Sudden Recent Drop in Impressions in GWT - WTF?
-
I noticed this recent drop in impressions in Google Webmaster Tools. It started mid-February, and I know there was the page layout algorithm on the 6th, and I've heard mention of a Panda update around the 11th, so I started to wonder what was resposible. A manual penalty was just recently removed, too. As I dug deeper, I discovered other problems. For one a misredirected blog causing 404s, plus a redirected site whose duplicate pages were never removed from Google's index. There are also two exact match domains 301 redirected to the site, but there were no links or content prior to the redirect. In a site:operator search, one is showing a duplicate homepage.
When the wordpress.com blog was redirected, it was not redirected to the /blog subdirectory. Could the resulting 404s which go back as far as I can see in GWT (3 month limit) be the cause of this drop? We're talking about hundreds of blog pages and their links. FYI the main nav in /blog pointed to the old site until 2/7 when I pointed them to the existing domain (so hundreds, if not thousands of links were being redirected)
The million dollar question is: is it just the 301 redirect issue causing the problem here? It looks like I might just have exacerbated it when I fixed the nav menu links. Will fixing the redirect rescue the impressions?
My plan of attack includes killing the 301 redirects from the exact match domains with no backlinks, and removing the old site from Google's index from within GWT. Any yays or nays?
FYI, a 301 redirect of .index.html, default.asp, and non-www was done 1/8,
the reconsideration request was sent 1/24, manual penalty lifted 2/10. Index.html still redirects twice, going to www.site.com/index.html before resolving at .com. Same with default.asp. -
Here I am (partially) answering my own question...
i just this minute checked a fresh crawl report from Moz which shows that the no-index/follow I implemented in Wordpress SEO for pagination is very much to blame. (Though perhaps not entirely) I just checked Google Analytics for a parallel pattern in traffic, but I don't see one. I did seem stagnant compared to last month a few days ago, but it's up a little now. Being proactive was my motivation.
I would definitely still love some insight to my questions, as I am sure I am nowhere out of the woods on this site. I hope my acronym isn't keeping anyone at bay
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
-
I redesigned a clients website and there is a pretty massive drop in traffic - despite my efforts to significantly improve SEO.
Hi there, I redesigned a clients website that was very old fashioned and was not responsive. I implemented 301 redirects, kept the content pretty similar, website linking structure very similar - the only things i changed was making the website responsive, improved title tags, added a bit more information, improved the footer and h1 tags etc.. however although clicks are fairly similar search impressions have dropped about 60% on average over the past week. The old site had some keywords linking to pages with no new content so i removed those as seemed like black hat seo tricks and also there was a huge list of "locations we deliver to" on the homepage followed by around 500 citys/towns I removed this. Could this be the cause for the drop? as i assumed those would do more harm than good? Fairly new with SEO as you can probably tell. Looking for advice on what may be the cause and what steps I should take now. Thanks for reading! duGeW
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | binkez321 -
Competitor Drops 10,000 links since last index. Lets play detective.
One of the intriguing things about SEO is being able to reverse engineer your competitors rankings because all the technical information is available for those who know where to look. I recently looked at my Dashboard and saw that one of my competitors had dropped 10,000 links. The questions is why? Google algorthm change? Blackhat Penalty? Something else.? Here are the numbers, I am going to lieave my own clients site out because his numbers are pathetic. www.Leafly(dot)com 50.4k Links Down 10k www.thcfinder(dot)com 1,530 links Down 71 www.weedmaps(dot)com 64,000k links Up 1.5K Is it just me or is that a lot of links to loose over one indexing period?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | DavidMeshah0 -
70% organic traffic drop in October?! Algorithm change?
I oversee content for a client and this past month there was a 70% decrease in traffic. We noticed the hit start on September 29th, and has never rebounded. Any suggestions what this could be (i..e latest Google algorithm update) and or tools I should use to look into it? Nothing is showing up as an alert on Moz analytics and need to address with my client asap.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | jfeitlinger0 -
Link profile heavy with press release syndication links caused drop at Penguin 2.0
I'm wrestling with something that I'm hoping members of the community can provide input on.... I've working with an enterprise level client that is in the business of data capture and distribution. I've diagnosed a clear drop of traffic on May 22nd, i.e a loss of search visibility post Penguin 2.0. Their link profile is big! Discussions with internal stakeholders who have been with the company 10's of years confirm that no "link building" service providers have ever been hired and no over-zealous employee is ever likely to have tried to "do" link building internally. They are just one of those lucky companies that by their nature publish information that people want to link to and share. As a first port of call I've grouped links by anchor text and can see groups of hundreds of matching anchors based on their brand URL and specific page titles. The matching anchors have resulted from big take up of interesting data that they have marketed via press releases. NOT for link purposes. My question is this.... Does the community think or have evidence (or can point me toward any case studies) that show that Press release syndication alone could result in: a) a penguin penalty or...
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | QubaSEO
b) a devaluing of press release type links during Penguin 2.0 that could have resulted in a loss of search visibility and give the impression of a penalty Your thoughts are much appreciated!0 -
GWT 404 best practices
I'm getting back lots of 404 errors for old websites that are linking back to my current website. If the website content/anchor text has no relevancy to my current content is it still best practice to redirect to current home page, contact the web master to remove link or any other suggestions? Not exactly sure if redirecting looks spammy since it's irrelevant content. Thanks for your help!
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | IceIcebaby0 -
Looking for recent bad SEO / black hat example such as JC Penney example from 2011
I am giving a presentation in a few weeks and looking for a "what not to do" larger brand example that made poor SEO choices to try and game Google with black hat tactics. Any examples you can point me to?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | jfeitlinger0 -
SERP dropped Today ??
Hi, Long story shot. my 2 main keywords 'makeup artist sydney' and
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | EdsonGroupMedia
'sydney makeup artist' that have fluctuated in #1 - 4 position for the last year even after panda, have now moved to the 2page as of last night 23 May 13. I have checked webmaster tools and have no messages or error, i have checked Bing and still rank # 3 for the keywords. I am all out of ideas! am I being paranoid ? there hasn't been any major changes to the site and I don't seem to have major duplicate content issues! Any suggestions and Ideas would be great, website is www.sparrowmakeup.com.au Thanks.0 -
Drop in non-branded organic search April 1
I saw an intense drop in non-branded organic search for major pages on my site on April 1st this year. The homepage wasn't affected and it's not an annual thing. I've attached a screen shot showing the drop. I'm new to the company and recently learned that they had hired a pretty black hat company last year and I'm worried that this is Panda...although the timing seems wrong. Has anyone experienced panda effects between the two updates? I'd love to get some feedback!! 1ry2a.png
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | CIEEwebTeam0