Hi, I have recently adjusted the geographic target of my main website from 'nothing' (i.e. check box not ticked) to United States. The reason I did this was because I target the United States and United Kingdom but no matter what I did SEO-wise my website never seemed to rank well in the United States. I had the advantage in the United Kingdom of my webserver being located there so my ranking was quite good there. Now that my 'United States' targeting has kicked in I rank much, much better in the United States - the first page for my most competitive key term and first for my website name (also one of my key terms). My rankings have dropped somewhat in the UK though - I am talking in some cases dropping from 3rd to 10th position on the first page, but for my most competitive UK term I have currently slipped from 1st page to 8th page. I am basically wondering whether I should keep my targeting as it is. The United States seems a lot harder for me to rank in without targeting specifically and there is much more competition and traffic available - so I could keep on working at linkbuilding and hopefully creep back up in the UK and gain even higher positions in the US... Or should I revert back to 'untargeted' and drop in the US and rise in the UK? I ideally want to target the UK and US and only there but it seems you can't do this.
It's quite obvious and only you should know the answer... What are your priorities? Do you prefer to hand good ranking in UK or would like to patiently wait for it in the hope of getting good ranking in UK and US. The main question is... were you earning more before the switch or after? If you earn more now then keep it as it is, otherwise you might want to switch it back (they problem is that you're not guaranteed to get the rankings back).
Is your product or service equally applicable to both the US and UK? If so, I would tend to stick with targeting the US in webmaster tools. Since you're located in the UK it is easier to get into local directories and get links from country specific websites. In time, I think you'd see your UK rankings improve.
the dropping and ranking is totally normal.. and if you change and change its not going to improve.. i suggest to improve as it is.. and to rank well in US try to gather more US related sites.. it usually works that way..
Absolutely. The great thing about my 'product' is that is applicable to anybody with a computer. I currently use Amazon affiliate links (geotargeted) for US and UK customers - which is why I am interested in these two in particular. Thanks for the advice too.