of 52,000 keywords, and taking the average score of each site appearing in each position in the top 10 results:

As you can see, across a large dataset there is a really nice degradation of strength in the top 10 results, a real vindication that the data we are looking at is rational and is a good indicator of how strong you need to be to rank a given page (providing the content is sufficient and focused enough).

You really want to splice the data into categories at this stage, to identify the areas of quickest opportunity and focus on building content and links towards the areas where you are likely to earn traffic.

The below chart represents a comparison of three categories of keywords, sorted by the average Citation of the results in each category:

From this we can see that of the three keyword categories, we are likely to rank higher up for keywords in the "brown widgets" category. Having said that, though, we are also able to rank lower down the page in the "blue widgets" category, so if that has significantly more traffic it might prove a better investment of your time and energy.

There you go!

We have created a homebrew keyword difficulty tool, capable of analyzing hundreds of thousands of URLs to mine for opportunity and guide your content and linkbuilding strategies!

There is so much you can do with this data if you put your mind to it.

True, scraping Google's results strictly speaking is against their Terms of Service, but they have a habit of using our data, so lets turn the tables on them for a change!

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

Panic Stations! A Case Study on How to Handle an Important Page Disappearing from Google

Posted: 02 Dec 2013 02:33 AM PST

Posted by steviephil

This post was originally in YouMoz, and was promoted to the main blog because it provides great value and interest to our community. The author's views are entirely his or her own and may not reflect the views of Moz, Inc.

Picture the scene...

You wake up, grab a shower, throw on your Moz t-shirt (and other clothes, presumably...), boil the kettle, pour yourself a cup of coffee, switch on the ol' laptop, let your daily rank checks complete and then slowly run through them one by one...

...Yep...

...Ooo, that's nice...

...Uh-huh...

...Yes! Great jump there!...

...Yep...

...Ye- Wait, hold on... What? Lots of red, all across the board? Rankings have either dropped multiple pages or dropped out of the top 100 results entirely?!

Uh-oh. It's gonna be a looong day....

This happened to me recently with one of my clients. Their homepage - their main page as far as rankings were concerned - had mysteriously vanished from Google's index overnight, taking with it a lot of page one rankings, as you can see from the world's saddest and perhaps most unnecessary GIF image below:

This was also the first time that it'd happened to me. Granted, I've consulted on this type of thing before, but usually when it's happened to someone and they approach me asking what's happened afterwards. However, this was the first instance of it where I was discovering it for myself and it was happening under my watch, affecting one of my clients.

This post runs through the steps that I took to resolve the issue. I acted methodically yet swiftly, and in doing so managed to get the homepage back in Google's index (and - with it - its former rankings) in less than 12 hours.

I accept that this is one of those articles where you probably won't even need it until it happens to you. To be honest, I was in that exact situation - I pretty much knew what to do, but I was still a bit like "OMG OMG OMG, whowhatwherewhenwhy?!" in trying to find an article to just double-check that I was doing everything I could be doing and wasn't overlooking anything obvious.

So... Are you ready? Here we go!

Check if it's just that page or all pages on the site

I primarily use Link Assistant's Rank Tracker (with Trusted Proxies) for my rank checking needs, with Moz PRO's rank checking as a backup and second opinion. Rank Tracker allows a 'URL Found' column, which revealed something to me instantly: other pages were still ranking, just not the homepage. Additionally, where a ranking had seen a drop of a few pages (but was still ranking within the top 10 pages/100 results), a different page was ranking instead - in my client's case, it was things like the Services, Testimonials and Contact pages.

This suggested to me that it was just the homepage that was affected - but there was still a way that I could find out to be sure...

Use the 'site:' operator to check if it's still in Google's index

My next step was to use Google's 'site:' operator (see #1 here) on the domain, to see whether the homepage was still in Google's index. It wasn't - but all of the site's other pages were. Phew... Well at least it wasn't site-wide!

Even though I had a feeling that this would be the case based on what Rank Tracker was saying, it was still important to check, just in case the homepage was still ranking but had been devalued for whatever reason.

