I'm struggling with ranking for a really important keyword!

[Cubiqdesign]

I'm helping with SEO for a client who has a very old website, but is updated regularly and has lots of relevant content for the keywords i'm looking to rank for. For other keywords we are able to get to position #3 on Google, yet for this one - the name of the town the website is about - we rank on page 15 of Google. I haven't done anything differently between the two and I really can't see why we can't get there.

I've just done the monthly report for the client, and it's showing as being at position #1 for all of July - I checked during that month, and it wasn't. And then on 1st August it dropped to page 20 of Google. I understand slight fluctuations but this is pretty major.

Can anyone help?

[Nigel_Carr]

Hi John

What's the URL?

It's probably that the name of the town is in every title, some kind of duplication issue - let me see the site and I can tell you more.

Regards

Nigel

[chrissmithps]

Aren't we all lol!

Firstly I'd look at which websites rank higher than you. If it's websites such as Trip Advisor or Wikipedia etc, this can be difficult as they have such a trusted domain and many backlinks etc.

That is a major jump though. Is the website optimised for mobile? Google wants to present it's user with relevant content and a good user experience. So check if your Bounce Rate has increased over the past few months.

I've wrote a quick list of things I personally would check;

• Competition (Who is above you on Google)
• Bounce Rate
• Backlinks (you may have lost some with strong domain authority)
• Duplicate Content
• Over use of the search term

Be good to hear how you get on!

[MiriamEllis]

Hi John,

It would be super helpful to the community if you can share the both the website you're referencing, as well as the exact keyword phrase you're trying to rank for. Also, please let us know if you're aiming for local or organic rankings. Without this information, I'm afraid we can only make random guesses, which aren't going to be helpful to your specific scenario.