Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Why my website disappears for the keywords ranked, then reappears and so on?
-
Hello to everyone.
In the last 2 weeks my website emorroidi.imieirimedinaturali.it has a strange behavior in SERP: it disappears for the keywords ranked and then reappears, and so on.
Here's the chronicle of the last days:
12/6: message in GWT: Improvement of the visibility of the website in search.
12/6 the website disappears for all the keywords ranked
16/6 the website reappears for all the keywords ranked with some keywords higher in ranking
18/6 the website disappears for all the keywords ranked
22/6 the website reappears for all the keywords ranked
24/6 the website disappears for all the keywords ranked...
I can't explain this situation. Could it be a penalty? What Kind?
Thank you.
-
Hi Paul,
This question is marked as "answered," so there aren't many SEOs reading it, unless they have the same problem as you! Please post a new question, so we can get the right people to answer.
Best,
Kristina
-
Yeah Kristina,
the keywords are:
- emorroidi cura
- emorroidi rimedi
- cure emorroidi
- curare le emorroidi
- emorroidi cure
- emorroidi rimedi naturali
- emorroidi esterne
- alimentazione emorroidi
The website actually ranks in Google.it with the homepage for them all, except the last two that rank with the relative page.
Thank you very much,
Emanuele
-
Yeah, I'm not sure. One idea would be an algorithmic penalty that is rechecked every few days (although most articles I've read say that algorithmic penalties are applied and then stay applied long after the problem has been fixed). Another is that someone at Google applied a penalty manually, then someone else removed it, then someone else put it back on again.
But neither of those seem likely.
At this point, all I can think of is looking into the keywords themselves. I haven't done that so far, though, because I don't know Italian. Can you share them anyway, though, so someone else in the community can help?
-
Hi Kristina,
- Yes, during the times where I'm not ranking for most keywords, my homepage ranks for the brand name;
- I haven't got any else message in Google Webmaster Tools;
In your opinion what kind of "poorly applied penalty" could it be? An algorithmic one I suppose...
-
Weird. So, that means that this isn't because of problems with Google's crawler not finding your content, and it's not that you are ranking for keywords that just fluctuate all the time anyway. My next guess would be that this is a poorly applied penalty of some sort. A couple of questions to see if it is:
- During the times where you're not ranking for most keywords, does your homepage rank for your brand name?
- Have you gotten any other messages in Google Webmaster Tools / Search Console since the original "Improved search visibility" that you mentioned in your original question?
Best,
Kristina
-
Hi Kristina,
- I mean that all the pages are indexed;
- I haven't analized very well my competitors in these days, however in the days my website disappears, it seems that the other websites that compete for my keywords don't fluctuate, or not so much: the SERPs remain almost equal.
Thank you,
Emanuele
-
Hi Emanuele,
To clarify:
- When you say you've verified it with a site: search, do you mean that you verified that the pages that were no longer ranking were still indexed? Or, do you mean that you verified that the site itself was still indexed? I'm wondering if you're only losing certain pages.
- I'm not sure what you meant by your response about your competition. Are you saying that the competition doesn't fluctuate for the keywords that your site is fluctuating for?
Thanks,
Kristina
-
Hi Kristina,
thank you for the answer.
About your points:
- On the days where my site stops ranking for keywords it is correctly indexed, I've verified it with site: command;
- when the website disappears, any keyword stays at the same rank, neither the long tail keywords.
- I haven't made any change to on page or off page factors since the website started to disappear and the reappear.
Best,
Emanuele
-
Hi Emanuele,
Wow, that's really weird! A few questions:
- On the days where your site stops ranking for keywords, have you done a site: search on those pages to see if Google has them in its index?
- What is your competition for these keywords? Have they been changing around a lot too, or is everything else staying about the same rank, with your site just jumping in and out of the list?
- Have you been making any changes to the site during this time? Even if you didn't change the specific page in question, it's possible that changing the link structure of the site is drastically changing their ability to rank.
Best,
Kristina
-
Hi Daniel,
thank you for the answer.
In the days the website disappears, there are drops in organic ranking like images attached. All the pages with ranked keywords disappear.
-
Ciao Emanuele!
If you seem to be experiencing ranking issues, the best way you can see if there is something to worry about or not is by seeing if there have been any drops in organic sessions on analytics. Has there been a drop?
If there is a pattern to the types of keywords which you seem to not be rankng for, you should check in analytics to see if the pages on your site which correspond to the keywords are losing organic traffic or not. Example: keyword A will be most relevant to example.com/page-a
Search results are different for different users, based on location, which version of Google you are using, whether you are signed in to Google not etc. so don't be too concerned unless traffic is also affected.
Additionally, the message in GWTs on 12/6 isn't something to worry about. I have also seen this message for many of the sites I manage and it is really just Google giving some tips such as defining a target country, giving access to other users, creating XML sitemaps etc.
Let us know if you are also experiencing drops in traffic!
-
Hi Hector,
thank you for the answer.
Yes, I always use Moz Rank Tracker and also I search logged off and with the same geolocalization...
