Added content to site, dropped 5 spots

Discussion in 'Search Engine Optimization' started by atlas812, Jul 13, 2009.

  1. #1
    Hi,

    3 days ago I added keyword rich content on the home page of my site, today I checked and I dropped 5 spots.

    The content had the keyword I was targeting, and it was used the same number of times as the first guy. The only difference was that my article actually made sense when you read it...

    Does anybody have any idea why google dropped me?
     
    atlas812, Jul 13, 2009 IP
  2. SpyrosPan

    SpyrosPan Peon

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    #2
    Don't worry about that it's the natural process. You will be seeing those ups and downs continually. Just go on creating more content and your website will hopefully get more value over time and you will be more easily found by the search engines.
     
    SpyrosPan, Jul 13, 2009 IP
  3. daniel@mainehost.com

    daniel@mainehost.com Peon

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    #3
    Was any of the content you added already on the internet, copyright protected or not? If so, if Google sees the content with a document creation date later than the original content Google will penalize your page rank. Changing the content at least 25% usually minimizes this effect on duplicate content.
     
    daniel@mainehost.com, Jul 13, 2009 IP
  4. atlas812

    atlas812 Active Member

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    #4
    The content was unique. I just hope that they don't penalize me for using the keyword too much.
     
    atlas812, Jul 13, 2009 IP
  5. Canonical

    Canonical Well-Known Member

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    #5
    If you have a page that is ranking well already, I would suggest NOT making major changes to the page. You should consider making one or two minor tweaks at the time and then waiting on the page to be recrawled/reindexed a time or two. See what the changes do to your rankings... If the changes are positive then move on to the next tweak. If negative then wait on it to be recrawled/reindexed another time or two. If the rankings don't rebound then roll back to the previous version of the page.

    The search engines like for sites to update their content/add new content... But generally this does NOT mean making major changes to the content on a page that already ranks well. The best way to "update your site" or "add new content" is to add new pages to your site. The more pages you have on your site, the more keyword phrases you can target. Each page can focus on a single keyword phrase.

    Having a keyword on your page the same number of times that the guy in #1 has it on their page is not going to make you rank for that keyword. This is probably the poorest way to attempt to SEO your pages. The number of times the keyword appears on the page is MUCH less important than WHERE it appears on the page (<title>, <h1>, <h2>) or more imporantly whether that keyword appears as the link text on other pages on your site and other sites that link to your page. In fact, I can easily make a page rank for a particular keyword when that page doesn't even contain that keyword simply by getting inbound links from other pages using that keyword as the link text. My home page ranks for all kinds of keyword phrases that don't even appear on the page simply because of inbound links.
     
    Canonical, Jul 13, 2009 IP
  6. mrandrei

    mrandrei Peon

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    #6
    Google dance after updating the content of your site is just natural. Expect to get your ranking back in a few days. Just keep on building quality links for your site.
     
    mrandrei, Jul 13, 2009 IP
  7. newostar

    newostar Peon

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    #7
    I know it is frustrating to see your site go down after putting work into it. However, like others have said, you just have to be patient - your ranking will go up again in Google.

    Just on a side note, you also have to be careful how much you use your keyword. Often Google doesn't like when you excessively use sales speak, such as lots of !!! and you, you, you.

    Good luck. Report back in a week.
     
    newostar, Jul 13, 2009 IP
  8. atniz

    atniz Well-Known Member

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    #8
    Dropping 5 spots does not sounds like a penalty to me. It will be alot worse if penalty incur. My guess is that you just lost some of your quality backlinks there. Work on that, on see if you can bring up to higher SERP position.
     
    atniz, Jul 14, 2009 IP
  9. joelchrist

    joelchrist Banned

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    #9
    Dont change your cotent often. dont pull lot of keywords into your content. becoz that will lead you to face some problem.
     
    joelchrist, Jul 14, 2009 IP
  10. Frost813

    Frost813 Peon

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    #10
    hmmm, so you suggest an anti SEO approach, interesting.

    Frequently updated content keeps spiders coming back to your site, and the more often you have new content for them, the more often the will crawl your site.

    As for the keywords in your content, don't stuff it full of keywords. Just make sure that the content sounds natural, and not like your trying to push your keyword, and you should be fine.
     
    Frost813, Jul 14, 2009 IP
  11. atlas812

    atlas812 Active Member

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    #11
    thank you for all the replies, I regained about 2 positions but I'm still down 3. From your experience, what would be a good keyword density? 1-3%?
     
    atlas812, Jul 24, 2009 IP
  12. blake3334

    blake3334 Member

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    #12
    A good keyword density to me is 1.5% - 2%, you really don't want it to be to high because you might get slapped in the face by google.
     
    blake3334, Jul 24, 2009 IP
  13. Frost813

    Frost813 Peon

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    #13
    Keyword density can actually be very high with no adverse effects on your ranking, it really depends on how much content you have on the page, and how natural the keyword usage is in the text. The content on the page should read naturally, and so you shouldn't use the keyword any more than you would in natural speech.

    If you have little content on the page, then your keyword density will naturally be higher than that of a page with 300 words or more.

    -------------------------------------------------
    I just read that again, and I have to say that it reads well, and if "natural" were a keyword of mine, I would have great KW Density. :)
     
    Frost813, Jul 24, 2009 IP