How on earth is a site with ONE LINK ranking so well for a competitive keyword?
-
Ok, so I'm sure you get the gist of what I'm asking about in my question.
The query is 'diy kitchens' in Google UK and the website is kitchens4diy[dot]com - which is ranking in third from my viewing.
The thing is, the site has just ONE BACKLINK and has done for a good while. Yet, it's ranking really well.
What gives?
-
Hey Matthew
We have some sites in similar fields ranking highly in local and organic and have done no link building at all. New players, outperforming established players, in organic and local and no links have been built. Times are changing and whilst links (the right kind) are still powerful, there is a multifactorial way of doing things that in many cases is more powerful when going up against folks who have just tried to heavily go after one aspect.
I tend to think and our recent experience shows this that search has several factors and the effectiveness of each factor is amplified to some extent when they all work together. Brand, URL, Local, Citations, Links, Content, On Page etc.
The keyword in the brand / URL is a great example of this where it can still seemingly help as long as it is not abused and forms part of a larger cohesive strategy. A recent client starting out was advised by us to add the location they serve to the company name and it has worked out fabulously for them. This is a local client ranking in organic and local well above the competition with only 8 weeks or so of very light local SEO (and again, whilst it was one of my guys that did the work, I am sure there was no links built as it was just a whole lot easier than that).
Still, there is no better tool than an experiment so try adding some citations and see if you can influence your clients listing as performance for every keyword in every market is different so only through close analysis and tinkering will you know exactly what will move the dial for your client.
Marcus
-
With regards to the co-occurrence of the keyword and brand comment, I'd just like to point out that in this case they are effectively the same thing. From a branding perspective, if you are choosing a name for your business you could not do better than incorporating a relevant keyword you're trying to rank for.
-
I suspect this is the biggest factor in its ranking, you're right. Which shouldn't be the case, of course.
-
Hey Marcus,
First off, great response. I appreciate the time you've taken out to reply with such detail.
Now, to address the points you've raised;
-
I think we can both agree on that.
-
The keyword is probably more competitive than you think. Like I've just mentioned above, there was a great deal of spam EMD sites infiltrating the search over the past few months and they've only just been removed.
-
It's been there for at least two or three months by my reckoning. The competition was spammy. Now, less so.
4, 5) Interesting. Although, I doubt it's intentional. I know people say the future is "linkless" but this is taking it to the extreme.
-
-
Well I would say that their domain name is definitely having something to do with them ranking well
I know EMD (Exact Match Domain) have taken hits from google, but this is not an EMD, but very close.
-
Hey Rikki,
The one link they have comes from here;
http://www.globalknives.org.uk/best-quality-kitchen/
Although, I can't see whereabouts it is on the page.
Our client's site is one of those on the second page with decent DA/PA. Only today have I actually noticed the removal of some spam EMD sites from the search that were infiltrating the results. The keyword is probably a lot more competitive than you may think.
-
I will like to ask
- Has the keyword recently been searched or came into search
We can give you an example of one of the blogs which is :- http://www.highsecurityplates.com
The keywords - high security number plates, high security plates are recently been on search in google.co.in for last 1 yr.. Hardly any link building has been done.. Still we recvd a traffic of over 1000 visitors every day 2 months back which though fallen to 150 visitors - though ranking remains intact. when ever there is a news in media the traffic increases
However, the site is ranking number 1 from the very first month till now despite of many high competition sites
So, this could apply to the site given, if the keyword competition is not much...
-
Hey Matthew
There is really no substitute for tinkering and running some experiments of your own but we can do a bit of digging and see what we can turn up here.
1. The site is weak from a link perspective, no doubt about it
2. The keyword is only returned as moderately competitive (34%) in the Moz keyword tool and there are other sites in the top 10 with only one link.
3. How long as the page been there? How spammy is the competition?
4. They do have some decent UK citations which you can dig into like this:
"Kitchens4DIY" "DY5 1TX" -site:kitchens4diy.com
You can even expand that to look for the keyword in those citations to see if we are seeing more of this co-occurance that is such a hot topic at the moment:
"Kitchens4DIY" "DY5 1TX" -site:kitchens4diy.com "diy kitchens"
5. They also have tons more unstructured citations with the brand + keyword combination.
"Kitchens4DIY" -site:kitchens4diy.com "diy kitchens"
Summary
- The keyword is not terribly competitive in link power terms
- There does not appear to be tons of competing sites for the term
- This is a new site with no negative equity
- Possible spam signals amongst the competition
- Lots of unstructured and a reasonable amount of structured citations
- Frequent co-occurrence of the keyword and brand
- Homepage title is well optimised for this term
Obviously, this is a five minute analysis but really, I see no mystery here. The keyword is not competitive, the site is new, has a clean profile, plenty of citations and good co occurrence of the keyword.
Would be interesting to see your clients site to do a side by side comparison though as that would likely reveal more insights than this general overview.
I wrote about this a little here if it helps:
http://www.bowlerhat.co.uk/blog/types-of-citations-for-seo/
Hope that helps you dig in and build your plan of attack!
Marcus
-
I was expecting to see a page which is very well optimised and with lots of content but it only seems to use that phrase once on the page and doesn't have it in either the H1, Bold tag or an image alt. The page content seems very average too.
