Banned by the latest changes or just dropped relevance?

[paulosebin]

Maybe some expert can help me. For the last 3 months the site I'm working on is dropping organic traffic. I googled about the latest algorithm changes, including forum posts here, and I'm having trouble diagnosing something.

How do I know my site has been banned or just affected by new Google rules?

How can you further diagnose changes relevant to the site to resume growth in access?

If relevant, the affected site is this: https://www.example.com.br/ - is Brazilian.


Mod's note: Exemplified domain, as we don't allow site reviews anywhere in public areas of WebmasterWorld.

[edited by: Robert_Charlton at 12:16 am (utc) on Sep 20, 2019]
[edit reason] Exemplified domain.... [/edit]

[Robert Charlton]

paulosebin, Welcome to WebmasterWorld [webmasterworld.com].

I've exemplified your domain name, not because it might not be relevant, but because leading members to your site, either via linking or by name or keywords, is not permitted in the public areas of WebmasterWorld.

Before deleting the domain, though, replacing it with "example.tld" (which is a domain name designed to be an example domain)... I did search for your brand name as it was in the domain by itself (ie, as before I replaced it with the word "example"), and Google does return your site in first place. This suggests to me that it hasn't been "banned"... ie, it's still in the index... but it might not rank well on competitive queries for a variety of reasons.

How low it's doing in competitive rankings, though, may have to do with Expertise, Authority, and Trust... which might include, eg, how trusted your material is, or how original it is. I did not look at your site, though, and your niche is something that our Terms of Service allow us to discuss only in the very broadest terms.. ie, no specifics to lead to your site. .

I posted a few thoughts on an earlier thread, about how I believe subject matter "niches" are becoming more and more granular, with subcategories that effectively "intersect" these "EAT" categories in different ways. This might apply to your current situation, and might explain the drop....

Updates to Google Search Quality Raters Guidelines on Sept 5, 2019
9/10/2019
https://www.webmasterworld.com/google/4963546.htm [webmasterworld.com]

Or, another possibility... you may still simply be targeting keywords, but, increasingly, the new Google algos are all about concepts.

The idea of "relevance" gets complicated in all this, and includes many more factors than keyword matching, and exact keyword matching has become de-emphasized.

[martinibuster]

Expertise, Authority, and Trust have comparatively little to do with broad core ranking issues.

It's mostly relevance. Relevance is the big factor.

THINK about it. Do some of you REALLY believe there's an E-A-T algo that Google makes more potent in every single broad core update?

Come on people, think. Google is about relevance. Google's algo has many factors for evaluating sites and ranking sites, but in the end it's all about relevance.

For example, improving RELEVANCE is the reason why Google started treating Nofollow as a hint. Gary Illyes said it was about the link signal and for improving relevance.

So really, all this Expertise, Authority, and Trust nonsense that some SEOs are peddling is misleading.

[tangor]

@paulosebin ... Sorry ... no hard and fast answers ... but there is empirical evidence that some topics/content does not get the same love as it once did (and the reasons are many and varied). The black box remains opaque, the criteria has NEVER been revealed. The best we can do is look at the results and draw conclusions (probably 75% correct) and go from there.

That said, webmasters in general are seeing a down turn in traffic the last few years. I suspect g is finally cleaning up their act as they focus upon their profit side (and their products) going forward. The "free ride" of the old days, and the webmaster's ability to steer or game the system no longer exists.

On the web since 1996 and I am also seeing a reduction in traffic, gradual over the last 10 years. However part of that can be the abundance of new noise on the web, copy cats, scrapers, and assorted other uglies.

The other possibility is that users just aren't looking for what you are offering! User cycles are also part of the mix, though most don't realize it. After all, how many Abba songs do you listen to, or Gene Autry, or Elvis Presley? Tastes change all the time.

If the concern is about adsense income ... do know that changes in THAT part of the business have more to do with the ADVERTISERS and g's increasing cut of the take than anything you are doing!