5 Things You Can Do When Your Sites Goes Down in the Google Rankings
Maybe this has happened to you: you awaken one morning to find your site has disappeared from the search engine universe, nowhere to be found. Even if it’s only dropped a few pages, it may as well be a hundred.
What do you need to do? Scream at your SEO guy? Pop open that Christmas bourbon a wee bit early in the day? Blame it on the President?
Changes in ranking happen regularly, but larger shifts as a result of an algorithm change are more dramatic, and can wreak havoc. While this is not at all within our control, have a look at these 5 ways you can help stem the carnage.
5 Strategies to minimize a drop in rankings
Have a site and rankings monitor in place – It’s a very good idea to have your site’s search engine position monitored, so you can not only see when there is a huge problem, but also the trends that are taking place over time in your rankings. There is no substitute for this kind of intelligence.
Plug into social media more – There is a vast audience out there you can turn to for help with traffic and links, and this is social media. While it may be harder in some ways to convert this traffic, the mere fact that’s coming is a sign that your pages are still relevant, and this matters to Google.
Look at your Google Webmaster Tools – This is a valuable resource that can help you spot penalties and SEO issues quickly. If you are not signed up for this, avail yourself of it immediately. It is free and is packed with useful assistance.
Look into your SEO – when there are ranking problems, it’s always wise to look in the mirror first. See what if any SEO issues there are with your pages, such as missing title tags, descriptions, alt tags, flash and some of the other 200 or so ranking factors. Like it or not, these issues are part of how Google ranks you pages.
Produce more content and links – Make it your mission to carry on and create good content and incoming backlinks. It might be a smart idea to expand your topic and keyword profile at this point, while still remaining relevant, to see if these pages begin to rank well.
