Google Updates and SERP Changes - November 2019

[engine]

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System: The following 8 messages were cut out of thread at: https://www.webmasterworld.com/google/4966830.htm [webmasterworld.com] by robert_charlton - 4:01 pm on Nov 1, 2019 (PDT -8)

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Not what i'd seen, it wasn't even that.
I'd class myself as an experienced searcher, and, sometimes, when I look at Google's serps it's trying to pre-empt my intent. More often than not, it's presenting either highly-optimised sites, or, in this case, it was all wrong. Something's broke.

It works that way these days.

I don't ever use "best" as that is spammed out.

[BushyTop]

@stupidintelligent Yup! Crazy how we all seem to see the same thing. France....all day.

[StupidIntelligent]

This should explain this phenomenon. Go to the bottom of the article: [imperva.com...]

[mosxu]

@SnowMan68

Is your brand including a search term or is all unique? Also is your brand registered?

[SEOMike]

I had some weird activity on my site from 11/7 through 11/13. Analytics reports a lot of direct traffic to very old blog pages, all with 0% bounce rates and 0:00 session times and all of it out of Chicago. I don't get a ton of traffic to my own site so seeing a spike in traffic of a few hundred visits a day got my attention. I thought maybe I had been hacked or was being attacked by an AWS (I see AWS traffic out of Chicago a lot). I checked my server logs to find the IPs associated with the visits so I could squash a potential hack. I did a 1:1 comparison of times and URLs reported in analytics against my server logs and saw that all of the weird activity reported originated from IPs owned by Google. Geolocaiton tools put all of the traffic out of Cali (probably because of Google's ownership of the IPs) but also lists the IPs as "Google Proxy". The useragent from the Google IPs was Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/74.0.3694.0 Safari/537.36 Chrome-Lighthouse

I use GTM to bring in GA. I've checked client sites with similar implementations of GA and don't see similar activity. Just my site. The activity seems to be picking up again today.

I haven't seen Googlebot leak into Analytics in many, many years. Anyone else seeing anything like this? I wonder what they're up to...

[StupidIntelligent]

@BushyTop - are you the individual who gets over a million visits per month in the automotive sector?

[samwest]

Crazy stupid drip pattern returned this morning after a nice start to the day...but now a single visit spaced at exactly 10 mins apart for the past 2 hours. Bang ON, Bang Off. It's traffic insanity. No change in SERP's - just radical ON / OFF patterns.

[browndog]

I'm finding that they're not returning exact matches. I've just searched for 'American Widgets', I get:

American widgets
List of widgets
American widgets
List of widgets
American widgets
List of widgets
10 large widgets
List of widgets
Widgets most popular in America

I then search for my article on American widgets and put in the name of my site after widgets, and it's nowhere to be found. The post is 2-3 weeks old now, so should have been indexed. Very strange.

[NickMNS]

I don't know what is up but I'm currently seeing a massive in flux of direct traffic to my site. I'm talking a 5 to 10X of what I would typically expect. There seems to be some correlation with some traffic from Reddit, in that the traffic is all landing on the same page. The traffic according GA does not seem to be coming from the same location and is mostly US based.

[seomotionz]

@SEOMike I saw a huge spike in traffic like this on Friday. They were all direct. If you see at a glance then you wouldn't even notice anything apart from the fact that they had a high bounce rate. When I went through my analytics thoroughly I found that all of these traffic has originated from google.com

Google is loosing their trust from users at a faster rate than I imagined. I mean SERP's are all sh**t, analytics are flooded with these type of void traffic (which a general user or a newbie wouldn't be able to determine), and above all adwords is costing way much more than usual. On a click which we are used to pay about $2-5 or may be $6. They are charging about $15-$20 which is way out of limit.

[arjunsinhchandravat]

After 7-10th November, suddenly there is a drop in rankings from 1 they moved to 2 and from 2-3. I have analyzed the URLs that are ranking on #1, our content is any day better than theirs and has authoritative and move backlinks. My assumption is, this could be due to BERT update. We were ranking for a set of keywords on #1 for the past 6-7 years now. Any suggestions what should I do, I am already working on the content part.