Now that I knew for sure that the homepage was gone from Google, it was time to start investigating what the actual cause might be...

Check 1) Accidental noindexing via the meta noindex tag

In my experience, this is usually what's responsible when something like this happens... Given that the option to noindex a page is often a tick-box in most CMS systems these days, it's easy enough to do. In fact, one of the times I looked into the issue for someone, this was what was the cause - I just told them to untick the box in WordPress.

In order to check, bring up the page's source code and look for this line (or something similar):

  <meta name="robots" content="noindex">

(Hit Ctrl + F and search for "noindex" if it's easier/quicker.)

If you find this code in the source, then chances are that this is responsible. If it's not there, onto the next step...

Check 2) Accidental inclusion in the site's robots.txt file

It seems to be a somewhat common myth that robots.txt can noindex a page - it actually tells search engines not to crawl a page, so it'd only be true if the page had never actually appeared in Google's index in the first place (e.g. if it were a brand new site). Here's more info if you're interested.

To be honest though, given what had happened, I didn't want to assume that this wasn't the cause and therefore I thought it would be best just to check anyway.

But alas... The site's robots.txt file hadn't changed one iota. Onto step 3...

Check 3) Penalty checks

Given that this was my client, I was already familiar with its history, and I was already adamant that a penalty wasn't behind it. But again, I wanted to do my due diligence - and you know what they say when you assume...!

I jumped into Google Webmaster Tools and looked at the recently added Manual Actions tab. Unsurprisingly: "No manual webspam actions found." Good good.

However, let's not rule out algorithmic penalties, which Google doesn't tell you about (and oh lordy, that's caused some confusion). As far as Pandas were concerned, there was no evidence of accidental or deliberate duplicate content either on the site or elsewhere on the Web. As for those dastardly Penguins, given that I'm the first SEO ever to work on the site and I don't build keyword anchor text links for my clients, the site has never seen any keyword anchor text, let alone enough to set off alarm bells.

Following these checks, I was confident that a penalty wasn't responsible.

Check 4) Remove URLs feature in Google Webmaster Tools

Another check while you're in your Webmaster Tools account: go to Google Index > Remove URLs and check that the page hasn't been added as a removal request (whether by accident or on purpose). You never know... It's always best to check.

Nope... "No URL removal requests" in this case.

It was at this point, that I was starting to think: "what the hell else could it be?!"

Check 5) Accidental 404 code

On the day that this happened, I met up with my good friends and fellow SEOs Andrew Isidoro (@Andrew_Isidoro) and Ceri Harris of Willows Finance for a drink and a bite to eat down the pub. I ran this whole story by them along with what I'd done so far, and Andrew suggested something that I hadn't considered: although extremely unlikely, what if the homepage was now showing up as a 404 (Not Found) code instead of a 200 (OK) code? Even if the page is live and performing normally (to the visitor), a 404 code would tell Google that that page "don't live here no more" (to quote the mighty Hendrix) and Google would remove it accordingly.

Again, it was worth checking, so I ran it past SEO Book's HTTP header checker tool. The verdict: 200 code. It was a-OK (pun fully intended - it's a good thing that I'm an SEO and not a comedian...)

Ok, so now what?

Testing the page in Google Webmaster Tools

Now it was time to ask the big boss Googly McSearchengineface directly: what do you make of the page, oh mighty one?

In order to do this, go to Google Webmaster Tools, click on the site in question and select Crawl > Fetch as Google from the side-menu. You should see a screen like this:

Fetch as Google screenshot 1

Simply put the affected page(s) into it (or leave it blank if it's the homepage) and see what Google makes of them. Of course, if it's "Failed," is there a reason why it's failed? It might also help to give you an idea about what could be wrong...

Asking Google to (re)index the page

Once you have done the above in GWT, you're given this option if Google can successfully fetch the page:

Fetch as Google screenshot 2

I decided to do just that: ask Google to (re)submit the page to its index.

At this point I was confident that I had done pretty much everything in my power to investigate and subsequently rectify the situation. It was now time to break the news, by which I mean: tell the client...

