Is this type of activity normal?
-
One of our pages has been significantly changing positions over the past few weeks. I know that some daily fluctuation is normal, but this seems a bit extreme. Any insight as to why this might be happening?
-
It's always a tricky one when changes have been made and reverted Joel. There is an element of waiting for things to settle down again, while a part of you wants to carry on and make more improvements - but this can work against you.
It 'looks' like Google is trying to figure out where you should be, but I don't think it is anything more sinister than that. It's certainly not a penalty at work as they give you a hit and rarely see movement like this.
I would monitor the stats for another couple of weeks and then see where you stand. If it levels out, you at least know where you need to be heading and what changes to make next.
-Andy
-
Hi Andy,
Thanks for the reply. It's good to know it's not uncommon, and it is an internal page. I haven't tried any other tracking apps, but I might have to give that a shot to see if it reports the same findings.
As far as ongoing work, we did make a few changes to the page in late April/early May. We modified a few on-page ranking factors to boost our Moz page grade for that query, but that's unfortunately when the initial drop happened from #8 to out of the top 50. We've since reverted a few of these changes and haven't touched it for about a month.
-Joel
-
I wouldn't say it's necessarily normal, but it certainly isn't uncommon. I do see this sort of thing quite a lot, and oddly enough, I see it most on internal pages.
Is there on-going work happening on the site? Are changes being made frequently? Have you also tried other tracking apps, as I do know that some are not quite as accurate as others and report differently.
-Andy
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
-
Is there any benefit or negative impact to including schema for both @type WebPage and NewsArticle on the same page?
Is there any benefit or negative impact to including schema for both @type WebPage and NewsArticle on the same page? The websites I work on are editorial news sites. Our CMS automatically outputs WebPage schema to every article we publish. I want my dev to set up auto-generated NewsArticle schema. The are pretty much identical with a few different attributes. I just want to make sure I make the right choice about adding both or removing one.
Technical SEO | | DJBKBU0 -
Does this type of writing follow the "original content" criterion of structured data?
Hi!' So, in Google's general guideline for structured data, it's stated that the webmasters must "provide original content that you or your users have generated." If I were to write an article about post similar to stuff like "how to get a driver's license" or "how to apply for an accounting license", which requires looking up information from official and non-official sources. After researching, I compiled the information I found and wrote a few blog posts. Are these considered original content? Can I apply structured data to these posts without Google penalizing them? Thanks!
Technical SEO | | EverettChen0 -
Another company is coming up in search results when I type in my phone number
If I search for my client's phone number on Google, without gaps, ie 02036315541, another company comes up at the top of the list. This company has a similar name to ours, but it is in a different town and it does different things. My company name is Energy Contract Renewals https://www.energycontractrenewals.co.uk/ and their company is https://energyrenewals.co.uk. As far as I can see, the other company does not mention our phone number anywhere on their site or on their GMB page so I don't know why they are coming up. We do not come up at all for this search. However, if I put our phone number in like this: 020 3631 5541, our company does come up and the other company does not. Anyone know how I can correct this or if it is even possible to do something about it?
Technical SEO | | mfrgolfgti1 -
Redesigned and Migrated Website - Lost Almost All Organic Traffic - Mobile Pages Indexing over Normal Pages
We recently redesigned and migrated our site from www.jmacsupply.com to https://www.jmac.com It has been over 2 weeks since implementing 301 redirects, and we have lost over 90% of our organic traffic. Google seems to be indexing the mobile versions of our pages over our website pages. We hired a designer to redesign the site, and we are confident the code is doing something that is harmful for ranking our website. F or Example: If you google "KEEDEX-K-DS-FLX38" You should see our mobile page ranking: http://www.jmac.com/mobile/Product.aspx?ProductCode=KEEDEX-K-DS-FLX38 but the page that we want ranked (and we think should be, is https://www.jmac.com/Keedex_K_DS_FLX38_p/keedex-k-ds-flx38.htm) That second page isn't even indexed. (When you search for: "site:jmac.com Keedex K-DS-FLX38") We have implemented rel canonical, and rel alternate both ways. What are we doing wrong??? Thank you in advance for any help - it is much appreciated.
Technical SEO | | jmaccom0 -
Has Google stopped rendering author snippets on SERP pages if the author's G+ page is not actively updated?
Working with a site that has multiple authors and author microformat enabled. The image is rendering for some authors on SERP page and not for others. Difference seems to be having an updated G+ page and not having a constantly updating G+ page. any thoughts?
Technical SEO | | irvingw0 -
Having to type Google CAPTCHA all the time
Hi guys, Our office has about 15 computers all on the same IP address and about 10 actively search on Google. Recently we have been asked to type in CAPTCHA almost every single time searching on Google and would like to know if you have any suggestions of resolving this. We do use Firefox Rank Checker to check ranking once per week (around 400 keywords) but we use Hide My Ass to hide the IP. No malware or virus detected on computers in the network. Many thanks for your help in advance David
Technical SEO | | sssrpm0 -
What type of link should I usef or view cart, login and register
Hello, What is the best practice for links appearing on every page of your site pointing to shopping cart, login, registration, etc. pages? Basically what is the best format for links in your site template that point to pages you do not need to rank or possibly even be indexed? no-follow, iframe, regular? Thanks.
Technical SEO | | WebstaurantStore.com0 -
Dynamically-generated .PDF files, instead of normal pages, indexed by and ranking in Google
Hi, I come across a tough problem. I am working on an online-store website which contains the functionlaity of viewing products details in .PDF format (by the way, the website is built on Joomla CMS), now when I search my site's name in Google, the SERP simply displays my .PDF files in the first couple positions (shown in normal .PDF files format: [PDF]...)and I cannot find the normal pages there on SERP #1 unless I search the full site domain in Google. I really don't want this! Would you please tell me how to figure the problem out and solve it. I can actually remove the corresponding component (Virtuemart) that are in charge of generating the .PDF files. Now I am trying to redirect all the .PDF pages ranking in Google to a 404 page and remove the functionality, I plan to regenerate a sitemap of my site and submit it to Google, will it be working for me? I really appreciate that if you could help solve this problem. Thanks very much. Sincerely SEOmoz Pro Member
Technical SEO | | fugu0