7 Reasons Your SEO Rankings May Drop

1. 7 Reasons Your SEO Rankings May Drop If you are running a successful search engine optimization campaign, you have probably enjoyed watched your rankings improve over the course of the campaign. While your rankings are not the only measure of your SEO success, they do give you a handle on the overall impact of your efforts. That is why, if you notice a drop in your rankings, you should take some time to determine why. There are a number of potential causes behind a drop in your search rankings. Following are just a few of them. You have been penalized by Google. The most serious cause for a drop in rankings is a penalty from Google. These penalties typically result in a drastic and rapid disappearance from the search rankings. When you are penalized by Google, you typically drop up to 20 positions in the rankings, and do so over multiple keywords. Google applies these penalties if it feels as if you are using illegitimate (called black hat) SEO techniques (such as buying links) in an attempt to rank well without providing valuable content.

2. When faced with a penalty from Google, you will need to determine which practice earned you the penalty by consulting Google's Webmaster Tools. Once you know what the issue is, you will need to take steps to fix it (i.e. by disavowing bad links) and then submit a reconsideration request to Google. While you can recover from these penalties, it will take time and patience on your part. Google's algorithm has changed. Google's algorithm provides the criteria that its search crawlers use when reviewing and indexing your pages. The search engine is continually updating this algorithm in order to make it better at identifying valuable content. In a single year, Google will sometimes roll out hundreds of updates. While most of these updates are minor, a few of them implement major changes that can significantly impact the performance of certain websites in the search rankings.

3. Because algorithm updates change the criteria that make for successful websites, your site may suffer if it does not meet the new criteria. This is why many websites experience a drop in rankings when a new update is rolled out. The drop you experience may vary from very slight to very large. The best way to identify and fix this problem is to check for updates to the algorithm and to make sure that your site is complying with the most recent changes. You have lost links. Part of your search engine optimization success depends upon the number of reliable inbound links you enjoy. These links are links from other websites to your website. The more of these links that you have from reputable sources, the better you will perform in the search rankings. These links benefit your SEO efforts, because search engine crawlers see these links as proof of the value of your content. Unfortunately, links sometimes disappear. A site may remove the content that contained the link, or may remove the web page altogether. You can identify this type of problem by checking your site's lost links to see if there has been any recent and sudden increase in your number of lost links. The only way to resolve this problem is to engage in good link building practices that will encourage the growth of organic inbound links over time.

4. Your competitors are doing better SEO than you are. Sometimes, you experience a drop in your rankings simply because your competitors are doing a better job at SEO than you are. This type of up and down success is part of the search engine optimization world. You can usually identify this problem by looking at your rankings for certain keywords. If you have experienced a slight drop for one or two keywords, but not for others, than you have likely been out performed by your competition. The best way to fix this problem is to keep it from happening in the first place. You can do this by engaging in ongoing search engine optimization efforts that keep up with the latest changes in the field. Expert SEO services can help you stay on top of the SEO industry and keep up with your competitors.

5. You are experiencing the normal ebb and flow of SEO. Ebb and flow is a natural part of search engine optimization. Sometimes, you will rank in one position in the search results, while another day, you will hold a slightly different position. These variations are generally due to circumstances that are out of your control. These problems are generally characterized by slight drops in the rankings. You can diagnose them by a process of elimination. That is, if you cannot find any other potential cause for a rankings drop, then you are likely facing a normal ebb that will right itself quickly. The best way to deal with these fluctuations in your search rankings is to wait them out. You cannot prevent them or fix them when they occur. Instead, you must accept them as part of life in the SEO world, and give them a few days to work themselves out. There are many more potential causes for ranking drops than those listed above. If you find yourself struggling with ranking drops, you may need help from an SEO company to help you identify and fix the problem. Once you know what the issue is and repair it, you can go on to enjoying the SEO success to which you are accustomed.