Why has my home page replaced my sub-category page for set of keywords? Happened 2x in last 2 weeks for day or so only to fix itself. What is going on?
-
Today I noticed a really weird problem. Our LED Step Lights page (https://www.pegasuslighting.com/led-step-lights.html) has been replaced in the search results with our home page. See screenshot below.
As I started to research what was going on, I noticed that this same thing must have happened on January 26 and 27 because in my Analytics I can see that our LED Step Lights sub-cat page had a sudden drop in traffic on those two days only to bounce back again on the 28th. See screenshot below.
Our LED Step Lights page has had no changes in content, meta information, or anything in months. We have done no recent link building to this page in years.
I don't understand what is going on. This is a popular page for us generating decent traffic. I really don't understand what is going on or even how to try and resolve this problem.
I checked our Search Console. No messages. No manual web spam actions. Nothing to suggest that anything is going on except for the weird drops in traffic.
Has anyone ever seen this happen before? Does anyone have any ideas as to what may be going on?
serp-led-step-lights.png organic-traffic-drops.png search-console-led-step-lights.png
-
This happens more than you'd think, and it can be frustrating. It can, on occasion, be a sign that Google is on the fence about your category page. In other words, it could signal quality issues, although that's not always the case.
Could you tell me what search you were running when this originally happened? There are ways to see how Google is viewing the pages on your site that match that search.
-
I checked this morning and our sub-cat page is back in the SERPs for appropriate keywords and our home page is gone. The SEO world is "normal" again.
I have attached 2 screenshots...1 shows the SERPs this morning and 1 shows that the organic traffic we are getting has already returned. We already have more visitors as of 745am ET then the past 2 days.
I understand a little volatility around a particular page while Google does "something" (for lack of a better word this early morning). Maybe pushing the page down while it "rechecks" things? But, to show the home page on Page 1 for these sets of keywords is strange. While I love our home page (smile) it really does not belong Page 1 for these keywords. Plus, to see this happen 2x in the last 2 weeks each time lasting 1-2 days. Never seen anything like this before.
Anyone else experience this?
-
Good morning,
Although you haven't changed anything, it's very likely google has changed how they interpret your info. How else could they keep the ever-changing landscape of SEO interesting and sometimes frustrating,
There looks to have been a google algorithm update in January and Yoast is saying they are seeing "a high correlation between the keyword(s) being the first word(s) of the slug (the URL) and the ranking" see: https://yoast.com/google-core-algorithm-update/. Google might be playing with results based on the more descriptive slug to see if leads to a higher CTR. When I look at the first 2 positions in the SERPS I see that pegasuslighting.com/led-step-lights.html ranks for 6 terms as of Jan 16th and pegasuslighting.com ranking for 497 terms, so although you might see some fluctuation over the next little bit I think your home will continue to dominate results.
Is anyone else noticing drops in organic traffic or weirdness in Analytics and have some theories?
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
-
Ranking Page #1 for Keyword without Hypen, Not at all for Keyword with Hyphen
Hi There! So I work in an industry where there are different conventions for referring to, searching on and spelling the industry name. For example, let's pretend there were a variety of different conventions for referring to the SEO industry. So someone could search for S-EO, SEO, sEO, etc. and those would all be accepted and understood means of referring to the industry. If we use the SEO example as a comparison for our industry, the two most common conventions would be S-EO and SEO. Using this example, we rank on the first page for the term "SEO" but do not rank AT ALL for the term "S-EO". We have a high-value piece of content that is targeted in the following way: "S-EO (SEO): The Basics Guide" so it is more targeted at the hyphenated word but does not rank at all for the hyphenated version, whereas it is page one for the non-hyphenated term. As additional pieces of context: -In general, our site is more targeted at the hyphenated term and there are places where we rank in the top spot for both the hyphenated and non-hyphenated versions. For example, we rank in a top 2 position for both S-EO & SEO software but do not rank at all for the broader "S-EO" term. -There are times when we do appear on page one for the term "S-EO" but it's typically only for a matter or hours or days and then we disappear entirely from the SERPs for that term. We consistently appear for "SEO." -I currently do not believe we are dealing with a penalty of any sort - our link profile is clean and our spam score per Moz is 2 / 17. Any thoughts or ideas as to what is going on here and how we can potentially rank for the term "S-EO?"