-
That kind of behaviour is really strange. Are you always searching from the same computer, and always logged off -or at least always in the same Google Account? Seems like you are getting some kind of customized experience based on your geolocalization, browsing history, Google Account or something like that.
For checking your ranks, always use an external tool like MOZ.
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
-
Why has my website been removed from Bing?
I have a website that has recently been removed from Bing's index, but can't figure out why. The website isn't new, and it is indexed just fine on Google. These are the steps I've tried: The website is verified in Bing Webmaster Tools and successfully submitted the sitemap. I tested the URL to ensure that Bingbot is allowed to crawl the site I submitted URLs to Bing via the URL Submission tool There isn't a "noindex" on the site preventing it from being indexed When I do a URL Inspection, an error message comes up saying "The inspected URL is known to Bing but has some issues which are preventing us from serving it to our users. We recommend you to follow Bing Webmaster Guidelines." I contacted Bing to ask whether the website was removed in error, but received a reply that the website doesn't comply with Bing's quality guidelines, but they wouldn't go into detail as to which guidelines the website isn't meeting. The website URL is https://www.pardeehospital.org. Can anyone offer any advice or insight as to why Bing won't index our site? Thank you!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | lindsey.steinkamp0 -
If my website do not have a robot.txt file, does it hurt my website ranking?
After a site audit, I find out that my website don't have a robot.txt. Does it hurt my website rankings? One more thing, when I type mywebsite.com/robot.txt, it automatically redirect to the homepage. Please help!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | binhlai0 -
Ranking 1st for a keyword - but when 's' is added to the end we are ranking on the second page
Hi everyone - hope you are well. I can't get my head around why we are ranking 1st for a specific keyword, but then when 's' is added to the end of the keyword - we are ranking on the second page. What could be the cause of this? I thought that Google would class both of the keywords the same, in this case, let's say the keyword was 'button'. We would be ranking 1st for 'button', but 'buttons' we are ranking on the second page. Any ideas? - I appreciate every comment.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Brett-S0 -
Why is Google ranking irrelevant / not preferred pages for keywords?
Over the past few months we have been chipping away at duplicate content issues. We know this is our biggest issue and is working against us. However, it is due to this client also owning the competitor site. Therefore, product merchandise and top level categories are highly similar, including a shared server. Our rank is suffering major for this, which we understand. However, as we make changes, and I track and perform test searches, the pages that Google ranks for keywords never seems to match or make sense, at all. For example, I search for "solid scrub tops" and it ranks the "print scrub tops" category. Or the "Men Clearance" page is ranking for keyword "Women Scrub Pants". Or, I will search for a specific brand, and it ranks a completely different brand. Has anyone else seen this behavior with duplicate content issues? Or is it an issue with some other penalty? At this point, our only option is to test something and see what impact it has, but it is difficult to do when keywords do not align with content.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | lunavista-comm0 -
"Null" appearing as top keyword in "Content Keywords" under Google index in Google Search Console
Hi, "Null" is appearing as top keyword in Google search console > Google Index > Content Keywords for our site http://goo.gl/cKaQ4K . We do not use "null" as keyword on site. We are not able to find why Google is treating "null" as a keyword for our site. Is anyone facing such issue. Thanks & Regards
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | vivekrathore0 -
We have two different websites with the same products and information, will that hurt our rankings?
We have two different domains, one for the UK and the other for the US, they have the exact same products, categories and information. (the information is almost the same in 400 products) We know that Google could recognize that as duplicate content, but will that actually hurt our rankings in both sites? Is it better if we create two completely different versions of the content on those pages?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | DoitWiser0 -
Exact keyword URL or not?
Hi all, I have a quick question about the proper use of permalinks. Let's say that I have a website about sports and I want to create an internal page dedicated to shoes. I know that the keyword "shoe" has 15.000 monthly visits, while the keyword "shoes" has 1.000 monthly visits. How do I have to name the internal page? http://www.example.com/shoe or http://www.example.com/shoes (with a final 's')? I would think that by naming the URL http://www.example.com/shoes, the search engine would consider that page for the keywords "shoe" and "shoes", but I am not sure about it. Should I create a URL that only focuses on one specific keyword ("shoe", in this example) or a URL that may encompass more than one keyword ("shoe" and "shoes")? I hope this is clear. Thank you for your time and help. All best, Sal
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | salvyy0 -
Sudden rank drop for 1 keyword
A page of mine (http://loginhelper.com/networks/facebook-login/) was ranking in the top 10 for keyword (facebook login) and has been for at least 2 months, moving between 5th and 10th. Suddenly in the last 3 days the rank for the keyword dropped from 7th to 46th, yet none of the other keywords have been affected (they target other pages) and their ranks have continued to improve. I am trying to figure out what caused this sudden drop in the ranking of 1 page (the page has quality mainly text based content and isn't in the least bit shallow or spammy) I have been thinking perhaps a crawl or server error may be to cause leaving the page temporarily unavailable or with a big load time... Otherwise what could cause one page to drop so much so quickly whilst other pages improved their rank?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Netboost0