I guess its not a massively competitive phrase but the other sites on that page (and a few on the pages below) do have decent DA and PA. What is the one link they have? Is it a strong one with exact anchor text for that phrase?
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Loss of 1,000 links has negatively affecting rankings
Hey there, One of the clients we're working with has lost about 1,000 or so backlinks over the last two or three months - mainly old article and directory links - and it has massively affected the site's search rankings. The site was ranking for pretty much all of its keywords in prominent positions on Google (mostly first page) but has now seen positions dive to 50, 90 and even outside of the top 100. Is there any immediate action we can put into place to help restore our rankings?
Algorithm Updates | | Webrevolve0 -
Does the page title keyword count in anchor text when link is web address?
If someone links to my plumbing site with this link as the anchor text: http://www.plumbers.com/austin-plumbers.html does the key phrase "austin plumbers" get counted in the anchor text by google or is this a sample of anchor text that google ignores? Thanks mozzers! Ron
Algorithm Updates | | Ron100 -
Are links irrelevant now?
After having one of my sites trashed by penguin, I rebuilt it on a new domain. Pretty much everything was the same except for the look of the site plus I decreased the keyword density and did a few other things to avoid future Penguin penalties. I created a small number of directory links. My site is now maybe 6 months old, doesn't get much traffic, however I wa suprised to see that my main keyword " uncontested divorce lawyer" is now ranking number 1 in google in US ! This despite the EMD update. The domain name is www.uncontesteddivorce-lawyer.com . Like I said I still don't get a lot of traffic on this site. I have another site which until recently was driving over 500 visitors a month, since November it has declined to 350 a month. This site is over 4 years old and was unaffected by all the updates, until recently. It too is an EMD but has more links. Not co complain but can anyone explain the #1 rating? Also it would appear that links are practically irrelevant. I have read and heard that practically no one is linking to content, instead they are sharing, liking, etc. Any comments
Algorithm Updates | | diogenes0 -
When to remove bad links.
Hi everyone. We were hit on the 5th Oct with manual penalties - after building some good links and building good content we saw some gains in our SERPS, not to where they were, but they are definately improving for some low competition keywords. In this case would people recommend still trying to remove bad links? We have audited our links and identified ones which seem spammy. We were going to go through a step by step process, emailing bad link providers where possible, and then sending a disavow for any links we were not able to remove. If we have started to see gains through other means is it wise in people's opinion to start contacting google? We watched Matt Cutts video on disavow usage and he states not to use it unless in extreme situations, so we don't want to 'wake the beast'. Many thanks. James.
Algorithm Updates | | Quime0 -
Penguin Update and Long Tail Keywords
Since the Penguin update, organic traffic for our site; oxygenconcentratorstore.com
Algorithm Updates | | chuck-layton
has dropped almost 25%. The thing I cannot figure out is that when I compare April 1<sup>st</sup> to May 15<sup>th</sup> (before the update) and June 1<sup>st</sup> to July 15<sup>th</sup> (after); 8 of our top keywords are up. Our 2 main keywords are up 15% and 11%. Where we lost most of our traffic is from our longtail keywords. We have almost 1000 longtail keyword phrases that we got visits from in the April/May period that we did not get in the June/July period. Is there a reason why our top keywords would continue to improve while we most of the longtail keywords?? If Google penalized us, won’t all of our keywords be dropping and just not the longtail. Any help/info would be awesome. Thanks.0 -
Selection of the Right Keywords - Some insights needed!
I have recently begun with my content and keyword selections. I used the Adword's keyword tool and for eg: got a few keywords like laser skin treatment dermatology dermatologists cosmetic laser surgery The competition for these are low and medium. Now what I understand is. If I wish to use them in my articles on content generation I can have them as medium and long tail keywords to write around. So for eg: laser skin treatment = " Benefits of a laser skin treatment in India" and the url for this article could be /laser-skin-treatment For dermatology = "best dermatology practices" url could be /dermatology-practices Do the above happen to be the medium and long tail keywords? Am I going in the correct direction. How do I judge and come out with medium and long tail keywords. Please suggest Thanks
Algorithm Updates | | shanky10 -
Why is my client's website, ranking higher for serps on bing and yahoo for competitive keywords
My client is in the competitive Private jet charter space. Why is my client's website, ranking higher for serps on bing and yahoo for competitive keywords phrases? like Private jet charter as an example. http://www.jetcharter.com/
Algorithm Updates | | AndrewSEO0 -
SEO Ranking & Brand Names
I have several situations where one of my sites rank organically in 4th or 5th place for a specific search term relating to a 'big brand' .. I usually fall in behind the brands main website .. commercially this is very good for me. Let me give you an example .. in google.co.uk type in 'thomas cook exchange rates'. I rank position 4 (comparecurrency.co.uk). Position 1-3 are thomas cook's own pages. Naturally. However, my question is .. could I outrank them and how could I initially measure the effort involved in getting to position 1? I noticed Google recently put me into position 1 for this term and then quickly (within a few days) pulled me back down to position 4. Does anyone have any experience of this type of search positioning and have any information that may help me? My gut feel is that I have maybe maxed out the economically viable potential of these keywords and that I should invest my SEO $s into other phrases? Thanks in advance Olly
Algorithm Updates | | ojkingston0