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | dpayne10 -
Category pages
I am a very basic question on managing categories in WordPress. We have an Android website, and we cover news, rumors, tips and tricks about new devices. We have been creating categories for the new devices or at least for the popular ones which are launched every year, and link to them internally with the hope that it would improve the page authority and ranking. For example, we have a category page for Moto X, another one for Moto X (2014) and one more for Moto X (2015). One of the reasons for creating a category was to ensure that it is easier for readers to get information about a particular device rather than going to a category page that has information about all the models. However, the problem with their strategy we're now realizing is that it means we have to build page authority for the new category page from scratch, which can take time. So we are thinking of reusing the same category for multiple models. So reuse the Moto X category page for Moto X (2016). However, we are not sure if it would be right approach as we would be linking to the same category page with different anchor texts. So while it would be good to reuse a page rather than rebuild the page authority from scratch, would we be diluting the authority for the main keyword by using it for different models. I would love to hear your thoughts on how we should be handling categories and internal links in this case.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Gautam0 -
Two Similar Profile Pages: One Ranks 2 in Google - The Other 150
My client's site has a directory of doctors on it's site and they are targeting weight loss surgery patients. The problem is that when searching "weight loss surgeon richmond va" one of the doctor's profiles ranks 2nd in Google organic results while the other is not even in the first 10 pages. Both have very similar link profiles and I have checked all the technical things like noindex tags, canonicals, etc to see if that might be the problem but it all checked out. The second doctor's profile IS indexed in Google, just not ranking. We have done a lot of work to push his profile page up in the rankings but all efforts seem to have fallen short. Here are the profiles: http://advancedsurgicalpartnersofva.com/physicians/profile/Gregory-L-Schroder-MD - ranks 2 in Google http://advancedsurgicalpartnersofva.com/physicians/profile/Matthew-Brengman-MD-FACS - does not rank Any ideas would be much appreciated!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | chrisvogel0 -
Spam Score - how to fix No Contact Info and Low Number of Pages Found
Hi We recently change the layout of our website to a responsive theme in the hope of improve our rankings. We are getting less more traffic but less conversions to sales. Our Spam sore has these flagged No Contact Info - we have the phone number on top of every page and a contact us link at the bottom of every page - Is there something we are missing ? Low Number of Pages Found - we have over 3000 products each of which has a page, plus other info pages on our stite - Whay would this be flagged.RegardsAdrienne
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | CostumeD0 -
My blog's categories are winning over my landing pages, what to do?
Hi My blogs categories for the ecommerce site are by subject and are similar to the product landing pages. Example Domain.com/laptops that sells laptops Domain.com/blog/laptops that shows news and articles on laptops Within the blog posts the links of anchor laptop are to the store. What to do? Thanks
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | BeytzNet1 -
Yoast Seo + Home Page
Hi All, I'm using Studiopress Genesis Enterprise child theme in Wordpress + InstantWP + Yoast SEO. I have created a standard home page (see image) along with bespoke pages My question is this: When I select Pages | All Pages ... I cannot see the home page and therefore cannot optimise the home page with Yoast SEO. What am I doing wrong? Thanks Mark XQvbFl2taJEgFXJ
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Mark_Ch0 -
How many links home on a page?
We are planning on a mega menu which will have around 300 links and a mega slider which will have around 175 links if our developer has their way. In all I could be looking at over 500 links from the home page. The Mega Menu will flatten the site link structure out but I am worried this slider on the home page which is our 4th most visited page behind our 3 core category pages. What are your thoughts?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | robertrRSwalters0 -
Home page sudden drop in rank, but not others.
Over the weekend, I noticed "www.thematstore.com" drop out of the search results for "chair mats", where previously it was between 10-12 ranked. The other pages on the domain have remained the same in regards to rankings for their intended keywords. The only thing I changed (on Nov 29th) is the title tag from "Chair Mats - Commercial Quality Chair Mats, Custom Made", to "Chair Mats - Best Custom Chair Mats, Commercial Quality". I know there is a lot that needs to be done on the site, and the site architecture is a bit of a mess (I recommended building a new site)... but I was hoping to gradually fix these issues without gambling with a rank drop. Not sure why the home page all of the sudden dropped out, any suggestions?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Joes_Ideas0