Adding a Directory to Successful Article Website
-
We are considering adding roughly 1,300 pages to a 2,300 page website within the drug rehab niche. Our website is generating roughly 10,000 uniques from Search / month.
**Is there a way to estimate the change in traffic to the existing content on the site when we add 30-40% pages in the form of a directory? **
**Is there a way to estimate the effect of the existing traffic and links to our newly added part of the site (the directory)? **
-
You were fairly brief, which makes it difficult to give definitive answers, but here are mine. For the first question:
- Are any of these new pages going to compete with currently ranking pages? If so, they could limit the traffic to existing pages. Use Google Analytics to identify your top organic keywords and check them against your new pages. Compare any new pages that might compete with existing pages; which ones do you think will win?
- If the new pages WON'T compete with existing pages, they will only have an effect on the Domain Authority, which should really only be a net gain. You'll have more pages, and more links overall.
- Last, is there any chance that this new content will trigger a penalty? I only ask this because AndieF is right, search engines don't see much value in directories, and if your site goes from 50% directory pages to 75% directory pages, the entire site may be hurt as a result.
And, for your second question, about the effect of existing traffic on the new pages
- If the new pages are really brand new, they should be indexed faster since they're a part of an established site. To estimate the traffic they'll bring it, identify the keywords they're targeting, get the monthly traffic from Google AdWords Keyword Tool (download the list of keywords for actual previous months' traffic), and find the opportunity traffic based on how well you can reasonably expect to rank: http://geoffkenyon.com/google-serps-click-through-rates/
- You mentioned in a comment that these pages are currently living on different domains, and you're moving them over. If you use 301 redirects, you'll only carry over 90 - 95% of Page Authority, but not all of it. If those links are more valuable than the new links you're providing through your site, they won't do as well. If you have some really good links to those old URLs, you may want to contact the webmasters who are sending traffic to your site and ask them to update their links.
- Also note that pages will take a dip in rankings whenever they get new URLs, so if you get significantly less traffic for the first couple of weeks, just wait it out.
TL;DR Check:
- That the new pages won't compete with old pages
- That the new pages won't trigger a penalty from Google
- **The estimated searches/month (from Google AdWords Keyword Tool) for the new keywords you'll be targeting, and the proportion you can reasonably expect to get to your site (based on CTR research for Google) **
- The number of links that were pointed to the pages on the old URL that you'll only get a portion of the Authority from
Hope this helps!
Kristina
-
The site actually currently links outwards to a number of different state specific sites which act as a directory. We would essentially be bringing these sites under the same umbrella and creating a similar user experience. Given the drug and alcohol related article content, including a directory of drug and alcohol treatment centers is a relatively logical decision.
It's also partially a business decision as in our experience, the directory portion of the site converts users far better than article content into leads.
One option if adding that many pages is too much... Scaling back the number of pages added in the directory and slowly adding more over time.
-
Why are you planning on adding so many pages? What's the benefit for a user?
Directories are pretty frowned upon generally.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
What is the best way to structure website URLs ?
Hi, can anyone help me to understand if having category folder in URL matters or not? how to google treat a URL? for example, I have the URL www.protoexpress.com/pcb/certification but not sure google will treat it a whole or in separate parts? if in separate parts, is it safe to use pcb/pcb-certification? or it will be considered as keyword stuffing? Thank you in anticipation,
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | SierraPCB1 -
Conundrum with brand new website keywords...
I'm working with on a website for an app called BetterRX. There's a prescription card called BetterRX Card. Our domain is Better RX.com and the card is BetterRXCard.com. "Better RX" as a brand search is dominated by prescription discount cards, with Good RX being the most dominant. Any suggestions on how to go about mixing optimization for brand as well as the app?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | sickle3110 -
Website Snippet Update in Search Console?
I have a company that I started working with that has an outdated and inaccurate snippet coming up. See the link below. They changed their name from DK on Pittsburgh Sports to just DK Pittsburgh Sports several years ago, but the snippet is still putting the old info, including outdated and incorrect description. I'm not seeing that title or description anywhere on the site or a schema plugin. How can we get it updated? I have updated titles, etc. for the home page, and done a Fetch to get re-indexed. Does Snippet have a different type of refresh that I can submit or edit? Thanks in advance https://g.co/kgs/qZAnAC
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | jeremyskillings0 -
Installing SSL to website and site ranking
I am installing SSL to my website. Will it hurt my ranking in Google as the url will change and backlinks of the website are without ssl url.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Esnipper0 -
How to stop some continuous attacks on our website
Hi Fellow SEO Experts
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | leadstar0007
We would like to ask for your help in STOPPING some continuous attacks on our website.
It seems that we are constantly needing to Disavow these URL’S like http://www.econsultmgmt.com.my and http://www.unicontmt.com.br as they keep redirecting to our Sitemap. Is there any tool or any clever way to stop these constant and unwanted links to our sitemap please?
We have tried on MULTIPLE occasions to contact them and ask them to remove the content that has the hyperlinks back to our sitemap but without success ☹
Any assistance from our global colleagues would be greatly appreciated. Thanks & Regards, Manish0 -
Whats up with this website?
cybercig.co.uk Languishing around 150-200 in the rankings, very barely making it above 70. But also ranks for Refillable Electronic Cigarette on the first page. Any ideas whats happening? Not a huge amount of links but I'd have thought it would've been much higher. I'd love to know opinions 🙂
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | jasondexter0 -
API to power all websites
I spoke to one of my lead web developers and we are planning on powering all of our desktop, mobile and tablet sites with our new API. Everything will be populated through javascript and is cloud-based rather than through actual HTML. How do we incorporate all of our SEO?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | recbrands0 -
Article Marketing For Link Building
Just wanted to get a discussion going about the effectiveness of article marketing for building links. All of my content will be decent and unique. I will submit to the following 10 directories: Ezine Buzzle Goarticles Article Dashboard Sooperarticles Helium Articlebase Articlealley Isnare Article City Of course, varied anchor text and relevant content to my various niches. I just want to know if this is still an effective link building strategy. Please don't recommend i "try" something else because i am doing everything else as well. Thanks guys
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | danielblinman0