Why my website disappears for the keywords ranked, then reappears and so on?

[emarketer]

Hello to everyone.

In the last 2 weeks my website emorroidi.imieirimedinaturali.it has a strange behavior in SERP: it disappears for the keywords ranked and then reappears, and so on.

Here's the chronicle of the last days:

12/6: message in GWT: Improvement of the visibility of the website in search.

12/6 the website disappears for all the keywords ranked

16/6 the website reappears for all the keywords ranked with some keywords higher in ranking

18/6 the website disappears for all the keywords ranked

22/6 the website reappears for all the keywords ranked

24/6 the website disappears for all the keywords ranked...

I can't explain this situation. Could it be a penalty? What Kind?

Thank you.

[KristinaKledzik]

Hi Paul,

This question is marked as "answered," so there aren't many SEOs reading it, unless they have the same problem as you! Please post a new question, so we can get the right people to answer.

Best,

Kristina

[emarketer]

Yeah Kristina,

the keywords are:

• emorroidi cura
• emorroidi rimedi
• cure emorroidi
• curare le emorroidi
• emorroidi cure
• emorroidi rimedi naturali
• emorroidi esterne
• alimentazione emorroidi

The website actually ranks in Google.it with the homepage for them all, except the last two that rank with the relative page.

Thank you very much,

Emanuele

[KristinaKledzik]

Yeah, I'm not sure. One idea would be an algorithmic penalty that is rechecked every few days (although most articles I've read say that algorithmic penalties are applied and then stay applied long after the problem has been fixed). Another is that someone at Google applied a penalty manually, then someone else removed it, then someone else put it back on again.

But neither of those seem likely.

At this point, all I can think of is looking into the keywords themselves. I haven't done that so far, though, because I don't know Italian. Can you share them anyway, though, so someone else in the community can help?

[emarketer]

Hi Kristina,

• Yes, during the times where I'm not ranking for most keywords, my homepage ranks for the brand name;
• I haven't got any else message in Google Webmaster Tools;

In your opinion what kind of "poorly applied penalty" could it be? An algorithmic one I suppose...

[KristinaKledzik]

Weird. So, that means that this isn't because of problems with Google's crawler not finding your content, and it's not that you are ranking for keywords that just fluctuate all the time anyway. My next guess would be that this is a poorly applied penalty of some sort. A couple of questions to see if it is:

• During the times where you're not ranking for most keywords, does your homepage rank for your brand name?
• Have you gotten any other messages in Google Webmaster Tools / Search Console since the original "Improved search visibility" that you mentioned in your original question?

Best,

Kristina

[emarketer]

Hi Kristina,

• I mean that all the pages are indexed;
• I haven't analized very well my competitors in these days, however in the days my website disappears, it seems that the other websites that compete for my keywords don't fluctuate, or not so much: the SERPs remain almost equal.

Thank you,

Emanuele

[KristinaKledzik]

Hi Emanuele,

To clarify:

• When you say you've verified it with a site: search, do you mean that you verified that the pages that were no longer ranking were still indexed? Or, do you mean that you verified that the site itself was still indexed? I'm wondering if you're only losing certain pages.
• I'm not sure what you meant by your response about your competition. Are you saying that the competition doesn't fluctuate for the keywords that your site is fluctuating for?

Thanks,

Kristina

[emarketer]

Hi Kristina,

thank you for the answer.

About your points:

• On the days where my site stops ranking for keywords it is correctly indexed, I've verified it with site: command;
• when the website disappears, any keyword stays at the same rank, neither the long tail keywords.
• I haven't made any change to on page or off page factors since the website started to disappear and the reappear.

Best,

Emanuele

[KristinaKledzik]

Hi Emanuele,

Wow, that's really weird! A few questions:

• On the days where your site stops ranking for keywords, have you done a site: search on those pages to see if Google has them in its index?
• What is your competition for these keywords? Have they been changing around a lot too, or is everything else staying about the same rank, with your site just jumping in and out of the list?
• Have you been making any changes to the site during this time? Even if you didn't change the specific page in question, it's possible that changing the link structure of the site is drastically changing their ability to rank.

Best,

Kristina

[emarketer]

Hi Daniel,

thank you for the answer.

In the days the website disappears, there are drops in organic ranking like images attached. All the pages with ranked keywords disappear.

aOm66h0.png Xnv5jIq.png

[Daniel_Morgan]

Ciao Emanuele!

If you seem to be experiencing ranking issues, the best way you can see if there is something to worry about or not is by seeing if there have been any drops in organic sessions on analytics. Has there been a drop?

If there is a pattern to the types of keywords which you seem to not be rankng for, you should check in analytics to see if the pages on your site which correspond to the keywords are losing organic traffic or not. Example: keyword A will be most relevant to example.com/page-a

Search results are different for different users, based on location, which version of Google you are using, whether you are signed in to Google not etc. so don't be too concerned unless traffic is also affected.

Additionally, the message in GWTs on 12/6 isn't something to worry about. I have also seen this message for many of the sites I manage and it is really just Google giving some tips such as defining a target country, giving access to other users, creating XML sitemaps etc.

Let us know if you are also experiencing drops in traffic!

[emarketer]

Hi Hector,

thank you for the answer.

Yes, I always use Moz Rank Tracker and also I search logged off and with the same geolocalization...

[hectormainar]

That kind of behaviour is really strange. Are you always searching from the same computer, and always logged off -or at least always in the same Google Account? Seems like you are getting some kind of customized experience based on your geolocalization, browsing history, Google Account or something like that.

For checking your ranks, always use an external tool like MOZ.