Does #1 Ranking Actually Mater?

From the two images you can see that 55% click rank 1, 1.5% click rank 9. 8% reach page 2 so 55% of 8% click rank 11, 4%.

You are correct but I'd still prefer to be rank 9 than 11, it's easier to reach rank 1, 2 or 3 from rank 9 than 11.

 

Interesting to see only talk about clicks and traffic, nothing about conversion. #1 is great, but if it doesn't create converting traffic it's as useless as position 100.

 

...if you're ranking for a half decent keyword 10,000 visitors will convert at the same ratio at 1,000 so the higher the rank the better.

 

A UK 'seo' company that I spoke to last year - a company founded in 1994 doing web development and later SEO - I was told their research showed that the site ranked number 1 for a search term gets approx. 60% of traffic. Second got 20% followed by around 15%, then 10% and fifth place brought in 5%, with the latter 5% being split between 6th and 10th place.

These were obviously guesstimations, but based on their research in 2006 this was assumed correct.

I have noticed a notable increase in traffic on a certain product page on my site by jumping from out of the top 10 into the top ten. Traffic doubled going from average for the month being 9th place in Google UK. I am now 3rd in Google UK for this phrase and traffic has raised by around 70% for this keyword. So yes, I would say being number 1 certainly matters.

I also think when a specific search phrase wields Adsense ads at the top of the listings, the normally 1st position isn't the most hit. Don't know why, that's just the way the cookie crumbles, I guess.

Would be interesting if someone had 1st, 2nd and 3rd place in Google for a reasonably well keyword, and could show some stats that this keyword produced for their sites.

 

I've noticed this in my own experience... I get some decent traffic ranked #11 or #12. It seems to be better than ranking at the bottom of page 1.

 

Yes it matters if you are in the #1 position. I also believe anything past the 3rd page people generally get bored and move onto something else. Unless they are into some deep research or something.

 

Yeah the top always shows the most relevant search terms that you were looking for.

 

Thanks for sharing the images, this is exactly what I was talking about.

It is everyone's choice to preffer a position or other but please bear in mind that for a medium to competitive key phrase the difference between 1.5% and 4% it might be translated in hundreds of daily visitors.

Also from my experience...it has always been easier for me to jump from second page to first 5-6 positions then to climb from 9th or 10th. For some reason it seem that it takes longer to improve your rankings when you are 9 or 10 comparing with being on the second page and making the final jump.

Just my 2c

Thanks

 

If you are a general use, definitely you will click on #1 ranking site. But you are experienced in search a term, you will look at different factors, like terms in title, in description, some time if you are search for specific term like a pdf file then you will look at url also. According to user search depends the hits.

 

No. 1 is of course the best place to be..

 

if you are in a highly competitive market #1 can mean the difference between earning 10k a day and 1k a day.

 

#1 rank get huge traffic, visitor always click the top result, and being in top 10 are essential... targeting in top rank is important

 

This analysis is interesting, it sort of conflicts with a different chart as saw in a large SEO forum which says the complete opposite of what is asserted in this thread.

 

I think ranking 1st matters a lot.

I used to be on the second position in search results, when I moved to the 1st place for some time, I saw a big increase in my traffic.

 

the graphs are interesting, but what are you basing this on? Have you been in each position long enough to collect stats for those spots? Or was it based on a guess?

 

It has been proven that Number one ranking brings the most traffic in.

Will.

 

I think ranking #1 in any search-engine is very important, though I would not call it common sense. I think it depends on the extent to which internet-users are savvy. The more experienced people are with search-engine results, the greater their tendency to look at which title and description most closely adhere their expectation before selecting the link to click on.

Doesn't matter. I've seen one of those heat maps (I can't come up with the name of the company that produces them) of the first pages in Google, which shows that most people look most frequently at the website that ranks first and at the advertisements above it. The websites that are ranked lower receive very little “eye-contact”. If you're interested, there is a free tool from LabsMedia that can produce heat maps of websites.

Really? Could you provide a reference? Your statement contradicts the results of the SERP Click Distribution from SEO Researcher, which show a gradually decreasing clicking rate. The scientific study on Eye-Tracking Analysis of User Behavior in WWW Search from Cornell University shows similar results on the effect of the search-engine ranking position on the number of visits.

 

yes, #1 is the place to be. it gets the most traffic 100% of the time.

 

I have been sitting at #2 for a while and would love to get to #1. I believe that the top 3 positions get 80% of all the hits, so being top 10 is good but top 3 is essential.

 

It's called #1 for a reason.