Eligible To Rank For Few Queries
-
I can't figure out why this site (www.liveathomeseniors.com) is eligible for so few search queries on Google Webmaster Tools. I know there is a lot of work to be done, but this is my biggest puzzle right now. What am I not seeing? 379 pages are indexed and yet the site is has only been deemed eligible to rank for 3 queries over the past 3 months. Is it all the repetition in the way the content has been structured?
I'd appreciate people's thoughts on this. I can't see the forest for the trees.
Donna
-
Thank you EGOL and Chris Menke. Very helpful. Much appreciated.
-
Yes, "eligible to rank" and "competitive enough to rank" are the key differences.
This site is not competitive enough to rank for the very very general terms that are in the title tags of the posts.
Plus, as I pointed out above this site has a lot of very very thin content and that could have its rankings reduced because of a panda problem.
Getting to actionable items... If this was my site I would....
-
delete all of the pages that have just a few sentences and a link to another website... and stop creating them
-
start writing posts that focus on very specific topics that will not face enormous competition and have title tags that consist of a few very common words
-
any post that I did write would be deep, substantive, beefy content
And, I would evaluate if search is the best place to get traffic for this type of website. Commiserative topics can pull traffic much more effectively from social media rather than search.... but then you have a community that might be viewed as an alternative to the service that this site seems to be selling.
I don't offer SEO services to others because I am fully committed to my own sites. But if I did offer SEO services and the owner of this site asked me to help, I would decline because I don't see an easy way to bring her ROI.
-
-
This may be just a matter of semantics but when you say "eligible to rank", it sounds a bit odd. GWT shows you the terms for which your site has been present on a search result page that the searcher has viewed. GWT does not determine eligibility--it reflects results determined by the algorithm. If GWT shows that your site is being seen by searchers for only 3 terms, it means that for only three different terms has someone searched and your site was on a result page that they viewed.
GWT would probably show that your site showed up for more search terms if visitors searching for terms relevant to your pages/posts clicked through 20 or 50 or 100 pages of search results--but of course they don't do that, they only click through to page 1 or 2 or 3. The issue we were trying to help you recognize above is that by organizing and choosing your concepts and your keywords better (better optimizing) your other pages will rise from page 20 or 50 or 100 to page 1 or 2 or 3 and thus be seen by more people. When that becomes the case, your GWT will reflect that by showing the additional search terms that the algorithm deemed your pages were worth pushing to the top of the results.
-
"You are in a forest of trees that are really hard to tell apart or in a haystack with so many pieces of hay that getting yours showing up at the top of the search engines is going to be improbable."
-
Moz just prompted me to decide whether my question has been answered or not. I don't think I've been clear in my question.
My question is about Google Webmaster Tools. Why is www.liveathomeseniors.com not eligible to rank for more than just 3 queries? I realize there is much that can be done to improve the site from a SEO perspective, and I can see that the site has been indexed - including a lot of duplicate pages. Yet it only shows up as being eligible to rank for three queries:
- "live at home seniors" with an average ranking of 1
- "seniors living at home" with an average ranking of 40; and
- "indemnity plans" with an average ranking of 450.
I also realize GWT only shows us a sampling of queries, but feel I should be seeing more queries showing up after the site has been in existence for more than year. Any ideas or suggestions as to why this might be happening?
-
In a very simplistic way, Google sees your page something vaguely like the following list. This list indicates the words used on http://www.liveathomeseniors.com/can-family-caregivers-deal-feeling-overwhelmed/ and the number of times they're used. As is normal with most pages, at the top of the list are all the articles and conjunctions, etc. After that, there's usually a grouping of vocabulary that directly relevant to your topic. In this case, I see "family", "overwhelmed", "overwhelm" and "caregiver". With that info, I'll do a couple of other things: 1. look to see how much of the rest of the vocabulary relates directly to any or all of those terms (the more there is, higher the content quality and in this case there is almost none). 2. Look to see how well crafted the page's title tag is 3. Do a search for those terms and see who's competing at the top of the search results for those terms. If you do that search, you'll see the caliber of the pages you're competing against. Overall, pages on the site are only vaguely optimized for search.
With all of that said, the words are still only part of the battle for search visibility. Google also wants to see that people find a site relevant and important for the topics around which it is optimized. Back links and social activity are what you need to make the site strong enough to rise above competitors who are already ranking for your primary terms.
