Sometimes it happens that sites at the top of search results experience a drop in traffic. That is, even despite high ranking positions, the site does not receive a sufficient number of organic clicks: search traffic decreases or does not grow at all. If this situation occurs systematically, it is worth taking appropriate measures.

Let’s figure out together with a digital agency from the UAE why site traffic may drop despite good ranking indicators.

Note: We immediately eliminate cases when semantics are collected incorrectly, and ranking is tracked by empty, from the point of view of traffic potential, queries.

Decrease in seasonal demand

A decline in consumer interest in certain goods or services caused by a change in season can be one of the reasons for a decrease in traffic. During periods of reduced demand, when customers have little or no interest in certain products, traffic does not grow, but falls.

At the same time, the visibility of the site in search engines remains the same, only user interest changes in comparison with previous months. For example, in the summer, the number of queries like “buy a down jacket” or “children’s skis” is significantly lower than in the winter. This means that the number of clicks on the site for them will be close to zero.

To check how seasonal demand for certain keywords changes over a selected time interval, services such as Google Trends are used.

Decreasing interest in the topic

Here it is worth mentioning the trends that are actively changing from year to year. Gradually, people’s interest in a once popular topic or product fades, and what was in demand last season is no longer so in the current one.

Low interest in the topic leads to a decrease in the corresponding search queries. People simply do not search for it on the Internet. And if the content on the site is formed for irrelevant queries, this often affects traffic. The situation is such that the site is at the top, but there are no visitors.

Unattractive snippet

One of the reasons why website traffic does not grow (or even falls) is often the so-called unattractiveness of the snippet. A bad snippet may not prevent (in the short term) good ranking of the site. However, low CTR rates do not allow getting the necessary amount of traffic from search engines. Users simply do not follow the links to the site, choosing competitors with more attractive snippets.

In order for a website to look most attractive in search results, it is important to use micro-markup, correctly compose and fill in the title and description, connect additional search engine services, for example, product selections and a price list.

We also recommend monitoring the rating of your store in the snippet. If your rating is below 4 and significantly inferior to competitors, then most likely, users will not choose your website.

Traffic cannibalization

Traffic cannibalization in this case means the process of intersection of organic traffic with advertising, when one “eats” the other. That is, the channel through which the user gets to the site changes.

This happens when launching advertising campaigns, when contextual advertising blocks are displayed in the first three positions in the search results, and links to the key website are displayed in the natural ones. In this situation, part of the search traffic goes to the site through advertisements, which is accordingly reflected in the statistics. At the same time, if you look at the overall traffic, there will be no significant changes.

Changes in search engines

From time to time, search engines add various blocks to pages that can divert traffic not only to the site you are looking for, but also to third-party services. This is especially true for commercial queries.

Deterioration of a company’s reputation

Brand reputation also affects SEO indicators. If for some reason a company’s reputation indicators have dropped, this may also affect website traffic. In most cases, users tend to choose sites with higher ratings and scores.

Technical errors on the site

If site traffic has dropped, the problem may be hidden in technical issues. Due to errors, search traffic may be completely absent or simply displayed incorrectly in analytical reports.

What errors occur most often:

Hacking. 

There are frequent cases when attackers gain access to the server where the site is located, which can cause a lot of harm. For example, they can start distributing malicious content, reconfigure transitions so that users get to other sites. Due to questionable activity, the site may be penalized. But this usually does not happen immediately – at first, there is a noticeable decrease in search traffic.

Removing analytics counters.

 Analytics services can fly off when making changes to the site. In such a situation, there is usually no actual decrease in organic traffic, but due to the lack of counters, the indicators are taken into account incorrectly.

Slow loading. The reason for this situation may be the hosting load due to many plugins, as well as insufficient free disk space for the site.

Problems with indexing new pages: 

If the site is regularly updated, but new pages are poorly indexed or do not attract traffic, the total volume of visits may decrease even if the positions of old pages are maintained.

In some cases, a traffic drop is observed when most of the organic traffic is directed to turbo pages that do not have counters installed. In this case, incoming traffic from search engines is simply not taken into account, although there may not be a real decline.

What else could go wrong?

Offline activity: 

If a company actively conducts offline advertising campaigns (radio, TV, banners, etc.), this can switch the audience’s attention to direct clicks (for example, entering the site address directly in the browser), which will lead to a decrease in the share of organic traffic.

Brand Popularity: 

If branded queries (company or product name) make up a significant portion of organic traffic, a decrease in them due to falling brand awareness or a decrease in offline advertising activity can lead to a decrease in traffic.

Cannibalization by other channels:

 We have already talked about how advertising sources often “eat up” traffic to the site. But this also works in all similar cases. If a company is actively developing other traffic acquisition channels, such as social networks, contextual advertising or email marketing, this can reduce the share of organic traffic, even if overall traffic is growing.

Mobile application: 

If a company has launched or is actively promoting its mobile application, users may prefer to use the application instead of visiting the site, which will lead to a decrease in organic traffic.

Redirection of traffic to marketplaces: 

If your product or service is available on marketplaces, users may prefer to make purchases or get information directly on these platforms, rather than visiting the site.

The list of reasons why a site loses organic traffic while maintaining its search rankings can go on and on.

Even when a site proudly holds its search rankings, organic traffic can slip away unnoticed. Reasons? From changes in user behavior to the fashion for marketplaces and mobile apps. It’s like keeping the door open, but the guests still leave through the window. In order not to be left alone, you need to monitor not only the rankings, but also what’s happening around you – from competitors to technical details on the site. Or better yet, contact a team of specialists from the top digital marketing WGG agency.