Inform the client

I thought it best to tell the client after doing all of the above (except for the 404 check, which I actually did later on), even if it was possible that the page might recover almost immediately (which it did in the end, pretty much). Plus I wanted to be seen as proactive, not reactive - I wanted to be the one to tell him, not for him to be the one finding out for himself and asking me about it...

Here's the email that I sent:

Hi [name removed],

I just wanted to bring your attention to something.

I conduct daily ranks checks just to see how your site is performing on Google on a day-to-day basis, and I've noticed that your homepage has disappeared from Google.

Usually this is the result of a) accidental de-indexation or b) a penalty, but I have checked the usual suspects/causes and I see no sign of either of those occurring.

I have checked in your Webmaster Tools account and Google can successfully read/crawl the page, so no problems there. I have taken appropriate steps to ask Google to re-index the page.

I've done all that I can for now, but if we do not see everything back to normal in the next couple of days, I will continue to research the issue further. It's likely the case that it will recover of its own accord very soon. Like I say, I've checked the usual signs/causes of such an issue and it doesn't appear to be the result of any of those.

Just to check, have you or your web designer made any changes to the website in the last couple of days/weeks? If so, could you please let me know what you have done?

I know it's not an ideal situation, but I hope you can appreciate that I've spotted the issue almost immediately and have taken steps to sort out the issue.

If you have any questions about it then please do let me know. In the meantime I will keep a close eye on it and keep you posted with any developments.

(Note: In this instance, my client prefers email contact. You may find that a phone call may be better suited, especially given the severity of the situation - I guess it will be a judgement call depending on the relationship that you have with your client and what they'd prefer, etc.)

He took it well. He hadn't noticed the drop himself, but he appreciated me notifying him, filling him in on the situation and explaining what action I had taken to resolve the issue.

* Recovery! *

Later on the same day in the evening, I did another quick check. To my surprise, the homepage was not only back in Google, but the rankings were pretty much back to where they once were. PHEW!

I say "surprised" not because of my ability to pull it off, but with how quickly it'd happened - I expected that it might've taken a few days maybe, but not a mere few hours. Oh well, mustn't complain...!

The real (possible) cause...

So what did cause the deindexation? Well, another suggestion that came from Andrew while we were down the pub that I'd stupidly overlooked: downtime!

It could've been an unfortunate and unlucky coincidence that Google happened to re-crawl the page exactly when the site had gone down.

I hadn't added the site to my Pingdom account before all of this had happened (something that I have since rectified), so I couldn't know for sure. However, the site went down again a day or so later, which made me wonder if downtime was responsible after all... Even so, I advised the client that if this was a common occurrence that he should maybe consider switching hosting providers to someone more reliable, in order to reduce the chance of this happening all over again...

Preparing yourself for when it happens to you or your clients

In order to make sure that you're fully on top of a situation like this, make sure that you're carrying out daily rank checks and that you're quickly checking those rank checks, even if it's a quick once-over just to make sure that nothing drastic has happened in the last 24 hours. It's clear to say that if I hadn't have done so, I might not have realised what had happened for days and therefore might not have rectified the situation for days, either.

Also, having a 'URL Found' column in addition to 'Ranking Position' in your rank checking tool of choice is an absolute must - that way you can see if it's a particular page that's affected if different pages are now the highest-ranking pages instead.

Anyway, I hope that this case study/guide has been useful, whether you're reading it to brush up ready for when the worst happens, or whether the worst is happening to you right now (in which case I feel for you, my friend - be strong)...!

Also, if you'd do anything differently to what I did or you think that I've missed a pivotal step or check, please let me know in the comments below!

Did you like the comic drawings? If so, check out Age of Revolution, a new comic launched by Huw (@big_huw) & Hannah (@SpannerX23). Check them out on Facebook, Twitter and Ukondisplay.com (where you can pick up a copy of their first issue). Their main site - Cosmic Anvil - is coming soon... I'd like to say a massive thanks to them for providing the drawings for this post, which are simply and absolutely awesome, I'm sure you'll agree!

marți, 3 decembrie 2013

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