Variations in stock level a (new) factor? - Traffic boost on fast-moving lines

[Shaddows]

As an ecom, reporting accurate stock levels (and particularly zero-stock levels) is vital from a customer POV. But it's never been a distinguishable factor in organic SERPS.

Except now, our run rates on our really fast moving, tightly controlled lines have gone through the roof. A quick check shows traffic up, and conversions within tolerence. Referal terms remain roughly proportional.

Its across a whole range of lines, with specific characteristics. These are
1) Stock gets close to 0 before replenishment
2) Stock cycle is < 2 weeks
3) Period is regular

Now, many of our lines (we have thousands) are kept in plentiful stock. Anything over 100 units is reported as "100+", rather than accurately. None of these have seen a boost.

Other lines are slow moving, and these similarly are unaffected.

However, across 10s of highly profitable lines, we are seeing massive growth. All since early-ish Jan. It's been progressive, not sudden. No special backlink growth, and no overt similarities between the lines.

So my question. Does Google now reward accurate stock level reporting, with a net effect of "punishing" sites with nominal (read: fictional) stock levels? Or is the rapidly updating stock figure pushing the page up SERPS for some people, as a type of "freshness"? Or is some other phenomena at work.

[Robert Charlton]

...across 10s of highly profitable lines, we are seeing massive growth.

By "highly profitable", do you mean you're making a big markup, or do you mean that the lines are popular and in large demand?

If the latter, which is what I'm assuming you mean, my initial thought (pending more information) is that there's a slow exponential growth which is taking place in areas external to your site and is increasing general interest in these product lines.

Is search frequency for these product lines increasing? You mention links and traffic, but you don't mention things like buzz in the press or in the consumer world... as well as metrics like rankings and search frequency.

I'm skeptical that stock level reporting is a factor, but it's a theoretical skepticism. ;)

[Shaddows]

I'm skeptical that stock level reporting is a factor, but it's a theoretical skepticism

Couldn't agree more.

And yes, "profitable" was a mis-speak. Revenue-generating is better.

When we started selling widgets, around 2001, they were rare, misunderstood and definitely geeky. Big margin, small sales, lots of value-add. We won customers then, customers which have stuck with us while the market exploded and the entire landscape changed. These customers have customers, who are end-users.

Now, I guarentee 98% of people on here have a widget at home, and everyone has one at work. To be fair, businesses had them before then. You usually get a flakey one free with a major class of service (almost a utility).

My point is, these are now commodity items. Total commodity. And the lines I'm talking about are NOT "buzzy". They're a bit niche, relative to the widget sector, in that the majority of sales are not to end-users (see above). These days we leave the non-niche end-user sales to the box-shifters or service providers.

5 accelerated lines come from here, or 60% of the accelerated revenue

A few years ago, a new innovation came about. It's brilliant for the home, overcoming a major obstacle to easy deployment of the widget-borne service. Latterly, some widgets had inbuilt solutions to service-deployment, but environmental factors were severely restrictive. This new technology is not environmentally limited, at least not within a single home.

We were among the first in the UK to sell this new technology, maybe 4-5 years ago. We shift volume, but it doesnt generate as much revenue- they're pretty cheap. About 15 lines of accelarated movers fall here, making 25% accelerated revenue.

The remaining 15 or so accelerated lines are a bit more scattered. We have diversified hugely in 10 years, and sell a wide range of stuff. These lines are ungrouped by type

Without gooing into the mechanics of the site, maybe 95% of the lines will be reporting either large ("+100"), stagnant, or non-varying stock levels. Of the remaining 5%, most will vary chaotically. Maybe 1% has nice, rhythmic, periodic stock cylcles. They make up getting on for 30% of our revenue.

I get lots of data passing over my desk. It is particularly these 1% of periodic shifters that are getting a boost. The correlation is statistically significant- very much so.

We're up about 50% of traffic (converttion rate and referal proportion unchanged) on less than 1% of our product offering. It would NEVER have come to my attention except that these are so important to us. On analysis of this tiny proportion of our offering, there are few universal features, few attributes that tie them together. But one theme stands out- the way stock levels vary over time.

I really cannot see the mechanism whereby stock reporting is a factor. Genuinely not. But rarely have I seen such a statistically significant event where of a population of thousands, two apparenty independant samples of 1% overlap with a frequency above 0.5. Expected frequency would be 0.01.

Sorry for the waffle. Hard to paint a picture succintly when bound by Terms.

[Robert Charlton]

Without going into the mechanics of the site, maybe 95% of the lines will be reporting either large ("+100"), stagnant, or non-varying stock levels. Of the remaining 5%, most will vary chaotically. Maybe 1% has nice, rhythmic, periodic stock cycles. They make up getting on for 30% of our revenue.

It's still not clear from what you've said whether the traffic is due to better rankings or to more searches on this product line.

It sounds, though, like this 1% is receiving the "best" stock level management, which is to say apparently the most efficient management, of your various product lines.

It's possible that either...

...search queries and/or rankings are being influenced by your supply chain management, which we agree isn't likely...

...or, the most productive lines have attracted enough attention somewhere in the supply chain (or perhaps throughout the supply chain) that their stock levels are receiving special attention. Perhaps it is popularity driving the management... and perhaps the management isn't intentionally preferential, it just happens in reaction to demand.

It's hard to say more without having more info about query level, popularity level industry-wide, how your particular site is ranking, how your supply chain is managed (throughout the chain), etc etc.

[Shaddows]

Got it nailed. A company went under, causing a surge of people looking for a new supplier. We hadn't considered them a rival as such- might need to rethink our strategic analysis in the future.

Looks like permanant aquisition of custom. Happy days.