We are seeing significant volatility again within the Google Search rankings again, this time starting around September 23rd (maybe the 22nd) and throughout today. As we have been seeing, the chatter is generally slowing down as Google has been sending less and less traffic to sites, but I believe there are enough signals to say there was some sort of unconfirmed Google Search ranking update.
Previously, we covered volatility on September 15th, then the weirdness with September 4 through 13.
I know many are expecting a confirmed Google core update soon – maybe all these unconfirmed updates are a preview?
Many of the tools are showing a spike in volatility over the past 24-hours and there is an uplift in chatter in the past day or so.
Google Tracking Tools
Here is what the tools are showing right now:
Wireboard – this report shows the aggregate of the tools above and plots them on one chart:
AWR:
SEO Chatter
Here is some of the chatter at WebmasterWorld:
Seems the Discover magic is slowly fading away
Things went pretty well over the weekend, until Sunday afternoon; today it started at 4 p.m. So it hasn’t faded away, but there’s definitely less of it. However, my app for the news site is finally available, and I’m surprised—it’s generating a lot of traffic after just a few days.
I still have the same issue. Brief boost from Discover (1-3 hours max), and then flatlines. 13th September was the last day when a story managed to hold for 24 hours. Discover down 70%
Monday normal, old-style traffic levels.
Tuesday, after CloudFlare’s issue traffic was -60%.Today after 11 hours traffic -80%
Garbage traffic completely normal.
I can confirm that, the traffic spike disappeared incredibly fast. On top of that, the Discover-Feed are still loaded with absolute garbage and spam. I’m currently down 48% (my ad revenue for September has literally been cut in half so far). To make matters worse, my rankings are tanking right now, though barely any traffic was coming through standard organic search anyway. I honestly don’t get what Google is trying to achieve with this.
It’s all very unstable now…I am seeing the same pattern of losing about 20% of my top ranking terms, and when that hits bottom it will reverse and start gaining again. Every 6 months or so you are at a peak or trough.
As for general traffic, it’s flat. Discover isn’t dead, but this week is showing the exact pattern that seems to be the new normal since late August: “articles launch, and a few hours later, the traffic is completely gone.” It’s just getting annoying. And regarding the shop, the weekend was good, and Monday was okay, but it has dropped significantly since Tuesday. Yesterday, once again, zero sales came through Google traffic.
What are you all seeing?
Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.
