The Lament of Icarus
My hope is that this post serves as a review plus helpful reminder to all who use this service.
My story could be called 'The Lament of Icarus'. If you are not familiar, he was a character from Greek mythology - see quote from
Wikipedia.
The main story told about Icarus is his attempt to escape from Crete by means of wings that his father constructed from feathers and wax. He ignored instructions not to fly too close to the sun, and the melting wax caused him to fall to his death.
Ok, I used this service on an EMD for a seasonal shopping keyword with high commercial intent (one of those snow sports). Anyhoo, I jumped to #1, then bounced down to 5 or 6, then just as 'Turkey Day' hit in the US, I popped back to #1 and was lovin every minute of it.
The problem was that I did not take the time to better my site. It was a crappy MFA site using a very well known template and hence just yesterday I got what I think was a manual review and plus +1 million penalty. The site is still indexed but not in top 1000 for any previously ranking keywords (top domain and sub pages).
So, like Icarus, I ignored the sage advice and flew too close to the sun. I allowed myself one day to mourn the loss of this site and the potentially crazy Xmas income. That day is over so I am here to post my story so that you too can take heed.
Make sure you use this service on a site that you would be prepared to pass a manual review or else, like me, you could crash and burn.
JC.
p.s. anyone know what to do with a burnt MFA site?