Sudden Ranked Drop? Google Algo Update?

Any updates?

nakamura said:

sure you are right. But some guys on here make it sound like “the problem are 301s” or “its because of expired domains” and thats just wrong and misleading. The “update” is still going on. On my behalf I see lots of changes everytime i refresh the serps. This thread has 17 pages now. I was reading every single post and my conclusion is there is not much in common.

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Yeah, but even the fact that "there is not much in common" actually tells us that this update probably hit several different areas. So the fact that we don't know, we now know it's not a specific thing. If that makes sense. Hence; discussing it here is a good thing IMO.

All I'm saying is; it's a good thing if people share if they got hit, and what link building strategies and so on they've been using.

It is COULD be a conspiracy to assume that Google does these updates specifically to attract advertisers. But, it COULD be naive to think that they don't want more advertisers by disrupting SERP positions. It could be more or less correct to assume that it is probably down the middle, but we will never know?

On the other hand, most of the big-budget companies are advertising on Google and Youtube already. Squeezing out every small business owner by changing their algorithm to hinder organic traffic, forcing them to advertise on Adwords would be counter-productive as it will lead to higher CPC and unprofitable campaigns.

This is why Facebook ads are a failure for most businesses; the newsfeed has such a high cost, that the margins for products are so low it wouldn't be worth selling. You are either breaking even or running at cost. This is why Shopify Dropshopping is a near-dead business model for the majority of the audience that was sold a bullshit dream from a clueless guru that made their first sale by selling a course.

Keep in mind: SEO is big business; not just for link builders and agencies, but for Google as well.

Don't underestimate Google understanding of the SEO industry:

They are the SEO industry.

They are not competing against it.

There is no "versus".

It is basically Google.

For every business that spawns into existence, there will always be an SEO company mass marketing businesses into the Google dream.
This is something I'm sure Google wants; just consider how many of these marketing efforts turn into Adword Management. I'm sure it is in the tunes of millions. If I'm Google, I wouldn't want my top affiliates being dropped off either. If Google were to pull a mass apocalypse and put every SEO company out of business, it wouldn't benefit them at all and will probably do the complete opposite.

sickminds said:

Any updates?

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For today I see any update with the normal traffic on my site. How about traffic on other site any update ?

a lot of site are getting hit day by day by google latest update

Kelvin Hernata said:

For today I see any update with the normal traffic on my site. How about traffic on other site any update ?

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My website are still dancing. Went from #1 to #60 to #30, then disappeared, then came back at #40, disappeared again etc. Totally random. What is stunning is what is ranking instead in the Top 10. Spammy sites, parasites with keyword stuffing, 10 years old articles etc. it will definitely change.

Some keywords rank but slow. Traffic still drop 8x%

Keywords barely even moved since Dec 16. I'm going to add a few links to see how it goes. Onpage is optimized btw.

I have a 6 months old travel Website (.de). So far every Google update has been good for me. So also this time. My about 40 tracked keywords have increased by 4.7 positions on average compared to last weekend. 5 top 5 and 17 top 10 rankings. Of course not a huge search volume, it is a niche site with just 30 indexed pages.

I have not used an expired domain, no 301's, no backlinks built (the site has not one good backlink yet), zero black-hat. I just have good content, because I write about an island, where I really was and I am enthusiastic about it.

For me it looks like high authority sites are getting ranked higher. Sites with lower authority are pushed down.

bahus said:

It's clear that you did something to get from zero to over 300 in a short period of time. It's also obvious that whatever you did, google didn't like it and put your website right where it was before. Did you build links, bought PBNs, did redirects?

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Yes, I used pbn, I created back links myself and also created more than 40 links through xranker. The total number of backlinks is 145 (these are the ones that appear in the Google Serch Console), but it seems to me that the scale is not so big as to give me a hit in the ranking. I could be wrong, I'm the second month in SEO.

Rachmaninoff said:

Keywords barely even moved since Dec 16. I'm going to add a few links to see how it goes. Onpage is optimized btw.

