Indexed Pages Increase and Major Drop June 25th and July 16th?

[kwilgus]

I am seeing information regarding a possible Google algorithm that may have taken place on June 25th...and seeing total number of pages indexed in GSC increase (cool!)...BUT, then on July 16, I'm seeing a consistent drop (BIG DROP) of pages indexed - not only on our site, but several. Does anyone have any insight into this or experiencing the same issue?

[brettmandoes]

Hi Kwilgus,

We've seen major fluctuations across several tools and our own proprietary data sets. One of the tools you could use to help keep track of ranking fluctuations is mozcast (http://mozcast.com/). Click on over to metrics, set to 90 days, and compare domain diversity with daily big 10 - the two seem to have an inverse linear relationship. You'll see that Google is monkeying around with their algorithm and giving preference to fewer sites.

Within our own data set we're noticing ranking fluctuations in the local SERP for August, and on other tools we've noticed some ranking fluctuations on the mobile SERP towards the end of July beginning of August.

So you're not going crazy, things are a little bouncy right now.

[iugac]

I have absolutely no information to base my answer on but am trying to help. One possible scenario (which I hope is not the case) is that you were hacked.  I've seen a few WordPress hacks which take control over your Google Search Console and index a lot of phishing pages.  Again, I hope this is not the case, but I would investigate exactly what pages were indexed in the increase and make sure that my website is secure. Good luck!

[lostsmith]

My site fell from 46,000,000 to 62,000,000 (ahrefs rank, sorry moz... guess you will have to index me) on July 6, 2017, I saw no reason for it. I still do not know why.

I had no unusual indexing increase prior to or during that time.

I have given up on finding out why. If you learn any thing please share it.