Why have my rankings dropped?

[muzzmoz]

I have a client who has just seen his average page rank creep up from around 39 to 34 over about two months, then it appears to have dropped back to position 40+ in the space of a week.

I believe he's made a lot of changes to targeted keywords, so I'd like to think it's simply because his old targeted keywords are dropping and new keywords still have to build their rankings. But I'm also worried in case he has over-optimised and might get getting penalised.

Any advice on where to start digging?

[EGOL]

When a page is positioned down in the 30s, 40s, or deeper, the rankings will not be rock solid.  They will constantly be moving up and down, down and up, in what many SEOs call "daily flux".   It is not a good idea to attribute these movements to anything.  They are simple fluctuations in how Google presents the SERPs.  I wouldn't even call them "adjustments" in the rankings done by Google because your location, previous browsing, Google experiments, change in rank by almost any website above or many from below could influence.

You can even use a rank checker such as those offered by Moz or SEMrush or any other company and see continuous daily flux in the rankings.

[muzzmoz]

Sorry, I should have been clearer...

• These are not Search Console average positions I'm talking about (I understand about the flux in that tool).
• These are the average rankings of 92 keywords tracked daily using the SE Ranking tool.

[EGOL]

No problem.

I would still give the same answer.

[muzzmoz]

Interesting.

So what is the value of the daily rankings? And at what point should we be worried?

[EGOL]

Here is my experience...

I am a statistics nut and I love numbers, but that can lead you to spend a bit too much time on rank-watching and too much time speculating if there is a meaning to the movements.  I have been watching the ups and downs of baskets of keywords such as those you describe since the 1990s.  Today, I have a few dozen baskets of keywords (a dozen to a hundred keywords per basket)  in a variety of industries that I am watching with SEMrush.

Almost every one of them has some up and down movement daily.  Close competition with just one or two competitors can cause apparent major moves in your averages as they move up and you move down, as you move up and they move down.  This is all part of the flux.

It is rare for a piece of my new content to move to the top of a worthy SERP right away.  Instead, it sits deep and climbs slowly - over weeks, months, even a year or more.  If you get links or do work on the site, those things rarely cause big jumps in your SERPs.  Occasionally that happens, but generally not - unless you have a tiny site.  So, the important thing to do, in my opinion, is to look back 90 days, a year, or more and see what progress you are making against your competitors.  Its the long-term average that is important.

You should be working ever day to improve your position, but that will cook into your SERPs gradually over time.  Tramping down hard on the accelerator, trying to move things with hastily-built content or a bunch of low-quality links is a mistake.  Working for quality is slow and if you have the patience and do great work you will be rewarded for it - in time.  Just keep your head down working, pay attention to your long-term SERPs and don't get too focused on small moves - especially when you are deep in the SERPs.  Your SERPs are of very little value until you are breaking into the first page.

[muzzmoz]

Sounds like solid and wise advice. Thank you!