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What tool is this please?

Antoxar59 said:

Yes, I used pbn, I created back links myself and also created more than 40 links through xranker. The total number of backlinks is 145 (these are the ones that appear in the Google Serch Console), but it seems to me that the scale is not so big as to give me a hit in the ranking. I could be wrong, I'm the second month in SEO.

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Thanks for the heads up. I don't think that the amount of links is the issue. It could be quality of the links, so initially, google had given you a boost but seeing low-quality links they took it back, this may have nothing to do with the update, it's just how google operates. Another thing that might have set your website back is anchor text. Google doesn't like when exact anchor text is used too many times. If that's the case, what you could do is change the anchor text of the links you have access to. If that doesn't help, start disavowing or removing (if you can) low-quality links. If this doesn't work, start removing links from your PBN and watch if there is an improvement in ranking. To be able to see what works and what doesn't you have to use another tool to track the rank of your keywords. GSC isn't best for that. SERPROBOT gives you like 25 free keywords to track, if you're on a budget, you might start with that. Another thing to keep in mind is when you make a change give it a week or two before making another. Otherwise, you won't know what works and what doesn't. And when you change anything regarding links (anchor text or delete them) run it through indexation to force google bot see that change. It speeds things up a bit. All the best!

I already try to disavow link. Hope it can works.

well, one of my sites which was ranked first on some queries had disappeared from the radars following the update, it had fallen into the abyssal depths of Google ( 20 th page and more ). Today I look at it and it went back up to the 1st page on some queries and in top position!
I don't think there's any real logic behind... Since the update I've made some minor changes to my site:
- I have removed the disavow file that I had created long time ago and that was linked to my site.
- I also realized that on many of my pages I had left affiliate links in 'do follow' and I changed everything to 'nofollow'.
To be honest, I am not sure these small changes have something to do with it. It's maybe totaly random.

Rafiki59 said:

well, one of my sites which was ranked first on some queries had disappeared from the radars following the update, it had fallen into the abyssal depths of Google ( 20 th page and more ). Today I look at it and it went back up to the 1st page on some queries and in top position!
I don't think there's any real logic behind... Since the update I've made some minor changes to my site:
- I have removed the disavow file that I had created long time ago and that was linked to my site.
- I also realized that on many of my pages I had left affiliate links in 'do follow' and I changed everything to 'nofollow'.
To be honest, I am not sure these small changes have something to do with it. It's maybe totaly random.

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Not sure but I don’t think Google react to your changes that quickly.

My personal strange theory:
1. The update hast nothing to do with 301. I guess google is able to remove the power of a 301, but the targeted site will not get a penalty. Simply because you can target some 301 to your competitor to harm him.
2. The analytics bug, the "algorithm update" is a result of the data loss from beginning of 2019 (9th to 25th april). I launched my site on may 2019.
3. The number of visitors and rankings nowdays are very similar to the first week i launched my website. It feels like google did a complete trust reset for my website (this would be look very similar). I think they tried to merge some data in backround and it fails...

The basic question is:
Everyone who is affected from this "bug" ... did he get now same visitors like in the first week of april?

Rafiki59 said:

well, one of my sites which was ranked first on some queries had disappeared from the radars following the update, it had fallen into the abyssal depths of Google ( 20 th page and more ). Today I look at it and it went back up to the 1st page on some queries and in top position!
I don't think there's any real logic behind... Since the update I've made some minor changes to my site:
- I have removed the disavow file that I had created long time ago and that was linked to my site.
- I also realized that on many of my pages I had left affiliate links in 'do follow' and I changed everything to 'nofollow'.
To be honest, I am not sure these small changes have something to do with it. It's maybe totaly random.

Click to expand...

There's a plugin called WP External Links, it can set all external links to nofollow.

bagle said:

The basic question is: Everyone who is affected from this "bug" ... did he get now same visitors like in the first week of april?

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Not at all for me

A few of my main kws went from 8-10 to 50, 60, some even disappeared.
No PBN, only a dozen of guest posts.