Has anyone had this happen to their site?

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btee

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Hi all -

I have an old site that includes a blog and other content - much of it user generated.

My blog posts rank well, generally - even new ones. For example one of my recent articles outranks NBC News, Buzzfeed, Reddit.

However, whatever I seem to do to write more articles or otherwise improve the site, the amount of clicks in GSC is like, exactly the same.

And the overall traffic is quite low - like 150/day from Google. A long while back my traffic halved, but this was way way before the HCU or these recent upheavals, which haven't affected it.

Is this normal? Am I just not publishing frequently enough? Has anyone experienced this phenomenon? It's very strange to me. Thanks.
 
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Yep. This is new normal on Google. You can write as much as you want but Google won't let you go far. Adding more content simply doesn't work any more. I tested it on many sites.
 
What I don't understand is how the new articles are ranking well, but the overall traffic remains the same. Big G has their thumb on the scale, for sure. I'd think of changing URLs but it has a good number of backlinks, a DR of 66, etc.
 
You can buy traffic through a number of sites This is just one way to do it Personal opinion only
 
btee said:
What I don't understand is how the new articles are ranking well, but the overall traffic remains the same. Big G has their thumb on the scale, for sure. I'd think of changing URLs but it has a good number of backlinks, a DR of 66, etc.
Click to expand...
The traffic you should have get went to other parts of google features... like PAA, more ads, more direct asnwers to people questions etc... Google doesn't want people to leave Google.... unless it is via paid ads. So... your ranking may still be good but there is no more power in this than years ago. Organic search results are no longer priority or even second priority after ads.
 
I have seen bigger sites getting a lot of fluctuations in their rankings. I have worked on one recently and I have seen one of my posts on it ranking #1 down to #4 with the first three positions taken by forums.

The site isn't just a regular content website, it's a major authority website. So, Google has other plans.
 
Thanks for the info and tips. I'll probably do what others are and diversify my traffic sources. Definitely can't depend on Google one way or the other these days.
 
btee said:
Hi all -

I have an old site that includes a blog and other content - much of it user generated.

My blog posts rank well, generally - even new ones. For example one of my recent articles outranks NBC News, Buzzfeed, Reddit.

However, whatever I seem to do to write more articles or otherwise improve the site, the amount of clicks in GSC is like, exactly the same.

And the overall traffic is quite low - like 150/day from Google. A long while back my traffic halved, but this was way way before the HCU or these recent upheavals, which haven't affected it.

Is this normal? Am I just not publishing frequently enough? Has anyone experienced this phenomenon? It's very strange to me. Thanks.
Click to expand...
Just publishing content is not enough right... You could try to write something of interest to the general public. After all, it would attract attention grab some and organic traffic towards your blog via Google..
 
hammadians said:
Just publishing content is not enough right... You could try to write something of interest to the general public. After all, it would attract attention grab some and organic traffic towards your blog via Google..
Click to expand...
For sure. I've been targeting keywords that are both evergreen and others more newsworthy that aren't covered as well elsewhere. As I mentioned those are ranking quite well, but I swear every tool/article I rank must bring down the other pages that used to rank, because the overall traffic never changes. I think the site's in a gray zone at Google where they aren't ready to fully trust it or something. I'll just keep improving it since there's no real downside other than wasting some of my time.
 
btee said:
I think the site's in a gray zone at Google where they aren't ready to fully trust it or something. I'll just keep improving it since there's no real downside other than wasting some of my time.
Click to expand...

I don't know if it's been mentioned already, but how old is your site?

How often did you try to put & rank new content?
 
PHPInjected said:
I don't know if it's been mentioned already, but how old is your site?

How often did you try to put & rank new content?
Click to expand...
It's about 20 years old. Only recently have I posted anything to intentionally rank - say a few years. It's a SaaS/community site. There are ~1 million pages of forum posts and user images, but the bulk of the Google traffic goes to the blog, which is where those articles I mentioned ranking well are located.
 
Usually I just write what I want to write.
Or follow the example of others:)
 
Yes, it is. This is the new normal for Google.
It's normal.
 
Thanks to all the non-bots for the insights :) Appreciated.
 
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