18 i
13 the
12 to
9 you
9 and
8 that
8 of
8 a
7 t
6 was
6 take
6 do
5 time
5 family
4 overwhelmed
4 overwhelm
4 on
4 make
4 feeling
4 didn
4 caregiver
4 care
3 yourself
3 when
3 what
3 self
3 overcome
3 my
3 like
3 jane
3 it
3 in
3 have
3 choices
3 can
3 by
3 buried
2 your
2 winter
2 video
2 something
2 snow
2 see
2 permission
2 out
2 minutes
2 meier
2 me
2 learned
2 if
2 heavy
2 hamilton
2 give
2 for
2 bush
2 be
2 at
2 as
2 action
2 about
1 would
1 with
1 wiser
1 will
1 while
1 we
1 way
1 visiting
1 understand
1 under
1 too
1 times
1 thought
1 this
1 think
1 things
1 there
1 than
1 talk
1 social
1 so
1 since
1 share
1 s
1 remember
1 recognize
1 realize
1 please
1 perhaps
1 path
1 partners
1 own
1 never
1 needed
1 myself
1 more
1 missed
1 maybe
1 many
1 making
1 made
1 lot
1 little
1 link
1 layers
1 laughter
1 joy
1 join
1 irritable
1 importance
1 hope
1 here
1 helpful
1 hadn
1 had
1 given
1 get
1 frustration
1 frantic
1 founder
1 focus
1 find
1 felt
1 feel
1 favorite
1 everything
1 even
1 enjoyment
1 end
1 done
1 don
1 doesn
1 difference
1 deal
1 days
1 day
1 d
1 could
1 control
1 completed
1 click
1 channel
1 caregivers
1 burdened
1 brings
1 blog
1 being
1 before
1 are
1 any
1 an
1 among
1 all
1 agree
1 absolutely -
The highest numbers that I see for my sites in that column is 10. Nice to know that higher numbers are possible.
-
Thanks for sticking with this EGOL.
"A query will be listed in Google Webmaster Tools when you have a page that competes in the top ten on the web for that query."
Then I'm not understanding what "average position" means because on other sites, I'm seeing numbers in that column that range from 1 to 750. Is it the average placement for:
- every page on your your site that's eligible to rank for that term, considering of course, personalization and location;
- every page on any site that's eligible to rank for that term; or
- something else altogether?
I searched GWMT looking for an answer and it's not clear (to me anyway) there either.
-
A query will be listed in Google Webmaster Tools when you have a page that competes in the top ten on the web for that query. Considering two things: 1) the enormous number of websites that compete for the words in the queries that I listed above; and, 2) the small amount of authority possessed by the site that we are discussing, I don't find it surprising that it is only in the top ten for a very small number of queries.
I agree that three is pretty small, but most of the title tags have nothing but extremely common words and that puts them in competition with milllions of other sites. They will not be in the Google Top Ten.
The other possibilities are:
-
the site is extremely weak (this is true in my opinion and it compounds the common keyword problem)
-
the site has a panda problem because of thin content. I found a lot of pages on the site that were really thin content. Here are a few. I could find a lot more.
http://www.liveathomeseniors.com/learn-about-home-health-care/
http://www.liveathomeseniors.com/keep-your-aging-parents-safe-at-home/
http://www.liveathomeseniors.com/managed-care-at-home/
http://www.liveathomeseniors.com/why-hire-a-geriatric-care-manager/
http://www.liveathomeseniors.com/optimal-aging/
http://www.liveathomeseniors.com/exercise-keeps-aging-brains-healthy-see-more-evidence/
A lot of these types of pages will tank a site. I would stop making them and get rid of the ones that exist.
-
-
Thank you EGOL and Chris Menke for taking the time to look at the site and giving me your thoughtful responses. It's much appreciated.
I realize it's an uphill battle with this site and that the site author is competing with herself in many instances, but I'm wondering why when I look at Google Webmaster Tools (GWMT), she's not even showing up for many search queries. I know GWMT only shows us a sampling, but surely she's eligible to rank for more than just the 3 queries it's showing me now after more than a year in operation. That's why I think I'm missing something.
-
It may seem counter intuitive, but often, the way to get more traffic to a site is to narrow down the topics that you focus on. The broader your topics, the harder it becomes to come across as an authority--and it's all about authority--to your audience and to Google. The topics you cover on your site are broad, diverse and competitive, making the job of being visible for any of them triple tough.
Its nice to be able to write about your passion but when it comes to creating something that you want other people to find in search engines, there's a lot to keep in mind as you're writing. In addition to everything else, you have to think about your competition. With each page you create, you have to carefully consider the key concept you are writing about, what words you are using as your key concept, how reflective of the key concept is the vocabulary used in the body of the copy, how many other authors have also written about such a key concept, and how people actually search for such a key concept. All those things help with your visibility. If you haven't read it yet, this is a good guide on how to do keyword research.
-
I can't see the forest for the trees.
I looked at the title tags of the content and I think that they are in that forest of trees.
For example..... these titles....
What could you do to bring joy to your heart?
Gifts of Family Memories
Medicare Open Enrollment 2013: Part D Prescription Drug
Keeping Your Aging Parents Safe at Home
Learn About Home Health Care
The topics of these blog posts are either: A) composed of very common words that do not distinguish them in search; or, B) go up against an enormous enormous number of other pages on extremely powerful sites with the same words.
You are in a forest of trees that are really hard to tell apart or in a haystack with so many pieces of hay that getting yours showing up at the top of the search engines is going to be improbable.