[koalapandaeu]

Hello, I have a new website, selling physical products in Europe. I don't use Adwords or any other form of advertisment, i don't engage in shady SEO operations.
You can see my daily organic google traffic here: [imgur.com...]
This is filtered traffic (without the 0:00 sessions). It was going well until the 25th September update. After that the sites started restoring some positions, but then came the November update. But the number of visitors is only part of the story. The september update changed the nature of my traffic, I suddenly started getting most of my google traffic from the USA/India (places where I can't sell) and next to none from Germany, Netherlands, Poland (my main markets). Interestingly enough my "well performing" English-language pages don't seem to reach any Brits.
And now this is my Bing traffic: [imgur.com...]
It is improving, while not driving many visitors. Other search engines also seem to like my site. I hope more people ditch Google and start using them.

[mosxu]

“On a click which we are used to pay about $2-5 or may be $6. They are charging about $15-$20 which is way out of limit.”

Smart robots moving the cheese first thing a webmaster does when buyer traffic disappears is probably putting bids up.

Now $15-$20 is not out of limit if buyer traffic goes to less and less advertisers

[Adrian100]

I run an affiliate website that reviews real products that I get from manufacturers. The last few weeks have been hell... Google shot my website into oblivion. Rankings are down, zombie traffic and almost no revenue. Just in August, I had one of my best months ever, rankings were going up but now they're decreasing faster and faster every day. Funny thing is the "big guys" (big magazines lol) with fake reviews, just listing the products and linking to Amazon, are ranking on position 1 - 10. Their content is literally nonexistent and they outrank my real reviews with 300-400 words. Btw the same goes for my competitors who also write real reviews. This is not fun anymore.

[seomotionz]

@mosxu We are putting less money in adwords now. The budget is almost 30% less.

After getting hit by a tsunami of bots this week seems to be good. No zombies or bots so far. The traffic is less but human, and a bit converting too. Everything changes and everything goes up & down. But what I am seeing to be constant is that the traffic stoppages. This started prior to the holiday weeks. And now its still there. A certain time of the day traffic stops, not even bots are seen at that time.

[mosxu]

@seomotionz

Yes in the old days the zombies were in large numbers but nowadays they do not compensate that much when traffic stops.

[samwest]

The churn continues...now my home page that was lagging an evergreen content sub page, popping in and out of the SERPS has now leapfrogged the evergreen sub page and is #1 for the term, and ranking for both singular and plural. Images are back...for now. Regardless of the home page being at #1, traffic is back to the zero / slow drip. Yesterday saw dramatic ON and OFF periods...or in other words, the new norm.
Just waiting for the day when they decide to take it all...it's close.

[MarvinG]

@Adrian100

I experience the same. Also write real reviews and in-depth reviews too. Most of them around 1500 words, but now I'm outranked by crappy reviews with almost no real content.

[SteveWrz]

@MarvinG

Yup, all of my articles are 1,500 fully researched and well written articles and I'm being beat out by of the top positions by absolute garbage.

The worst offender is Forbes outranking my site for some keywords with ONLY an image + caption page. Total word count on one of the pages outranking mine is 44. FORTY FOUR. It's literally a caption to a picture and that's it. No information, no links, nothing at all. How on Earth is that more relevant than what I'm writing?!

[goodroi]

@koalapandaeu Is there a scale to those charts or was your best day actually 37 people a day?

[dollarsound]

Talking again about the Nov 7th update...what I dont really understand is why all the sites I have access to, have dropped the very same amount of traffic. All of them already around 40%. Why not some loose 10%, others 20 or some others 50%. All the same percentage. Isn't it weird?

[seomotionz]

Talking again about the Nov 7th update...what I dont really understand is why all the sites I have access to, have dropped the very same amount of traffic. All of them already around 40%. Why not some loose 10%, others 20 or some others 50%. All the same percentage. Isn't it weird?

@dollarsound Why just talk about droppings? Some of our sites have gained traffic too. 10%, 30% or so on.

[dollarsound]

Yes of course. But isn't it curious that in all the variables that might affect a site ranking, that should be different from site to site, vertical to vertical, different link profiles... the ones that have been negatively affected are so in the same proportion?

