From #7 to #45 overnight on Google...can't figure out what happened

I can't understand it. I have been carefully working on building SEO on my website by adding content... using social media.. and registering with paid (not free spam) directories. I managed to get my site to #7 on one set of keywords and #9 on the other similar keyword. This morning I checked and the one that was at #7 is now #45. I have no idea what happened.

I don't know if I can post a URL here so I will put it as a non-link. The site in question is HappinessNowHypnosis (dot) com and the two key phrases are hypnotherapy michigan and hypnosis michigan. It was hypnotherapy michigan that got hit.

This feels like such a gut shot because I've worked so hard to do it right and have been doing it myself to stay out of trouble. I recently registered (paid) for some listings on the BigHealthDirectory (dot) com family of directories and on the OnlineStoreList (dot) come group of directories. I did the best I could to make sure these were not spam sites. the both got very low spam scores on the MOZ ose tool. Anyone who can provide some insight to what happened and how to fix this would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks

A couple of things. First, just adding content does not improve rankings. That is a myth. Social media also has no special impact on rankings.

I see the site on page one for those terms, so it may just be that you were connecting to a different data center for some reason. Rankings are not uniform across all of Google's data centers because they do not all have the same information at the same time. That will sometimes cause what people think to be a ranking fluctuation.

Bounces like that can also sometimes be caused by a server issue. If the site was loading painfully slow, Google might temporarily drop it in the rankings. You also might have a page out there with a very good link to your site which had server issues. Google could not find the link, so the site dropped. Next time Google crawled the page, the link was back, so now it bumped back up to where it was.

I could go on and on about reasons for a temporary drop like that.

I have just done a check for you and its showing on top #10 for your keyword.

Maybe Google is updating their search algorithm and it looks like you are facing with Google dance.

But you need to check your links on directories, Google could mark them as spam because almost links in directories made unnaturally.

Yes.. I just checked and it's back at #7... whew! As far as slow loading.. I checked the Google Developer PageSpeed Insights and it got an 85 on the PC and 67 on mobile. Not great.... but painfully slow seems a bit harsh. I have been thinking about redesigning the site going to WP from Joomla to speed it up but have been worried that the resulting change in the URL's for each individual page might mess up the SEO. Is there any way to prevent SEO damage if changing platforms and thusly the URL's of each page?
Thanks very much for the input.

SEOPub said:

Bounces like that can also sometimes be caused by a server issue. If the site was loading painfully slow, Google might temporarily drop it in the rankings. You also might have a page out there with a very good link to your site which had server issues. Google could not find the link, so the site dropped. Next time Google crawled the page, the link was back, so now it bumped back up to where it was..

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It is not really quite true, page speed is not a ranking factor for keywords it only affects on speed of crawling and indexing for your site by google spiders. It only affects very small for SEO.

SEOPub said:

That is a lie. Directories are fine as long as you stay away from the auto-approve crap. The OP said he is using paid directories, so he is fine.

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No one can guarantee all directories can store all quality sites on them, more spamming sites could buy and listed on paid directories and Google didn't update PR so that not sure Directories will still have high quality as it did.

HypnPro said:

Is there any way to prevent SEO damage if changing platforms and thusly the URL's of each page?

Click to expand...

Of course it will affect because your site structure and URLs will be changed when you change your web platform. I'd suggest you should put a separate question for this to get better helps in this SEO forum.

Harry P said:

It is not really quite true, page speed is not a ranking factor for keywords it only affects on speed of crawling and indexing for your site by google spiders. It only affects very small for SEO.

Click to expand...

Nowhere did I say site speed was a significant ranking factor. I said that if a server is loading painfully slow, Google might drop the site down until it resolves itself.

Harry P said:

No one can guarantee all directories can store all quality sites on them, more spamming sites could buy and listed on paid directories and Google didn't update PR so that not sure Directories will still have high quality as it did.

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Directories that are paid and moderated generally keep crap out. Junk sites are not gong to spend the money to get listed in them.

And PR has NOTHING to do with if a directory is quality or not.

Harry P said:

Of course it will affect because your site structure and URLs will be changed when you change your web platform. I'd suggest you should put a separate question for this to get better helps in this SEO forum.

Click to expand...

This was already answered. 301 redirects fix it.

