Websites Created with Wix get the Google Ban Hammer

Let’s face it. Everyone needs a website in 2015. Gone are the days when you can live in blissful ignorance of the Internet and its impact on the world. Especially if you’re a business owner. And while web technology has improved dramatically over the years, the tools to build websites haven’t really kept up. That’s where services like Wix, a free website builder, come in. Wix promises a simple interface for building custom websites and many people have used it for just that reason.

But whenever something’s free, there’s always a catch. And it looks like erstwhile web designers who are relying on Wix to power their websites might be in for a surprise. It was recently discovered that Google has removed many Wix sites from its search engine results. This has caused a massive drop off in traffic that was previously going to those Wix-hosted pages. While no one knows for sure why this may have happened, speculation is focused on the nature of the Wix system’s “websites-for-all” approach, which could allow for a proliferation of spam sites, SEO hacks, and other black-hat activity to occur virtually unchecked.

Google’s search engine is its most prized asset. The company has spent years refining its search results to ensure they remain useful, in spite of the Internet’s continued attempts at gaming that system. It’s unclear if Wix-hosted sites with mapped top-level domains have been affected by this change. But, if you’re relying on an example.wix.com URL to power your website, you may want to start looking for other solutions.