[markseo]

OK, so I've heard other people talk about this phenomenon now I've noticed it - since around 10am this morning ALL traffic is bouncing. Without exception. Traffic volume hasn't changed, it's just no one is engaging. I've checked and nothing wrong with the site. Any ideas what this could be? Theres on change in origin of traffic. Just seems to be very low quality all of a sudden.

[AustrianOak]

@dollarsound I would agree. It seems very suspicious that the majority of sites affected negatively all saw in the 30-40% range of lost traffic. As you mentioned, with dozens of variables if not more for each site, there is no way such a consistent hit would be shared, rather than a bigger spread which we don't see.

Everything is controlled very carefully.

[MarvinG]

@SteveWRZ

That's total BS. Being outrankend by a page with 44 words... Google always mentions content as being really important. So you would expect to rank higher than a crappy Forbes page. I understand your frustration!

[cheegum]

The fiscal year end is on 31st December. The books must be closed with heavy profits :)
Why would Google want someone to visit your site with high quality content and let the buyer make a decision? They dont want traffic to convert on your page BUT rather on Google (for the advertiser).

[glakes]

They dont want traffic to convert on your page BUT rather on Google (for the advertiser).

Google funneling users into clicking not just one but multiple ads is how they make money. Amazon does the same thing with their advertising platform, and they probably make more money with ads then they do collecting the 15% commission from a seller when a lower cost product actually sells. Both Amazon and Google are attempting to extract as much money out of the economy as they can, and they face little resistance from both regulators and complacent/silent webmasters.

Don't expect this environment to get any better. Between Google and Amazon they have a stranglehold on information and ecommerce, and it will get worse. The DOJ and FTC have abandoned consumers and businesses alike, leaving everyone to fend for themselves. It's a bleak future for those businesses that can't adapt, and adapt quickly, to shrinking profits. Consumers, on the other hand, tend to be oblivious - they will consume anything (information or products) placed in front of them and believe it is great because there is nothing better to compare it to.

It's unfortunate, but if half the people complaining about Google were to actually lift a finger and contact their elected reps and regulators, then the voice of the webmaster community might be heard. I spent the past few years doing this - sending emails, certified letters, etc. to all in authority. I'm one voice, and had hoped others would see the writing on the wall and do their part. Still, a large segment of the webmaster community has their heads buried in the sand. Those that think changing page titles, keyword density and overall page quality will help them overcome Google's appetite for profits are sadly mistaken.

[Selen]

When you search for some medical condition, like itchy skin, swollen eyes, or similar, a new kind of knowledge box on the right (desktop) appears: Health conditions related to this search. There is no link to the source other than something like that: Sources: Mayo Clinic and others.

Could it be the end of linking to sources or external sites? I'd like to hear about the benefits of appearing in such answer boxes.

[dethfire]

In GSC if total impressions drop with CTR and position stay the same, that would mean my total number of ranking keywords dropped right?

[koalapandaeu]

@goodroi, no scale, 37 organic visitors from google is top. and yet back in agust and early september i was making sales. today I might actually have equal visitors from bing and google - 10, lol.

[Rndm]

@Selen + For those health related queries Google works with a few partner health organizations to create that content. I am sure that the partnership is lucrative.

Here is an article from the Mayo Clinic about it: [mayoclinic.org...]

[jmorgan]

So, I've been following the SEO niche on Twitter a bit lately and I've noticed a bit of a "clique" between the likes of Schwartz, Gabe, Fishkin, Haynes, etc. who typically converse with each other in threads. Nothing wrong with that. I appreciate their views.

What's interesting is that pundits like Patel and Dean (Backlinko) don't appear to be part of that clique despite their profile. Very interesting .... Maybe I should create a YouTube video called "7 top strategies to be part of the Twitter SEO clique in 2019!"

[browndog]

For those health related queries Google works with a few partner health organizations to create that content. I am sure that the partnership is lucrative.

Here is an article from the Mayo Clinic about it: [mayoclinic.org...]

I think this will be rolled out in many different niches when they find appropriate partners, a great way to keep people on Google.

We are in a terrible place now. The site has dropped from 20,000 daily users to 3,000, despite more than doubling my content. Since the latest updates, I'm seeing sites I've never heard of before pop up, some of whom aren't even in my niche. It's too late for me to get help because I'm not in a position to pay anyone.

