Google Barely Indexes the Slog

I recently did a bunch of maintenance on the Slog's back end, but there are still many unindexed postings. They don't appear in Google searches, even if you search from the search field at upper left of the page. These postings remain invisible to the Internet, as well as to you and me internally searching right here.

The reason? An almost complete absence of incoming links. People need to publicly register value from a site (by linking, sharing, etc, anything but stupid Facebook “liking”) for Google to ascribe value to that site. 

With Chowhound, I implemented a fiendishly clever search engine optimization scheme: I created a useful site, worked ceaselessly to stock it with indispensable information, and figured crowds would notice and link to it and that Google, tracking this, would elevate our ranking. It worked, and for many years a search for, say, "scrambled eggs los angeles" would inevitably include Chowhound results on the first page.

My groundbreaking approach is now fatally old-school, yet I can't shake my cheerfully fatalistic perspective. I agree with Google. If the Slog were any good, people would enthusiastically spread the word, links would arise, and Google would deem it worth indexing. If not, well, the market has spoken.

After a lifetime convincing people to evangelize things they value, I can only giggle at the irony that folks avidly reading here year after year don’t share or link. It’s a favorite restaurant they keep under their hat, 1996-style. But, again, I'm cheerfully fatalistic. If this effort is to fade into utter obscurity, that's not on me. The crowd's voted, and Google's registered the vote!