Google Search Traffic Down
by Frank Jovine on 09/28/2009 in Google
In the last 2 months, I have been keeping a close eye on 5 websites that I currently track analytics for and noticed that Google search traffic is down by 50% across the board. This is a substantial decrease and one that I am sure many can’t answer why. Did Google change their algorithm in August?
I have been browsing some of the SEO forums and I came across very little information in regard to Google search traffic being down. It seems to me that Google is dropping many pages (not sure how many) from its index.
Search Analytics from June to August 2009
August Search Engines – 4,182.00 (21.63%)
July Search Engines – 10,462.00 (48.43%)
June Search Engines – 9,904.00 (46.75%)
Search traffic has dropped by more than 50% from July to August. The referring sites also have dropped in traffic by 30%.
Here’s a post I found at webmasterworld.com – “We usually had about 8000 long tail keyword referrals every day, now we hardly get 800″.
This tells me that something in Google’s Algorithm has changed in mid September, but I think it has been ongoing since the beginning of August. This could be due to the testing that’s going on for Caffeine. Read more about Google Caffeine.
The last Google Pagerank update occurred on September 11th for those who were wondering.
I would love to hear feedback on your search traffic from June to August.
Kikolani
Sep 28th, 2009
Google search traffic has actually been moving up for Kikolani and one of my client sites between June and August. Not significantly, but it is definitely not down. I have noticed that the number of URL’s submitted is usually less than the number indexed, so I agree that they are not indexing everything.
I was totally unaware of the PR update. Thanks for the info!
~ Kristi
.-= Kikolani´s last blog ..Meet Our New Kitten Natasha =-.
Frank J
Sep 28th, 2009
Kristi,
Tech is a very competitive niche and I am not ruling that out, but this change is pretty drastic. I get paid for living for SEO/SEM and have searched everything under the sun.
Klaus @ TechPatio
Sep 28th, 2009
What, the last pagerank update was September 11th? Aww man, I didn’t get a pagerank, I’m still at 0. How unfortunate
.-= Klaus @ TechPatio´s last blog ..Top 5 Ways To Make Money On The Internet =-.
Frank J
Sep 28th, 2009
Klaus,
0 is better than na.
John
Sep 28th, 2009
An educational site of mine went up in August then down in Sept., but this is a normal seasonal trend for that niche. Generally though, the Google update in July/August seemed to have a significantly negative effect on my search ranks for every niche.
Yet Caffeine looks like its going to put my site back where it was for keywords back in May or June – and in some cases much higher. The whole July-now situation has basically sucked, despite the nice seasonal bump in the one specific niche.
On the one hand, less competitive keywords seem to have higher likelihood of triggering penalties and link devaluation. On the other hand, highly competitive ones still seem to rely on mass linking and mini Google bombs.
.-= John´s last blog ..SEO – The Reality is Staggering =-.
Michael Aulia
Sep 28th, 2009
Do you think this is because of new the Google Caffeine change of algorithm perhaps? (unless if it hasn’t been actually rolled out)
My search engine traffic remains the same, about 500-600 a day
.-= Michael Aulia´s last blog ..Want to be a great blogger? Be an ant! =-.
Frank J
Sep 29th, 2009
Michael,
That’s what I suggested in my article, but hopefully it’s a momentary issue and not permanent.
Neva Flores
Sep 28th, 2009
I started using Bing a few months back. I never use Google anymore.
Frank J
Sep 29th, 2009
Neva,
As I stated above in another reply, I am thinking along those lines as well.
A. Zuck
Sep 29th, 2009
I wish search traffic was more equally distributed among the various search engines. If they were this type of variability wouldn’t be such a big deal.
I have made the switch to Bing too and I am not looking back.
Frank J
Sep 29th, 2009
Jason,
I am thinking along those lines as well. Bing seems to serve up more of my pages better on keyword phrases that I am targeting.
Faqs
Sep 29th, 2009
Google changes their algorithms on a regular basis. A couple of months ago I noticed a huge drop in rankings for one of my site that has remained unchanged for 2 years and has been ranking very high every since. I reckon this the last algo change was implemented some time ago and it is applied to more and more indexed sites as we are discussing this.
Frank J
Sep 29th, 2009
I wish I knew all of the particulars that Google implements. I would be first in line or in this case on the first page always for all keyword phases I am targeting.
BunnygotBlog
Sep 29th, 2009
My traffic numbers have been moving up over the last couple months.Now it seems to be down a little.So I am interesting anything to bring it up again. My husband likes Bing better then Google.
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