Google Updates and SERP Changes - November 2016

[jmorgan]

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System: The following 8 messages were cut out of thread at: https://www.webmasterworld.com/google/4820506.htm [webmasterworld.com] by aakk9999 - 10:16 am on Nov 3, 2016 (gmt 0)

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Something really strange happened yesterday. Analytics showed a complete tank of traffic for a duration of 2 hours between 10pm to 12am Melbourne, Australia time (equivalent I think to 7pm to 9pm EDT).

My revenue dip seems to reflect this. No server outages were reported during this time. Was there some kind of event happening out there, an internet outage or something?

Traffic today so far seems normal.

[mosxu]

@jmorgan

I know it has been Halloween but it sounds like zombies failed to compensate in those 2 hours

[Jez123]

@BushieTop my results are very much pre P4. All the results that rose have dropped back to where they were and all the drops have risen back too.

[javadth]

from my 4 site just one of them ranked from page 5 to bottom of page 3

rest of them are dancing

[mboydnv]

Something I have never experienced. But our conversions are non-existent now. I'm still paying my daily for adwords. In fact, I tuned them up (got rid of unknown demographics, focused on gender and age that converts) and low and behold my CTR went from 3.3% to 6%. But no sales.

Is it the world series?
Is it the US election?

I am wracking my brain to find out why nothing is all of a sudden converting on our booking form. They go through step 1, then land on step 2 and then leave. I've looked for malicious code, hacks etc. Nothing.

The same booking form was making money all the way up to last week then stopped. I ran a test sale and it works perfectly.

None of my affiliates are making sales. they hold #5 ranking. My adwords don't lead to sales. Nothing.

What is happening? Is Google doing something nefarious? All of a sudden overnight, everything stopped.

Who stops going to a major US landmark? Be it statue of liberty, yosemtite park etc. What is causing the sales to go bye bye literally overnight. The Penguin update gave us more rankings according to SEMRush.

I'm stumped here..

[mosxu]

@mboydnv

Very unlikely that you have malicious code, hacks no need to get paranoid. You may need to install something like clicktale or some other recording software (not hotjar) and you may watch a video of these zombies journey. Here [yooter.com...] some say zombies reach one page from another, though no hyperlink exists between the two.

And also you can give them gold and they will not take it.

[Jez123]

Has anyone got any theories as to what happened on the 26th Oct? It feels like a reversal of P4. I am surprised there isn't more chatter about it.

[BushieTop]

Hi @jez123 if you look at my previous posts, you'll see i'm commenting on the very same thing. Seeing a near 100% reversal to P4.

[ionguy]

@jaz123 it would be great if someone had; all dead from oct 26th;
think i should to chng 'add to cart' and 'order now' to 'take all free'

[NickMNS]

I had a slight dip in traffic that coincided with P4, down in the range of 10-15%. If I look back, I had a traffic peak on the 25th and then a small roll back. But overall my traffic levels have remained at or near pre-P4 levels since the October 25th. It is worth noting that given my normal day to day variation these changes are not statistically significant.

[expmrb]

In this week Mon, Tue & Wed were pretty good but it seems that its the worst in Thursday & Friday today. Are you guys noticing this too?
One of my site gets plenty of traffic from India but its low too today.

[Halaspike]

I think my traffic has been throttled. I can't pass 3k unique visitors per day and I post new content daily. I don't know how to break this google ceiling

[shamims]

I see some of my client's Keywords have improved a lot. But some older keywords get deranked for second pages. Need to audit the content on those pages by myself.

[WhoKnows111]

I always wonder how it's possible to have normal and bad days - but I never get for example a day with 30% over an average. Getting most traffic from search and having websites over several niches.

[mosxu]

zombie patterns changed, similar amount but different times of the day

[BushieTop]

Can see that Moz is measuring lower SERPs flux, but we are still seeing changes... wonder if there is an end to these changes?!

[Martin Ice Web]

On friday we received a message from google. They asked if we are prepared for christmas shopping. And that google shopping ads get 3 times more clicks than the organic serps. Short after that our traffic from google plumed like a rock.
Yes google, we are prepared. We put our money on amazon as roi from shopping ads is zero.

