Losing Rankings & Need Help
-
Hi Guys, I am not sure if anyone else is suffering from the July 4, 2013 update. I know many of us are awaiting to see what happens once the dust settles. I have a couple of issues/questions/statements below. This is the first time any Google update has every affected me negatively and I'd love some ideas or input.
1. I have ranked quite well for nearly 10 years for all my top keywords. Now, after this update, I am disappearing for my top keywords in the SERPS - definitely getting pushed to page two, etc. Can anyone help me discover the reasons? I have a great SEO expert helping me and I know quite a bit, but this has me baffled. My website is Journey Beyond Travel.com I have read MOZ's ranking factors for 2013 and also the recently published report from SearchMetrics. In the last few days, I've added more quality text to the homepage and shortened my page title on the homepage (although Google has been changing my homepage browser title to put my brand name first in the title - and they haven't for my competitors).
Over the past few months, I've really cleaned up my link profile to the best of my ability. I've never really taken part in any negative or black-hat practices. I am trying to get more links that use my 'brand' name rather than exact anchor text. I believe I have a natural profile - any thoughts?
2. One thing I notice is the higher ranking of larger brands now (at least in my field). Just because a domain with higher authority creates one page of content, how can that outrank me? I mean, I've got ten years and 600+ darn good articles of content on my website. How can one domain that is very 'general' (for example, well known in the world of travel and not specialized or niche like mine) outrank me? How can it be that Google allows larger brands to outrank smaller ones just because they have more backlinks and domain authority, but no real content to support these pages? Is content truly king? I am thinking about an article: "Google, Brands, and the Death of Small Business Online." Anyone wish to collaborate here? I am not being hatelful or resentful, but I foresee the day when an 'alternative' search engine emerges, doesn't allow crap ads, allows users more flexibility, and brings search to the next level. Not all of us want the big brands and are searching for alternatives that stand out. I ignore them when I am searching mostly.
Any thoughts or elaborations? Thanks!
-
This is just superb information. Thanks so much for sending it my way. I am going to read through this carefully. I have a lot of work to do : )
-
Glad I could help!
Here are some good sources to get your feet wet:
- Top four ways to earn links with Social Media - White Board Friday
- Utilizing Footprints - 5 Fundamentals of Large Scale Link Building - WordTracker Resource
- Broken Link Building Bible - YouMoz
- Advanced Guide to Link Building - Neil Patel's Free E-book
-
Hello There,
Thanks so much for your response. You are correct. I do have some quality links but a good portion do come from directories (albeit higher quality ones). I do need to balance those out with some better editorial links, connecting with bloggers, and may even start doing some more YouTube stuff. I will work this into the plan and will stay positive. Thanks so much!
-
First off, sorry that you're running into ranking problems. It's never fun, but always turns into a learning process.
Upon inspection, it seems as though your link profile is lacking a set of links with integrity. Those that come from natural evolution of the lifespan of a linkworthy site. Looking at your link profile, sorting by external links to the root domain shows top links are from directories in large part. Granted, they are directory links with good authority, I would surmise that there are a lot of competitor links you could obtain as well as the ever-sought-after editorial-type links.
You're right. Big brands have these and they will continue to grow in SERP saturation within your vertical. The best thing you can do is be dynamic, target time-sensitive news items, provide better content and build your network of bloggers, social authorities, youtube users and grow your footrpint the right way.
Look to the link profiles my friend.
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
-
Crawl results on keyword rankings differ from actual search rankings
For the second week in a row, the weekly keyword rankings in my MOZ account show "not in top 50" for most keywords. However, when I check some of my rankings I still broadly have the rankings that I used to have. It seems that the MOZ crawl is experiencing some difficulties. Does anyone have suggestions how to find out what's going on? If I can't rely on the crawl outcomes, then the tool is not very useful anymore!
Moz Pro | | matteis0 -
Rank Tracking results
Hi, Some problem with rank tracking from research tools: I rank #1 for this keyword "w immo" for URL : http://www.wimmobiliere.com in my campaign monitor (ranking tab) In rank tracking for the same Search Engine (google.be) i am not in the 50. Do you know why? Some images that might help... Rank_1<a class="attachment-title">Rank 1</a>Rank_2<a class="attachment-title">Rank 2</a>
Moz Pro | | VOUS0 -
Estimating the number of LRD I need to outrank competitor
I just ran a SERP/keyword diffculty report for a keyword I want one of my pages to rank Also, I just conducted the on-the-page-optimization and now I am going to start buidling links. => I would like to estimate how many linking root domains I need to overrank one of my competitor. These are the MOZ data:
Moz Pro | | He_Jo
1. My page:
Page Linking Root domains: 0
Root Domain Linking Root Domains: 151 2. Competitor:
Page linking root domains: 1
Root Domain Linking Root Domains: 5,786 I don't really know on which metric (Page or domain LRD) to rely on in order to make an estimation and I would be glad for some help! To simplyfy the problem, assume that all toher factors (code, on-the-page keyword use., social etc.) are equal for both sites. Can I just get 2LRD to that page in order to likely outrank my competitor or do I need around 5000 more links poiting to my site? I think an answer to this question could help a lot of users here, since I saw similar questions/difficulties regarding the use of page LRD vs. root domain LRD P.S. Non of the pages of my website do currently rank in the top 100 for that keyword.2 -
Tool Request - What keywords does a site rank for?
Hi folks, Something I've never had to do before so I'm not sure which tool to use, but is there a way to determine the keywords that a website currently ranks for? Hope someone can assist 🙂
Moz Pro | | ChristopherM1 -
SEOmoz showing crawl errors but webmastertools says no errors, need help!
Hi this is my first question and i couldnt find a similar question on here. basically i have a clients website that is showing 150 duplicate page titles and content errors plus others. SEOmoz analysis is showing me for example is 3 duplicate hompage URLS: 1.www.domain.com 2.domain.com 3.www.domain.com/index.html all 3 are the same page. after explaining to the guy (who built the website) the errors, he ensured me that the main URL is URl 1. and the other 2 are 301 redirects. however SEOmoz analysis doesnt seem to change the results and webmastertools doesnt seem to show any errors at all. also if i try all 3 URL's there are no redirects to URL 1. any help or clarity would be awesome! Thanks e-bob
Moz Pro | | bobsnowzell0 -
Rankings in Google UK
Hi everyone, I've posted before on this and I'm still not satisfied that the answer is correct. Basically, my ranking report is saying that hardly any of my keywords are ranking in the top 50 of Google UK. Now, I appreciate that rankings can be affected by my search history, but I've tried other computers, other IP addresses, logged out of Google, cleared cache etc.. and I'm still seeing the terms I'm wanting to rank for on the first and second pages of Google UK. What is going on? My boss is wanting to see progress with these terms - I'm confident that we're ranking well, but the report is saying otherwise.
Moz Pro | | columbus0 -
Seomoz & Duplicate Page Content Issue?
Hi, What is the criteria on Seomoz Crawl Diagnostic Report? I got a long list of URLs indicating Content that is identical (or nearly identical) to content on other pages of your site forces your pages to unnecessarily compete with each other for rankings. But as I gone through none of the reported pages duplicate. What should I do? Thanks in Advance
Moz Pro | | VipinLouka780 -
SEOmoz Q&A down last few days
It seems the Q&A section had some issues since the 25th. Users could post new Q&As but they were not visible to most users. Roger was caught slacking! The issue appears to be resolved at this time. I just wanted to share to anyone who asked a question the past few days who did not receive a response you may wish to repost your question as many readers will not go back and check questions from prior days.
Moz Pro | | RyanKent1