We (MerchantCircle) live and die by Google. 90% of our traffic comes from the Big G. One day in November (November 4), we saw a huge uptick in traffic. All from Google. We think we had gone from Page Rank 6 to a Page Rank 7. Didn't realize that we'd take a quantum jump as we crossed that boundary. While surpised, this was obviously Good News.
Now, come April 2007. Our traffic tanks. Our SERPs are down. Pages indexed by Google drops from over 2.5MM to less than 1.5MM. Visits from Googlebot become erratic. Visits, page views, and Adsense fall.
Ah, to live and die by Google.
When we started MerchantCircle, we made a bet; Google will be the driver of traffic to our site. We put all of our eggs into the Google basket, as the proverb goes. While this may seem obvious now, this wasn't necessarily clear then. In that bet, we decided to play fairly and transparently. We'd employ only "white hat" tactics to drive traffic and we were in it "for the long haul." We knew our efforts would not be rewarded immediately and we might not be rewarded at all. Further, we based our choices on anectodal knowledge and the collective wisdom of the web -- using Google of course. And, it's been difficult the measure the exact cause-effect relationship between our actions and changes in traffic. We've been moving fast, shipping significant releases at least once a month, with few analytical tools (Google Analytics).
Here's what Alexa says about us:
Further, here's what Google Analytics tells us:
(I've obsfucated the y-axis -- the exact numbers aren't important -- the trend is.)
We tanked in April. This is, obviously, Not So Good News.
I realize this is not an uncommon refrain. We're not complaining. We think Google treats us reasonably fairly. We understand they constantly (if not secretively) tweak search results; We get the "Google Dance."
None the less, this exposes our dependency on the G. We're digging in to figure out what happened and what we can do; Any suggestions?
Now, come April 2007. Our traffic tanks. Our SERPs are down. Pages indexed by Google drops from over 2.5MM to less than 1.5MM. Visits from Googlebot become erratic. Visits, page views, and Adsense fall.
Ah, to live and die by Google.
When we started MerchantCircle, we made a bet; Google will be the driver of traffic to our site. We put all of our eggs into the Google basket, as the proverb goes. While this may seem obvious now, this wasn't necessarily clear then. In that bet, we decided to play fairly and transparently. We'd employ only "white hat" tactics to drive traffic and we were in it "for the long haul." We knew our efforts would not be rewarded immediately and we might not be rewarded at all. Further, we based our choices on anectodal knowledge and the collective wisdom of the web -- using Google of course. And, it's been difficult the measure the exact cause-effect relationship between our actions and changes in traffic. We've been moving fast, shipping significant releases at least once a month, with few analytical tools (Google Analytics).
Here's what Alexa says about us:
Further, here's what Google Analytics tells us:
(I've obsfucated the y-axis -- the exact numbers aren't important -- the trend is.)
None the less, this exposes our dependency on the G. We're digging in to figure out what happened and what we can do; Any suggestions?
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