How to detect if the site is in sandbox filter?

There are various ways to know if your site is in sandbox.

a. One very good method which has long been in existence is the allinanchor: keyword1 keyword2 search. If your site ranks for the allinanchor: search but not for the normal keyword search, then most probably your site is in the sandbox filter.

b. Next method is to check your ranking in other major search engines. If your site is ranking exceptionally well in Yahoo and MSN but not in Google then it could be another possible reason for the site to be in sandbox filter. But remember, Google's algorithm is more sophisticated than yahoo or MSN and judging that your site is in sandbox only by this reason is absolutely wrong.

c. Check the quality of your backlinks and compare it with your competitors. There are numerous tools which show link comparison. Compare them and see what your competitor has, see the location where the link is placed to your competitor sites.

d. Check for both competitive and non-competitive terms. If your site doesn't rank for both then most probably your site is sandboxed.

e. Check for duplicate content on your site. If your site has duplicate contents better fix them first before checking for sandbox problems. As I said before sandbox filter is caused purely based on links. You should go to check your link problems only if your on-page factors are fine and are of Google quality. Remember, all these information discussed are for sites which have quality content, unique business etc. These instructions are not for sites which use scrapped contents, made for AdSense sites, aggressive affiliate sites and sites that use other type of spam tactics. This is purely for sites which are having good quality domains and are still having problem ranking in search engines.