Still seeing a terrible rank drop after last algo update?!

[snowflake74]

I'm still stumped as to why the ranking has gone so poor on a whitehat site. (see attached image)

As you can see we've steadily been improving the ranking over the last 6+ months and then got hit with a massive change this month... I can't physically see any issues and Moz isn't reporting anything negatively that would have such a major effect..

Like not as if the drops were subtle... they've all gone into the 50+ section!

Any insights into what may have changed in the latest algo update would be appreciated?!

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[VERBInteractive]

Hi Snowflake,

I'm not familiar with this outputted graph, so I'm going to assume the colors in the stack columns are various ranges of ranks (if you can clarify which color means what that might help for those of us that use a different product for tracking keyword rank). Assuming the line is measuring organic traffic it looks good, a slight dip in the shortest month of the year doesn't set off any red flags for me. Can you provide the URL of the site, I'd be curious to run it through my research tools to see if I can't spot a pattern.

[snowflake74]

Hi Verb - yep the rank graphic is from Moz's tools. Green is keyword 1-3, blue is 3-10,ect and red is 50+ ie might as well not be ranked!

I should say the dip in july for traffic was purely because analytics was removed accidentally from the site and not spotted soon enough.

The main pattern I'm picking up on is showing how we've done well organically historically moving the same keywords up the rankings and then BANG this month we are almost seeing as many 50+ keywords as we had over 6 months ago! ie back to where we started almost... I've sent you a pm with the url!

Thanks very much

[VERBInteractive]

Hi Snowflake, although we do use Moz for some tracking, we don't pay particular attention to the keyword ranking aspect of the tool. If I remember correctly it is based on inputted keywords, if rank has dropped but traffic is steady it tells me that the keyword list might be need of updating.

What region is your key market? When I run your site through looking at Google US I don't see any keywords in the converting 1-3 position, although I do see a 67% increase in first page rankings, mostly lower on the page. When running the site through Google UK I do see 2 keywords in the 1-3 position, (french summer school, french summer camp) combined monthly searches of 80. Historically these didn't rank at all before this month, so that is a plus. Plus there is some pretty good intent with those terms.

How does your organic traffic look in Google Analytics? Or you seeing the same dip?

french summer school

[snowflake74]

Hi Verb,

Normally the keyword / phrase ranking tool is updated weekly on moz and does seem to accurately reflect close to live data which is the main reason I'm perplexed. saying that I did just check a really simple keyword that moved to 50+ "french course morzine" that should easily be number 1 and it was.... so I wonder if whatever madness has happened will be reflected and put back on the next monthly update / weekly update.

We mainly use Google UK/GB for our campaign but do also have alternative language sites that are small but starting to grow.

I've attached a screenshot of the organic traffic it shows a pretty steady pattern of views.. feb received 800 sessions more than this time last year for instance. (again ignore july as thats when analytics was disconnected by accident).

I just don't know why Moz/Google would have us down for 12% visibility with our keywords and then decide to drop off so many of them to 50+ positions and the visibility of our site is now 7%ish for the same keywords / phrases..

Are you allowed to recommend keyword rank tracking tools to me that are outside of moz's products? or pm me some suggestions maybe?

Many thanks

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[VERBInteractive]

Hi Snowflake,

I think you need to find a keyword tracking tool that lets you know search volume, Moz's keyword tracking does not. For example "french course morzine" has no search volume in the states or the UK. So it doesn't matter where you rank for it since no one searches for it and there is no chance of click through.

You need to determine the search volume of your tracked keywords so you can cull the herd and put your efforts into battles you that are actually worth winning. You could look for a keyword tracking software that offers search volume (my current tools are at the enterprise level, so will not be cost efficient for just one site, a tools I used a few years back was SEOprofiler, and it worked rather well) or you could use the built in AdWords keyword planner tool and look up individual keywords and record the monthly search volume and competition level for each term. The first option will have a monthly cost + time, the second will have a monthly time cost.

In short, your organic traffic is up YOY so you are doing things along the right path. The only issue is the what you are tracking.

I hope that helps, good luck!

[snowflake74]

Thanks for the information Verb - the reason we track those other keywords separately from traffic is because I normally find their rank a good marker around the primary keywords but I understand what you're saying so there is more clarity in the focus.

I'll look for one of those tools and see if SEOprofiler works or similar. I've done the adwords method before but it's a bit laborious so I would prefer something automated if possible.

Thanks for the reassurance! It appears that yesterday evenings tracking in moz has updated and a lot of keywords have gone back up again so fingers crossed there was just a glitch / settling in phase!

Thanks