Google Updates and SERP Changes - May 2016

[Robert Charlton]

Continuing from:
Google Updates and SERP Changes - April 2016
https://www.webmasterworld.com/google/4798794.htm [webmasterworld.com]


Mod's note: In the April thread, Simon_H did an excellent job of saying something that needed to be said about off-topic discussion in the Google Updates and SERP Changes thread....

Irrespective of the rights and wrongs of Google's business ethics, moaning about it on here is counter-productive. When SER covered zombie traffic recently, there was a backlash of the type "it's just another conspiracy theory from the idiots at WebmasterWorld". That's very difficult to argue against.

If you believe that there's no hope because Google hates you, then there's no point posting on here about it. If you believe that there is hope, then try posting unemotional details of what you're seeing and we can collectively try to work out what is going on.

We try to keep the Updates thread primarily about ranking and traffic changes. The point of the thread is that by comparing changes, we can sometimes see patterns with Google that are not otherwise clear, and give those topics dedicated discussions when a pattern is observed.

[blend27]

And I'm not passing any briefcases.

So she said, a while back...

My main Competitor, EMD since 1996 online only, best widgets available(I swear on my neighbor's piglet, online only). #1 til 9 month ago. now at #7 for MY most desirable converting keyphrase.

Meanwhile at other sites above: "Sign up to get more details about this Pin", HER widgets, beautiful photography & excellent description of what each individual(unique) widget is.

[hasek747]

@blend27

I'm fine with change. What I was getting at is that not only the "big players" are getting the luxury of domain crowding; small sites are, too, and have been for years.

@samwest

I'm not sure I followed; do you mean to say that you only see domain crowding for large websites with funding? Sorry, English isn't my primary language so I can sometimes miss the deeper meaning of what is being said.

[samwest]

@hasek - I rarely see domain crowding from small sites anymore...MY site used to have incredible domain crowding, it's different in every niche but in mine big name well funded has taken over.

[3zero]

It's been a turbulent few years, but I think its time to accept certain factors in the new Google are here to stay. With Google now it's all about trust signals and Brands have them in abundance thats why they dominate so many markets, but it's a algorithm not personal. Domain crowding I suspect happens more when the competition don't have equivalent trust rank. Penguin and Panda will be incorporated in the main algo soon and though happening live I don't see the delays in ranking a site that has been penalised changing anytime soon. It's time for many to rethink their approach, although it's much harder to get a high ranking Google trusted site, the rewards now are higher than too.

[EditorialGuy]

I rarely see domain crowding from small sites anymore...MY site used to have incredible domain crowding, it's different in every niche but in mine big name well funded has taken over.

We still enjoy a fair amount of domain crowding for our main topics. Then again, we have an informational site (albeit in a competitive space), and the informational SERPscape may be quite different from its transactional counterpart.

[3zero]

We still enjoy a fair amount of domain crowding for our main topics. Then again, we have an informational site (albeit in a competitive space), and the informational SERPscape may be quite different from its transactional counterpart.

ERRP NO ..... Nice try but no banana , transactional sites enjoy Crowding too just look at Amazon.

[EditorialGuy]

Nice try but no banana , transactional sites enjoy Crowding too just look at Amazon.

We were talking about "domain crowding from small sites."

[3zero]

We were talking about "domain crowding from small sites."

...And you suggested there might be a different SERPscape for transactional sites, I am merely pointing out this is incorrect, and large or small site its the same algos.

[EditorialGuy]

We really don't know that (Google isn't telling), but in any case, this thread does tend to get bogged down in discussions of who's had a sale today or how traffic is converting. For those of us who are interested in Google Search, and not in e-commerce, the real news (what there is of it) tends to get lost in the commerce discussions.

[ionguy]

from last thursday average position up but traffic down for arround 30% / main keywords stable (page 1 / positions 1 - 5)
i'm not sure what is happening :(
we noticed a number of long breaks in traffic (up to 40 minutes) even during the day when usually a number of people open a site minute after minute

anyone else noticed the same?

[masterjoe]

Okay so the last few days I have had excellent traffic. Actually, most of this month has been okay, except for about 5-6 days last week when things were pretty quiet. For the most part, zombie traffic appears to have halted... but well see what happens over the long term before coming to any conclusions. I feel like penguin might be on the way with all this testing, but after many broken timelines it is a bit hard to trust Google at their word.

Almost half way through the year and were still waiting. Note that my results are not from a penguin hit site. The penguinized site has been under the penguin and has died a slow death to just 40-50 hits a day. A conversion here and there still happens but it is quite rare.

[hasek747]

Seeing an unusual uptick in traffic today (15% on a few-thousand-uniques-a-day website). No ranking changes reported by AWR yet, but this can be delayed. A quick manual check on keywords seems to indicate nothing has moved, at least for the major keywords.

(p.s. 100th post. Yey!)

[MrBlack]

from last thursday average position up but traffic down for arround 30% / main keywords stable (page 1 / positions 1 - 5)
i'm not sure what is happening :(
we noticed a number of long breaks in traffic (up to 40 minutes) even during the day when usually a number of people open a site minute after minute
anyone else noticed the same?

