We killed our SEO, but how come some of our keywords are still in the top 1-3

[Neckermann]

I am looking for the answer for this interesting question:

1. I have a static page with NO information on it, this is almost completelyblank, only a search box on it, which does nothing! The information it contains is absolutely zero, but the page has got a specific URL which is = the keyword i will look for

2. And i have another page which is fully optimized with the help of on page grader (97%) for anoter specific keyword

Q,

in case of 1:

Searching in google for a keyword which is = the page www.domain.hu/keyword, and i will have top 1-3 serp!???? (i say it again, the page contains no information...and the keyword is really frequent, in google adwords it says that this keyword which has got high competition)

in case of 2.

i have the /url which is completely the same as the keyword, have 97% on page grade, and i see that week by week i can only move upwards a little in the serp. Created unique content a lot, made several changes on this page and like no position changing.

So the question is WHY in case 1 i can be with no information in (empty static page) top 1-3 for a really hard keyword, and why i cannot move upward on the list for a not so frequent keyword however i did everything i could??

[JordanLowry]

What does the backlink profile look like for the blank static page?

[MattRoney]

Hi Endre!

For 1, have you tried your search in an incognito window? Is it possible that you're seeing personalized results? And how new is the page?

For 2, have you run any sort of competitive audit? It's entirely possible that your particular competitors are just particularly tough on that term.

[Gyorgy.B]

Hi Endre

It's difficult to give you insights without seeing the actual pages, their backlink profile and the keywords the pages are targeting.

Maybe a previous SEO agency link built the hell out of the empty search page and Google hasn't noticed that it has no valuable content and has bad user experience. Maybe that search page had good content previous and Google hasn't noticed.

Check the empty page with the Wayback Machine (archive.org) and see what it looked like in the past. Check the link profile of the empty page with more than one tool to find all the links it has (Moz, Majestic, Ahrefs).

[BrianJGomez]

What about the on page SEO for the blank page? Anything there? I agree with the other guys, sounds like this blank page has some signals going to it ... possibly a really powerful link (even by accident) that could be pushing it's PA up.