[aristotle]

On friday we received a message from google. They asked if we are prepared for christmas shopping. And that google shopping ads get 3 times more clicks than the organic serps. Short after that our traffic from google plumed like a rock.

Doesn't google always switch to a different version of their algorithm during the holiday shopping season? That's what everyone always says. It doesn't have much effect on my sites, but could have a big effect on ecommerce sites.

[jambam]

@Martin Ice Web I agree shopping ads ROI is stupid. You get a lot better ROI in a casino!
Currently I think that google has some sort of shop filter turned on in my niche I am seeing amazon made for affiliate spam sites ranking everywhere and appearing in the answer box whilst shops are pushed to the very back (unless you are amazon)..

For example nowadays if you search for a lot of products you only get amazon.. even big name stores struggle to rank now.

[30K_a_month]

jambam, i think you will find a lot of the amazon products are products pushed by SEO's. A lot of money can be made putting a product on amazon and firing lots of links at it ( wont get penalized as amazon is invincible ). So maybe you need to change your business model and learn more about SEO techniques for 2016

[ionguy]

yet another day full of z guys since mon; conversions dead. only little fluctuations and main kwords remain unchanged. any ideas what happen? any similar finidings?

[mosxu]

the traffic yesterday was full of zombies, noticed that competitors were allowed to advertise on our trademark,

how do they send so much junk?

[samwest]

Post election traffic is nearly zero. I suspect someone is very worried of the new administration. Perhaps that a new anti-trust inquiry would yield new results? Time to make hay while the sun shines me thinks they thinks. Only traffic coming in is repeat visitors. What a mess. Man these boards are quiet.

[BushieTop]

@samwest - SEOs losing jobs

[mosxu]

three hours now and no real human all zombies

[mikejag]

My site usedWidgetmotors.com has been ranking on no1 since Penguin became real time this year. This is a 10 year old site and has always been on top 3. BestWidgetengines.com another site with good content has been in top 3 for last 5 years. Both ranking well for " used Widget engines" This morning I see usedWidgetmotors moved to # 3 and bestWidgetengines.com on # 11. Is there any update going on ? I have good content and not issues with speed. I see websites that have poor rating according to Google page insights, slow speeds and thin content out performing these 2 sites. I have seen ranking fluctuation ever hour since morning today. Are there other members here experiencing the same ? Can someone recommend what can be done ?

[edited by: goodroi at 10:14 pm (utc) on Nov 10, 2016]
[edit reason] Please no specific keywords, widgetized :) [/edit]

[Robert Charlton]

Mod's note: Sorry for the edits and post deletions, and sorry to interrupt the well-intentioned feedback... but we do not allow domain names or site names. This includes your domain and competitors' domains. No hints. No clues. No search terms.

For everybody's protection, we do not allow public site reviews on the public forums of WebmasterWorld... and we do not allow public discussion of private information because that would be meaningless to many members. Please read the Google Forum Charter [webmasterworld.com] for more details.

Members are free to communicate privately, but references to those communications, including please sticky me requests, etc, are also not permitted in public posts.

[edited by: Robert_Charlton at 2:01 am (utc) on Nov 11, 2016]

[Lake]

Traffic predictably dropped on election day (like on Halloween for my demographic) but is still staying oddly lower than usual here... after effects?

[mikejag]

Ok here's another version. Two of my sites which is 10 year old and has always been on top #1 & # 2 spot on Google, just stumbled to # 3 & # 11 this morning. Websites above me are websites that were tanked in 2012 after Penguin update and another one that has less than 20% useful content compared to my sites and has fewer links. I am very disappointed. Good content strategy, honest / fair link building practices etc sometimes don't really work. Have other members experienced ranking fluctuations today ?

[mboydnv]

Thurs: 5:53 Pm Las Vegas

Been blogging all week on my site. Everytime I use fetch in GWT afterwards for my new post. My Blog post on Nov 4 was easily spidered and in the engine ever since up till today. Google is showing the version of a post (and date in listing) from 2013 that I updated and had crawled and viewed the next day from Nov 4 2016. So these are NOT the latest results Google is showing,