Location-Aware Browsing issue. Could it cause a drop in rankings

[highwayfive]

Hello Mozzers.

A client has seen big drop in their organic rankings in google.co.uk. Desktop results have dropped from page one to page three and mobile results have completely gone. They have recently added Location-Aware Browsing to the site so that it attempts to find you location and add this to the search box. However this appears to be in a loop and doesn't then turn off once you have allowed it. It keeps appearing in both Firefox and Chrome and asking for permission to use you location. Could this have resulted in the ranking drop?

There have also rolled out a new mobile version and this has the same issue. Any ideas?

Thanks in advance

TH

[seoman10]

A short answer is probably yes.

In a bit more detail...

Google hates you requesting/collecting data yourself, especially if you're webpages not secure.

Secondly, the script may be treated as dodgy by some of the big search engines.  I.e. potentially obtaining sensitive information.

Thirdly, check there isn't some other form of penalty.

[highwayfive]

Thanks seoman. Have spoken to the client and they also had some hosting and DNS issues at the start of the week that I think helped to kill the rankings. When you look at the cached pages in Google they are all 404s so nothing was cached. Fingers crossed its all now sorted and once re- indexed the rankings will recover.

[gfiorelli1]

Hi!

Do you have any news about this issue?