I am seeing exactly the same. I had a reasonable week last week up until Thursday. Not great amounts of visitors from organic search, but the visitors that were sent converted very well.

Search visibility has spiked but traffic and conversions back in the doldrums.

[ionguy]

@mrblack
exactly same here - everything was (lets say) quite good until thursday. no big deal since last september like most of us but just tic tic tic.
between 11am and 1pm and later between 4pm and 6pm gmt we usually got nice amount of visitors. today everything looks like a swiss cheese + the worse sunday from years

[vlexo]

Seeing really positive movements up in the niche I work in from last Thursday.

[samwest]

this thread does tend to get bogged down in discussions of who's had a sale today or how traffic is converting.

Really? Unless web design is your hobby and just something you like to do for no reward, Isn't that the point of traffic, to convert?
When traffic suddenly STOPS converting , it is likely a symptom of updates and changes in the SERPS. After all this thread is called "Google Updates and SERP Changes". Sharing this information and comparing conversion notes is very telling of changes, but if it bothers you so, I'll personally be sure to withhold that information in the future.

[ken_b]

Publishers of info/non-ecom sites are just as interested in search sourced traffic as ecom sites.

[Wijnand schouten]

Indeed, reading this thread closely surprised me since also publishers were bothered by google in a negative trend. I thought i had all my math straight, but the knowledge that publishers get less traffic from google puzzles me because this means less €€ 's for them. If you force ecom SEO to adwords, and there is less traffic from publishers i don't see the big picture anymore ...

[Atomic]

I don't know about anyone else, but my traffic and conversions are both up about 20% this week. I see a decent bump in SEMRush, but nothing not enough to account for what's happening. Traffic is now up 150% year over year.

[masterjoe]

Have been seeing okay conversions for the last 2-3 days, but all seem to happen at far more random times than i have historically. I believe some of the zombie issues may be resolved and are probably being tested. Simon where you at?!

[Simon_H]

@masterjoe Still here! Traffic is very confusing at the moment, as I'm based in the UK and we suddenly had fantastic weather hit last Friday and has stayed good since. So, all traffic is down (paid included) as it would seem people would rather enjoy the sun than buy stuff on the web. However, conversions are still good, so I can't say definitively whether this is an algo change or a weather change or something else.

[ecommerceprofit]

masterjoe - just to add more data...my conversions have been good. I have not really tracked formally but conversions are much better. I would not say this problem is solved but there is hope.

[masterjoe]

Seeing good things on my end too ecommerce profit. At an earlier date I did mention this could have been due to penguin testing. Now I am beginning to suspect long tail queries are being handled better by rankbrain possibly.

For example, for short competitive terms there seems to be unrelated results at times that are just so off the mark its hard to believe, but even days later I begin to see them start to go further and further down the results and pages. Still too early to say but it looks like some kind of quality change... it may have been an adjustment period for rank brain, or perhaps they are taking things like time on site as ranking factors more heavily. Either way, I hope they continue to hone in on this because for the most part, my sites have been converting well this month.

@Simon, take the sun in while you can! I agree, there is a lot more erratic behavior happening, but atleast we are getting decent traffic right now. Will be keeping an eye out for any trends.

[sqimul]

I'm facing some GEO change for one of my international site. The site is based on Entertainment and provides like music, videos. Currently watching a massive increase in visitors from Philippines . Visitors from Tire One ( USA, UK...... ) is down.

[Shepherd]

suspect long tail queries are being handled better by rankbrain possibly

That's an interesting observation. We have been watching our short tail, high volume keyword rankings drop weekly but our overall organic traffic from google is growing. Has to be coming from the long tail.

[SEOcomfort]

@masterjoe seeing the same on my e-commerce site. Yesterday had a record breaking day for organic traffic and conversions jumped up a full 1%. I was taking a look at my rankings and noticed that more of my long tail keywords saw jumps in rankings as well while broad keywords stayed the same or had normal day to day fluctuations.

[superclown2]

Overall I'm seeing a marked improvement for my better sites. By that I mean the ones that have plenty of unique content and are really (in my opinion of course) useful to visitors. This seems to be independent of incoming links, outgoing links, citations or any other voodoo. On the other hand a number of poor quality sites of mine, that still used to do very well thank you, are fading away regardless of the fact that they've got excellent link profiles - or at least what I used to think of as 'excellent'. Is Google's artificial intelligence system beginning to learn the difference between good quality and bad I wonder? Or are user metrics becoming more important? Either way something seems to be changing and I'm starting to feel that the SERPs themselves have improved greatly over the last few months too.

[ecommerceprofit]

Scratch that...low conversion day today and yesterday not so hot

[SEOcomfort]

I am noticing a lot of my blog content is seeing noticeable jumps in rankings. I have been adding new content weekly and repurposing old content. In comparison to my store pages, I haven't updated them the same way as the blog and seeing stagnant rankings. I am wondering if this week's fluctuations could be related to a Panda refresh? Since Google will not announce Panda related news, I figured this could be an indicator. Up for any insights from people.

[masterjoe]

I am seeing positive movement across the board too. Judging by others comments, its starting to look like a quality update of some sort. Informative content that keeps people on your site seems to have gotten a boost in the serps.