SEO on a mature site - diminishing returns?

[mhkatz]

I have a site that has been indexed in Google since 2002.  Back then, I secured all of the highly recommended links of the time, like DMOZ and Yahoo Directory, and got just a couple very high PR links from highly relevant sites.  That was enough to get us top listing on our best "niche" keywords and many long tail searches.  Once we got to that point, we got lazy and have just relied upon our original links and any natural links that came our way.  We also have a very highly detailed Adwords campaign in which we bid on almost any keyword that has every resulted in an organic conversion.

A few months ago, I decided to kick our SEO efforts up a notch and hired a company to do an aggressive link building campaign and target some very high search volume terms that we had previously given up on.  The campaign has been very successful in getting high ranking for several targetted terms.  However, I am seeing zero impact on our site traffic or sales.

I am beginning to wonder if Google's algorithms are so efficient that all of this extra SEO work is to no avail.  Is there a point of diminishing returns where it is not productive to optimize a site's organic listings any further?  Between our Adwords campaign, our already pretty good organic results, and google's ability to divine a searchers intent and lead them to the most relevant results, how do you decide when there is little benefit to further optimization?  It is an important question for me because I have been considering putting a lot of work into adding content to our ecommerce site and I would hate to do all that work for nothing.

[stevenheron]

Are the keyword terms this "SEO Company" is ranking you under receiving any actual searches?

[EGOL]

"The campaign has been very successful in getting high ranking for several targetted terms.  However, I am seeing zero impact on our site traffic or sales."

Something is wrong here.  Does analytics say that you are getting traffic for these new terms?

Your statements address total traffic.  The traffic through these terms might be up but down elsewhere.

[mhkatz]

Are you saying that having both paid and organic results on the same SERP page only results in 1%-20% increase over just one or the other?  If that is correct, it would explain why I am seeing such diminishing returns.

[FrankWickers]

Research has been done which shows that having a top ranking for both the organic and paid versions of a search term results in a higher click through chance. The increase is usually anywhere between 1% and 20%. Nothing dramatic, but it helps.

People are more likely to click on an organic result over a paid one, though. Searchers are generally slightly distrustful of paid ad results. So I'd say your problem may lie with my 1&2 advice tips.

Check your adwords account to be sure of the search terms your ads are displaying for. Are they displaying for very broad searches, and not the exact keywords you specified? Are they being clicked on and converting for those broader searches? If so you might want to change up the exact keywords you use both for Adwords and your Organic SEO.

[mhkatz]

I avoid personalization of search results by searching in Apple Safari and clicking Reset Safari before each search.  I find that my results match what various rank checkers report, so it seems to be working.

I am optimizing for keywords that convert well for us in Adwords but are expensive to bid on.  I think part of the reason we are not seeing big results is that people searching for what we sell may be just as likely to click a paid ad as an organic result.  I have always wondered if having a high ranking on both paid and organic results on the same page has a benefit over just one or the other.

[StalkerB]

The campaign has been very successful in getting high ranking for several targetted terms.  However, I am seeing zero impact on our site traffic or sales.

I am beginning to wonder if Google's algorithms are so efficient that all of this extra SEO work is to no avail.

All you're setting out to do with SEO work is impove your rank though, if that's happening but you're not getting traffic then it's possible you've been targeting the wrong keywords.

Can you see your clickthrough rate in webmaster tools for these new keywords? Are they exceptionally low? Perhaps your meta description isn't appealing and you're ranking are all for nothing.

I would work on bringing those people who see the results to the site by testing the meta descriptions, supplementing the link building with some social stuff to distribute your new content and a bit of conversion rate optimisation to capture those who do click through.

I would say you're never done with SEO though, just need to change the focus of your efforts to capture visitors who are going to make you money. If you stand still somebody will eventually beat you

[FrankWickers]

Are there diminishing returns for optimizing a site? No. At least not as far as being penalized for organically achieving new rankings.

Now then, you say you're getting good high rankings for various search terms, but you're not seeing increased traffic. Let's figure out why that could be.

First of all, when you're checking you're rankings, make sure you're not receiving personalized results for having clicked on your own website too many times. Do things like make sure you are logged out of any Google accounts you may have, and add the code  &pws=0  to the end of the URL for the searches you do.

If personalization is not affecting you, and you are achieving those ranks, then you likely have some other problems. There are 2 things most likely affecting you.

1st) Are you using the right keywords? If you're a company that offers a 'credit card fraud investigation service', you don't really want to be ranking for terms like 'credit card fraud'. That term isn't specifically related in its intent to what you are needing. Someone searching for credit card fraud is probably looking for information about, can you guess it, credit card fraud! They're probably not so much looking for people who investigate credit card fraud.

2. Your search description snippets might not be working well for you. Make sure you have meta descriptions declared on every page that is ranking, or is of importance, which clearly describes the content on that page. If you don't have meta descriptions when someone see your site in a search result, they could be seeing a description that looks something like "We have been in service since...... keyword is what we do if..... we don't think that way". Basically they're seeing something that makes no sense in relation to what they searched for.

If you declare targetted meta descriptions, you're likely to have a better click through rate, and thus more traffic.

[saibose]

Mhkatz,

I would refrain hiring agencies to do link building for me if its a mature website. There are other legitimate ways to obtain SERP results.

1. Social mentions and retweets (Google ranks them well if some influencial profiles retweet it).

2. Blog mentions with backlinks to your website.

3. Wiki mentions

At the end of the day, if your website content is growing, I am sure Google will rank you for related keywords. Backlinks shouldnt be the only idea behind SEO.