URL disappeared from the search results

[Chemometec]

Hey folks,

A URL on my webpage that has been climbing in search results ever since has suddenly completely disapeared from the search results and i'm absolutely stuck - no idea what the reason might be.

It was ranked #11 for the targeted keyword, than it slightly started dropping down to #14 and #17 after which it completely disappeared, not only for specific targeted keyword, but also for exact name of the product. The URL has vanished from search results.

I looked in search console, no particular errors or messages from Google.

The only case I might come with is that many URLs are cannonicaly linked to the URL in matter, but i don't assume this might be the case.

Does anyone have a suggestion what might the reason why the URL has completely vanished from the search results? Thank you a lot.

The URL:  http://chemometec.com/cell-counters/cell-counter-nc-200-nucleocounter/

Targeted keyword: 'cell counter'

[DmitriiK]

Hi there.

I played with keyphrases, positions etc and what's happening is that your index page is optimized better for those keyphrases than the page itself. Also I have noticed that the product page looks keyword stuffed like Thanksgiving turkey. Maybe that's the issue?

Also all pages have canonical links to itself. You have http://chemometec.com/product/nucleocounter-nc-200/ and http://chemometec.com/cell-counters/cell-counter-nc-200-nucleocounter/ but both have canonicals to itself. Competing with each other maybe?

Also I noticed that i get absolutely different SERs for "NucleoCounter NC-200" and "NucleoCounter NC200". In first case you don't rank, or at least not the product pages.

Make sure that you have internal linking with proper keywords, all your canonicals are in order and there is no overstuffing. At the same time use some phrases without trademark or rights marks. All this might be issues.

As for your phrase - your index page is coming up on second page, which means, again, it's more optimized (or may be not overoptimized in comparison with a product page.

Anyway, I'd look into canonicals first, then into page optimizations.

[Chemometec]

Hello Dmitri,

Thank you very much for detailed review on my issue, i appreciate it a lot.

How do you mean all pages have canonical links to itself? It is the first time i hear that a link have a canonical to itself (!?) I am using Yoast SEO plugin, that is how i manage my canonical links. Only canonical links i have are manually added pointing to the URLs i want to rank.

Thank you!

[DmitriiK]

Hi, sorry, I must have saw something what didn't exist. So, don't mind what I said about that. However, if I go to http://chemometec.com/product/nucleocounter-nc-200/ it has canonical to http://chemometec.com/cell-counters/cell-counter-nc-200-nucleocounter/ which, in turn, has canonical to http://chemometec.com/journal/nucleocounter-nc-200-the-most-precise-cell-counter/ which does have canonical to itself, meaning that canonical link tag points to http://chemometec.com/journal/nucleocounter-nc-200-the-most-precise-cell-counter/

Why to have this type of chain canonicals and also self-canonicals? I think it'd be better to canonicalize to the "end of chain", and for that "end of chain" don't have a canonical whatsoever.

[Chemometec]

Hi Dimitri,

Thanks again for taking time to help.

'The end of the chain' is http://chemometec.com/cell-counters/cell-counter-nc-200-nucleocounter/

And that is the only page that should rank. I have changed it so that other two links are canonically pointing to the 'end of the chain'. The confusion was because the 'end of chain' after being #11 has disappeared from SERP, which i don't understand why. Maybe keyword stuffing(!?) - i will try to reduce keywords ('cell counter') on the page.

Should continue to keep 'end of the chain' as it is and hope it will come back to SERP or should i use different strategy and use the landing page <a rel="nofollow" target="_blank">http://chemometec.com/journal/nucleocounter-nc-200-the-most-precise-cell-counter/</a> as the 'end of the chain' which is currently ranked high?

I still don't understand how it is possible that i have pages canonically linking to itself (!?) I havn't done it. Can it be possible that Yoast SEO is doing that?

Thanks in advance. You are really helping here.

[Chemometec]

If I may ask how you are able to see which URLs have canonical links on my site? Which tool are you using?

[DmitriiK]

Yoast automatically creates canonical links to itself, unless you specify otherwise or "teach" Yoast to behave otherwise.

[DmitriiK]

It's magical tool of "View source code" on a page

Ctrl+U in most browsers. Or right click - view source.

[Chemometec]

'Inspect element' - sorry for asking and thank you very much for the help.

[Chemometec]

But, what is your experience, should i expect my 'end of the chain' to return back on search results? Or is it better strategy to go for another page to rank, in this case <a rel="nofollow" target="_blank">http://chemometec.com/journal/nucleocounter-nc-200-the-most-precise-cell-counter/?</a>

[DmitriiK]

Correct, the "end of chain" is what you want to rank.