Currently Number 2 - Worth Shooting for 1?

[CleanEdisonInc]

Hello SEO Community,

So I was able to rise to #2 in a highly competitive search term after a guest blog post that I wrote really took off (wish I could recreate that for my other terms, haha)

Anyway, I steadily rose from 30ish to number 2 and have obviously seen more traffic, which is awesome and I'm happy.

But still, in terms of the amount of traffic that google estimates the keyword gets, and the amount I'm getting at #2, it seems like #1 is getting the VAST majority (I know this is how most markets work).

Judging from my link profile compared to #1, it would be extremely difficult to dethrone them.

So what do y'all think? Is it worth spending time and resources shooting for the glory and traffic of #1 and potentially never getting there - or focusing my efforts on my middling keywords and getting those on the first page as well?

[RuiZhiDong]

It depends on what your end goal is.

The #1 position will always get the lion's share of traffic. If getting more revenue is the end goal and moving from 30 to 2 has been profitable for you, then it will likely remain profitable for you to go for 1.

Not all competitive terms are profitable so you should monitor the performance of your search term to help you decide what to do next.

[BeardoCo]

I agree with Egol - if you can provide an enticing Title Tag people may want to click your link over the first.  Maybe pose a question or again offer a deal.

[EGOL]

Use your title tag to steal clicks away from them.

offer free beer

tell them you have Secrets

shout a kickass price or free delivery

make your title tag so much more interesting and enticing than theirs.

[TomRayner]

Very good question and becomes a discussion over time and resource management.

It should be said - you will usually see a marked increase in click-through rates even between #1 and #2.  So on that basis, always go for #1.

Whether or not to spend most of your focus improving this ranking to #1 or whether to improve some other keywords will depend on a few things - competition for those other keywords, what's their estimated search volume, can you attribute different levels of searcher 'intent' (eg 'red shoes' versus 'buy red shoes in london' - second one has much more intent to convert).

What I would do over the coming weeks is monitor your traffic and conversion rate in analytics.  Look out for any significant improvements that you can attribute to this higher ranking term - either through direct last-touch channels, or indirectly through increased brand search and/or conversions where organic search was a touch-point.  If you see a big increase, it may be worth pushing for the number one spot.  However, if you don't see a decent increase, even when ranking at 2, then it might be better to focus on your other keywords instead.

Hope this helps, would be good to get other feedback as well.