Is there or isn't there a Sandbox ?

The first point to note here is that there is no evidence to suggest that a Sandbox exists. So what is the Sandbox; or at least what do people think it is?

Google's sandbox appears to be filter that appeared to be put in place back in March 2004. The sandbox filter seems to affect nearly all new websites placing them in an area aside from the main search index until such time as the site has met certain criteria and proved its worthiness.

When a new site appears, and it recognised by Google's Robots, a filter is applied to the new website such that people refer to it as being put in the "sandbox". The new website will in all likelihood show in the result pages but it will not rank well. This is despite the fact that the site may contain original content, be well optimised content and have many quality inbound links.

The filter appears to restrict new websites from having immediate success in the search engine result pages of the Google index however the pages may still rank well in other search engine's results. It is believed Google first developed the sandbox as an area where relatively new sites, that appeared questionable, were placed until such time as they were reviewed several times. The sandbox strategy is believed to help ensure that Google users get high-quality results.

But does it really exist ? I believe Google does have a way of holding sites from fully appearing in their indexes as a way of assessing content. Exactly how they do it, if in fact they do, is a mystery. So if you have a new site, fully optimised and with good links, don't be concerned if it isn't #1 in Google within the first week - stick to the basic rules of optimisation and the results will come over time.