Branded terms CTR drop
-
Moz Hivemind,
I'm working with an ecom beauty brand and retailer who re-platformed their website at the end of August last year. Their CTR dropped from 70% plus for branded terms to 50% over night and has steadily declined ever since, down to the low 30s as an average the last few months.
Their rankings for branded terms have remained in the number 1 position, despite a slight blip at launch, which is to be expected.
They admit that some new distribution deals with major retailers have added some competition to the mix, but much later in the year.
I could totally understand a rankings drop and an initial hit, but has anyone seen anything like this before, is there something on the new site that could impact CTR like this, either in the SERPs or perhaps a reporting issue?
As the click itself is taking place in the SERP and their rankings are solid, other than the meta description, which they swear was unchanged the first few months after launch, any ideas what could be happening here?
Thanks so much.
-
Yes, first lesson: don't anchor text spam your site in comments like these as it's pretty obvious you tried to score a link with this comment. So stop doing that and focus on creating actual value.
-
Thanks everyone, all good answers, Title tags I will take a look at, but shouldn't have changed a great deal if at all... but the devil is in the detail.
Branded search ppc will definitely have played a part as well, including their own activity.
-
Do they have any insights from Google Ads on their branded keyword campaigns? That would usually be my first guess, somebody started bidding on their brand keywords which would take at least 10% away likely from your regular organic clicks by just pushing it down the page.
-
Go to archive.org to see your old title tags.
-
They swear the meta descriptions were unchanged, what about the title tags?
-
Your SERP CTR can drop when Google changes the SERP interface. They can slap more images, ads, videos, "people also ask" , news and various types of rubbish that absorb the clicks before your organic rankings are seen. Competitors above or below you could start adding kickass prices, free shipping, or free beer to their title tags.
.... but, my usual suspicion is that the developers monkeyed with something.
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
-
Penguin 4.0 update: drop in results end of September
Has anyone noticed certain drops in keyword rankings on/around 29 September? Has this to do with the Penguin 4.0 update? I read that this hasn't come "bug-free". Will this be adjusted the upcoming weeks? Or is this drop content-based based on the new algorithms and the content needs to be adjusted/updated?
Reporting & Analytics | | Mikrocentrum0 -
Extracting long-tail keyword conversion terms
Hi all, Does anyone have any concise info on how to extract long-tail (or any) terms in Google Analytics that have converted for me as I am having a hard time finding out how to do this? Many thanks
Reporting & Analytics | | Martin_S0 -
Separating branded from non branded org. traffic volume
What is the easiest way of separating branded from non branded org. traffic volume? I've created great rankings for a client, and at the same time their brand searches seem to have dropped a lot. How do I present this in the best way since GA only shows little org. keyword info. Thanks!
Reporting & Analytics | | Majsan0 -
Spike in Direct visits with Drop in Google Organic Visits
Does anyone have an explanation for why Google organic visits plummeted while direct visits rose the same amount. Total visits have been very normal. jI1Bn2B,UuzONNK kepV0eu
Reporting & Analytics | | phogan0 -
Feedburner stats show drop in multiple feeds from 6/21/13 to 6/22\. Anyone else seen the same?
Client has 3 RSS feeds in Feedburner, and they saw a drop in subscribers from 6/21 to 6/22. Wondering if anyone else has saw a drop recently. Obviously, this could be the results of multiple people cleaning up their feeds, but it appears too coincidental. Has anyone heard if there are any recent issues with Feedburner tracking?
Reporting & Analytics | | DanaLookadoo0 -
Webmaster tools traffic on one keyword dropped through the floor - ideas?
Hi there, We design and sell our own product range in a narrow niche, and we are also stocked by Amazon and a lot of other big retailers in the UK. During the first two weeks of Dec 2012 the position of one of our main keywords, which was in google SERPs on page 1 (8 or 9), dropped to page 4. The keyword describes the niche we're in. The drop is shown in the webmaster tools traffic report for that keyword. But it's the only one of our keywords where this has happened, and furthermore it hasn't happened for variations of the keyword. And in Adwords our quality score for the keyword is 10 For example say we were making and selling shopping trolleys - our keyword "shopping trolleys" has dropped through the floor, but "shopping trolleys (on) wheels" is just fine. Can anyone shed any light on what's going on here? Losing this one keyword has cost us some good organic traffic. i1uxSlB.png
Reporting & Analytics | | w1ll1am0 -
Since the 6th June there has been a serious drop in search impressions and clickthroughs in my GA + webmaster accounts.
Since the 6th June there has been a serious drop in organic search impressions and click throughs in my GA + webmaster accounts for my website. This leads me to believe my site has been punished for something? Where would be the best place to start diagnosing the issue causing the drop in search traffic? 2T9hz.jpg
Reporting & Analytics | | Scurrypoint0 -
Reasons for drop in URLs Receiving Entrances Via Search
Hi I'm having trouble understanding why I'm getting the results I am for my organic traffic data. I've been focussing on a few keywords throughout my website and the most recent results show that there is a big increase in the Organic Search Visits and the Non-Paid Keywords Sending Search Visits for both Branded Keywords and Non-branded Keywords, but the results for URLs Receiving Entrances Via Search are the complete opposite. Down by a few percent. I don't understand why this would happen and was hoping that someone could maybe explain and give a few reasons for why this is happening and maybe give some tips on how to stop it from happening in the future if possible. Thanks.
Reporting & Analytics | | Bonx0