Ranking dropped after change single page url, should I change it back?
-
I was making updates to the content on the following page, and a few days later dropped from #2 SERP ranking to 50+.
Things I checked:
Yes, 301 redirect was implemented right away.
After publishing, I manually requested indexing in search console.
Right after publishing I re-submitted the sitemap manually and Google said they had not crawled it in 9 days.
My question: should I change the URL back to the old one, or give it a little more time (especially since I re-submitted sitemap)
Original URL: https://www.travelinsurancereview.net/plans/travel-medical/
New URL: https://www.travelinsurancereview.net/plans/travel-medical-insurance/
-
Thanks Boyd for such a detailed reply. This is all very helpful information!
-
Well essentially there were 3 major changes that happened at the same time (in Google's eyes): the url change, overhauling your content, and getting rid of the site-wide link from your navigation.
I know you said that the navigation link drop happened a month ago, but you have to remember that no change on your website affects your rankings for good or bad until Google comes back and crawls your page(s) and sees the change.
Some of your main pages probably were crawled within a few days of the navigation change but the majority of pages weren't re-crawled for a few weeks after that change. I can still find some of your pages that haven't been crawled since before the navigation change.
Now, I don't think that the content change is what's hurting you because you added more useful content. Although maybe you have over optimized it a bit for "travel medical insurance" since that exact phrase shows up 48 times.
URL changes with proper 301 redirect implementation can drop your rankings temporarily but my experience has always been to gain back the temporary loss soonish afterwards.
If it were my site, I'd do the following:
- Immediately put back the link pointing to that page in the navigation with the same anchor text it had before
- Wait about two to three weeks after that to see if any ranking recovery has happened
- If no change, I'd drop that exact match phrase several times from the article (then wait for it to be recrawled to assess if it helped or not)
- Then if no change still, I'd test changing the content back to the old page keeping the new URL
- Then if no change still, I'd change the redirect back
My hope is that you'll recover the rankings after just putting the navigation link back.
Good luck
-
There are many factors that affect on dropping in ranking. It happened with me also once upon a time, Here is strategy applied by me:
Left new url for 7 days.
Did not update or replace url in those 7 days.
I saw improvement in ranking and yes, my new ranking was better than previous one. SEO is game of patience. Have that with you
-
Thanks Boyd, below are thee clarifications:
- For the ranking drop, are you talking about the phrase "travel medical insurance"
Yes
- How many content changes did you make? From looking at the wayback machine, it appears that you added a lot of content. But the most recent date the wayback machine shows is from March 14th, 2019 so I need clarification on what changes you made in addition to changing the URL.
Significant content changes including adding clarifying topics (header and content), added images, added a FAQ section, added outbound link to authority sources.
- Did you change the title tag?
No
- Did you make a change to your navigation? The wayback version shows you had a sitewide navigation link to link in the navigation to the Travel Medical page under the "Plans" drop down but I didn't see that on the current site. Was that change just made along with the 301 redirect?
No, the main navigation change (removing the Plans dropdown) happened about 1 month ago (end of Jan)
- Did you get rid of any other internal links to this page around this time?
No
Thanks very much for whatever insight you can provide, much appreciated and let me know if you need anything else.
-
Some clarifying questions:
- For the ranking drop, are you talking about the phrase "travel medical insurance"
- How many content changes did you make? From looking at the wayback machine, it appears that you added a lot of content. But the most recent date the wayback machine shows is from March 14th, 2019 so I need clarification on what changes you made in addition to changing the URL.
- Did you change the title tag?
- Did you make a change to your navigation? The wayback version shows you had a sitewide navigation link pointing to the Travel Medical page under the "Plans" drop down but I don't see that on the current site. Was that change just made along with the 301 redirect?
- Did you get rid of any other internal links to this page around this time?
Right now I am seeing that Google has recrawled the new page and has recognized the 301 redirect because when you do a "site:https://www.travelinsurancereview.net/plans/travel-medical/" search, Google lists the new URL in the results and the cached version's most recent date is 2/24/20 at 21:21:18 GMT.
I wouldn't change the redirect back just yet. But I need answers to the above questions before giving you my final opinion.
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
-
Will it upset Google if I aggregate product page reviews up into a product category page?
We have reviews on our product pages and we are considering averaging those reviews out and putting them on specific category pages in order for the average product ratings to be displayed in search results. Each averaged category review would be only for the products within it's category, and all reviews are from users of the site, no 3rd party reviews. For example, averaging the reviews from all of our boxes products pages, and listing that average review on the boxes category page. My question is, will this be doing anything wrong in the eyes of Google, and if so how so? -Derick
On-Page Optimization | | Deluxe0 -
Why does keyword fluctuate in Google - I.E rank 48 - 13 - not ranked
Hello, I would like some advice on Google ranking, my site sportingdesires had a few keywords rank and now their not ranked for those keywords. Am still in the process of on-page and am not too bothered about them ranking high, more of a curiosity I suppose. am not expecting them to reach any where near top due to tough competition. Am just starting from top of website down to individual products ( this will take about 10 years lol ) sorting out seo issues. then will concentrate on link building & content engagement maybe i over optimised the page take a look at AC Milan club shop for example Kindest Regards, ste
On-Page Optimization | | sportingdesires0 -
Do sites with more pages rank better?
If a site has more pages and also has good internal linking, then logically it would rank better. Is this the case? Should I be building big (but high quality) sites?
On-Page Optimization | | T0BY0 -
How is this page ranking?
Hi. A client of mine is being outranked by a competitor whose landing page does not include the keyword within their page content AT ALL. Nor does their URL. Nor do any image alts. And their page title features the keyword in the middle of it, not at the start. Their link profile is not great with directories and the like. They are not socially active.. I am confused! I thought content on a page absolutely had to include the keyword to get ranked for it. Here's the page: www.springsoft.ie, keyword is "water softeners" Any thoughts I would appreciate. Many thanks.Christoffa
On-Page Optimization | | Christoffa0 -
I have a question about having to much content on a single page. Please help :)
I am working on a music related site. We are building a feature in our system to allow people to write information about songs on their playlist. So when a song is currently being played a user can read some cool facts or information about the song. http://imgur.com/5jFumPW ( screenshot). Some playlists have over 100 songs and could be completely random in genre and artist. I am wondering if some of these playlists have over 5,000 words of content if that is going to hurt us? We will be very strict about making sure its non spammy and good content. Also for the titles of the content is it bad to have over 100 h3 tags on one page? Just want to make sure we are on the right track. Any advice is greatly appreciated.
On-Page Optimization | | mikecrib10 -
Can you change meta description at any time without loosing rankings?
I'm wondering if it is possible to change the meta description of a page on your site at any time without it affecting rankings on google? Is it only changing how my SERP looks? Or could bad things happen to changing your meta description? Appreciate all opinions on this one, thank you guys!
On-Page Optimization | | danielpett0 -
Pages crawled dropped like a stone
set up a new campaign seomoz crawled the site and did about 1500 pages the last crawl it now only lists 1 page I can see anyway to see why, the site has not changed so why has the number of pages dropped?
On-Page Optimization | | spiralsites0 -
Particular page fails to rank well
Hi all We are building, managing and marketing a Danish tourism site for VisitSweden. The site targets a Danish market-group with information and travel tips on going to Sweden. We have one page in particular that has always failed to rank well for some reason. http://www.meresverige.dk/rejser/malmo This page targets the keyword "Malmø". Another page, with similar layout and content seems to rank alot better. http://www.meresverige.dk/rejser/goeteborg Keyword "Gøteborg" Any ideas? Smart tips? Have the best of days Fredrik
On-Page Optimization | | Resultify0