[rustybrick]

>> Twitter SEO clique

I don't try to be part of any clique - I will do my best to make sure I converse with more people.

[samwest]

@dollarsound - and why not some GAIN? Since 2010, I have yet to see an update be NON punitive. In that same time, Google profits rise 20% each quarter to now over 30 Billion. It's simple logic and simple math, that cash has to come from somewhere. Just sayin'.

[SnowMan68]

We are up 30% since the update.

[NickMNS]

I don't know what's up but Real-Time in GA has gone bezerk. At several points during the day, the big count "active on site" in my real-time rockets up, to like 10X the actual amount of traffic and then just stays there. But the actual traffic remains the same, there is no reference to this ghost traffic, the source figures only show the expected traffic, location only shows traffic for the expected traffic from the expected locations, no page-view bars in the real-time bar graph, nothing. The count that appears to fluctuate with actual traffic. This lasts about 5 to 10 minutes and then everything reverts back to normal, I have seen this happen a few times (2 or 3) of the course of the day.

What's even more bizarre, I have several views for each property, if I change views to the default view with no filters applied, the number shows normally, switch back to my regular view filters applied the number goes back up. If switch to another property, everything appears normal.

[jmorgan]

Is SEMRush broken? I keep hearing of all these updates yet the SEMRush sensor remains fairly flat.

[SnowMan68]

This seemed core related. Only saw some of the tools pick up on it. Almost all of our traffic increases came from the long tail queries.

[seomotionz]

@rustybrick You are already part of THE clique. Who else here speak directly to the Titans.

@NickMNS I have observed this yesterday. The total number of visitors per day remained the same but in real time of GA showed quite a number of visitors.

[BushyTop]

Weird that some are seeing impressions drop and CTR increase. I am seeing the opposite. My assumption is that this is obviosuly down to G filling the SERPs with more ads KG etc, since out meta hasnt changed. This has been going on since September tho....

[dollarsound]

@samwest what I mentioned could be applied to the drops and to the gains. I talk about the drops because I have first hand data. But publishers are reporting gains in similar percentages. So, if each site is unique how can an update affect in the same scale to so differents sites? For me it makes no sense. And then, it's true what others said, is not that we are down some positions in rankings but impressions have halved. So we are not in the SERPS anymore. I would understand changes in rankings coherent with what has been right until the update and ranking in lower positions, but the thing is that sites I monitor have been removed from the serps.

[edited by: dollarsound at 12:21 pm (utc) on Nov 20, 2019]

[samwest]

We are up 30% since the update

It that traffic converting? Did you do anything specifically to improve your site? Or did it just hapoen? Either way, congratutulations as this seems to be the exception rather than the rule.

[cheegum]

I am seeing sites that gained are now dropping.

[samwest]

The November 7th update had one major effect on my site. Amazon affiliate links no longer work. Also, new churn this morning as the garbage content farms are rising again. SERPS are never stable for more than a few hours these day. Like I said before, it's SERP Roulette.

[southernguy]

@samwest It that traffic converting?

That's my question to those who say they have seen an increase in traffic, for me a big spike in traffic means nothing anymore, what used to convert like crazy no longer does no matter how much of a traffic increase I see.

[BushyTop]

Had to turn on PPC...... G is winning

[seomotionz]

I wrote earlier that few of our sites have gained traffic. I am not saying that the traffic is constantly okay but there is a sudden increase after the update.

For those who are asking about whether the traffic is converting or not. I can't comment on that because those sites have nothing to sale in them, they generate revenue through ads. Yeah, the eCPM's are pretty good then previous times. And the traffic is not like zombies or bot like. They are real.

[Tonberry]

@samwest

What do you mean when you say your Amazon Affiliate links are no longer working?

Less clicks, less sales or both?

[samwest]

I'm on a VERY slight uptick too, but it's expected seasonal and VERY sporadic. I can sit for an hour with not a visitor then suddenly bang! it's back on. Round and round she goes, where she'll stop, nobody knows.

Overlaying old data from 2007-2014 makes me sick to my stomach...today same rank, no added direct competition, much bigger audience and yet 80 to 90% drop. Google is laughing...all the way to the bank.