Pulling in traffic from search with the types of titles that you currently have is going to be very difficult for a small site without a lot of power. To generate traffic from search, in my opinion, will require writing about topics and titles that have some more unique words that still have search volume.
I used to live in a tiny tiny town and someone asked me about getting a brand new site ranked for "gift baskets". There were almost zero customers who would drive to the town to purchase one. That left national search competition to obtain traffic. There are so so so many sites selling gift baskets that the resources required to become competitive would be enormous. Even going after long tail queries would be extremely hard because the web is so flooded with competitors. That, in my opinion, is what you are facing for these "common word" and "massive competition" queries.
Figure out a way to find topics that are not so crowded and competitive. Some of the current blog posts might be able to be retitled or refocused but it is probably better to build from scratch than recreate.
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
-
Finding the reason behind not Ranking-UP
Hello, I hope you guys are doing well. I published an article about 2 months ago and I tried to write a rich article in regards to SEO. Also, did a keywords research and found my competitors. I created a lengthy but meaningful article from all the competitors. Here is the link to my Article and my targeted keyword is "CSC Scholarship 2020". You can check my domain DA & PA also. It is higher than the websites' DA, PA who are ranked on the top of the page. My content is also Lengthy and Meaningful and to-the-point but still, my Article is not generating any result for me. I want that, please investigate the main issue that is causing this problem.
Technical SEO | | HansiAliya1 -
What is the risk of changing underscores to hyphens in URLs that are ranking
Client wants to change URL structure from underscores to hyphens - reason for doing this is a cosmetic move. What is the risk of changing underscores to hyphens for URLs that that have been around since 2012 and have a lot of keywords ranking in the top 5 in the SERPS? When the created the site - they structured the URL using dashes and underscores. Here is an example of what an URL looks like: /programs-degrees**/clinical-psychology/clinical_phd_kansas****-city****/** *This page ranks for many high volume keywords in the top 5 of the SERPS. I have started to compile a list on why the URL should not be changed... Building trust and authority from scratch 301 redirects do not pass 100% of the link juice 301 redirecting from underscored to hyphenated versions of the same content is an unnecessary risk to some of that link equity. Good chance rankings/traffic will drop because of the URL change
Technical SEO | | The-frank-Agency0 -
Domain not ranking in Google
https://www.buitenspeelgoed.nl/ is a domain acquired by our client. Previously this website was on http://www.buitenspeelgoed-keupink.nl. With the old domain they were ranking top 30 on 'buitenspeelgoed' in google.nl. Now with the new exact match domain they aren't ranking any more (for months). However, the website is indexed, as you can see on http://1l1.be/nz I don't know what to do anymore. Need some advise. What we allready have done the last months: made adjustments to the 301-redirects (this was originaly setup wrong by the webdesigner (de) optimized the homepage on 'buitenspeelgoed' (strange is the fact that the Moz robot can't access the site). Checked the robots.txt to see if the website was blocked for Google Checked the meta robots to see if the website was blocked for Google Disavowed some spammy (old) links which linked to the old domain Checked Search console > Fetch as Google if there isn't any Malware of some kind (and to see if Google can access the site) Checked Search consol to see if there manual spam actions (isn't the case) Checked for duplicate content by copy/paste some texts in Google and see if any other results are showing up (isn't the case for most of the texts) Please let me know what we can do.
Technical SEO | | InventusOnline0 -
IP address changed and some rankings drop
I changed my hosting company coz better server hardware and results (google). My website was perfectly for every queries on google but after changing company and ip address some results dropped to second page. What can i do now? These drops caused by changing ip address?
Technical SEO | | umutege0 -
Alexa Ranking - Improvement
Hey Guys, I have very decent traffic for my website but the Alexa rank is fluctuating very frequently.If the traffic is growing I cant see any changes and if the traffic dips down a bit then my rankings are going high 😞 Please suggest me what to do for getting an Alexa rank of **7000. **At present I have 9859 Hers ie my website link : http://www.teluguone.com/ Thanks in Advance Saikiran
Technical SEO | | logobite0 -
Rankings of Subdomains vs. Main Domain
Here's a puzzler... Our main domain (www.ides.com) doesn't appear in Google (but does on Bing and other engines). We think this is due to duplicate content which we're fixing. However our website's subdomains continue to appear prominently in SERPs, even on Google - here are some examples: IDES Prospector = prospector.ides.com IDES = support.ides.com Cycolac FR15 = catalog.ides.com Why would Google penalize a main domain and its subdomains?
Technical SEO | | Prospector-Plastics0 -
Can Google move up my ranking without caching it ?
Is it possible that my site was last cached in Google on 9 Oct (it was ranking 23 that time) and today on 29th oct its ranking position 3 for a kw though still showing cached on 9 oct. Its not cached since 9 oct, does that mean its not crawled since then? How can Google move up my ranking without caching it ?
Technical SEO | | Personnel_Concept0 -
How can i improve alexa rank of my website
www.meetuniversities.com Meet Universities - Get connected to your dream university
Technical SEO | | debal0