HypnPro said:

I can't understand it. I have been carefully working on building SEO on my website by adding content... using social media.. and registering with paid (not free spam) directories. I managed to get my site to #7 on one set of keywords and #9 on the other similar keyword. This morning I checked and the one that was at #7 is now #45. I have no idea what happened.

I don't know if I can post a URL here so I will put it as a non-link. The site in question is HappinessNowHypnosis (dot) com and the two key phrases are hypnotherapy michigan and hypnosis michigan. It was hypnotherapy michigan that got hit.

This feels like such a gut shot because I've worked so hard to do it right and have been doing it myself to stay out of trouble. I recently registered (paid) for some listings on the BigHealthDirectory (dot) com family of directories and on the OnlineStoreList (dot) come group of directories. I did the best I could to make sure these were not spam sites. the both got very low spam scores on the MOZ ose tool. Anyone who can provide some insight to what happened and how to fix this would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks

Click to expand...

If you do a Google search for the word BigHealthDirectory you will notice that the site you mentioned does not appear in the top ten search results. That is a telltale sign that the domain (or perhaps just the homepage) has been demoted in Google for some reason. I didn't bother to analyze that site to see what is up with it, but I bet they did something (got some links) that Google doesn't like. And that is probably why they no longer rank for their own domain name.

So buying links from such a place, in my opinion, is a really bad idea.

Something to keep in mind about doing SEO on a website that has very few inbound links.

If you get a link from a distrusted source (maybe in your case it is one of those directories and maybe not) you can actually watch a page suffer the very same ranking demotion that you just experienced. Sometimes it lasts for a day and sometimes it lasts for weeks from just one or two links. If you get enough of those links, it will demote your page for a very long time (as in months or years). I believe the Google algorithm that is responsible for that happening is different than the Google Penguin algorithm as this phenomenon occurred even before they ever launched the Penguin. I learned of this years ago while still using things like article directories to build links with.

It has been noted that some sites with a huge amount of built up authority can hold up to link spam quite well without suffering a ranking demotion. The presumed reason for that is because of all of the positive metrics the site has working in its favor that it has built up over time by acquiring lots of inbound links. A newer website with very few links and very little built up authority/trust is more susceptible to the negative effects of link spam.

Maybe this is what was happening in your case and maybe not. But beware that just because a link is a paid link and just because Moz says its spam score is low, that does not mean the site is a good/trusted source of links.

@SEOPub. Sorry dude. That site is whack. And Google thinks it is whack. Or else they would rank them for that 3 word search.

If you don't rank for your own domain keywords (without quotes), with keywords like this example, something is wrong. If that site had any authority whatsoever, it would rank number one for that search every time. If not number one, it would rank easily on page one or at least close to page one. I'm trying to think of an example of a site I have worked with that didn't rank one page one (or really close to it like 11 or 12 at worst for its own domain name when the domain name was 3 words long like that. I can't honestly think of one except when a site was under some kind of Google punishment (algorithmically or otherwise). In every single one of those cases, the site ranked high (at least on page one) for its exact match domain keywords right until it got penalized and severely demoted by Google.

If the domain happens to be some high volume keyword then I could see it maybe not ranking high; due to competition. How many people are competing for Big Health Directory....:neutral: It has so little competition that page one is littered with statistic sites that only rank in the absolute weakest of competitive scenarios.

Something is definitely wrong with that site. The only time I have ever seen that is when a homepage/site has been demoted in Google. Even a site that is less than one month old with absolutely zero inbound links will rank for its own domain when it is ridiculously weak competition low volume search like that; and it will rank number one almost every single time after it has a handful of inbound links. Try it. There are probably some exceptions but they are rare, like subdomains for example and maybe some rare other situations. If you have a three word domain name and its not a higher volume/competition keyword phrase and your site doesn't rank on page one for its own name, then it is safe to assume Google fricken hates your site/homepage for some reason.

There is like zero competition for BigHealthDirectory. And it doesn't rank. It's whack. No doubt about it. How could you possibly question that? Seriously?

Like I said, all you have to do is look at the results. You see results like

Health Care Directory
Healthcare Directory
Big Bend AHEC | Staff Directory

BigHealthDirectory.com does not even use "Big Health Directory" in its title. It is using "Healthcare Information Resource", so it really is not all that surprising that it is not on page one or two even. Even that search term is mostly dominated by government resources and educational institutions. Nothing I would expect this directory to have any chance of outranking for anything.

I'm not arguing that it is not a weak directory. I'm just saying your test does not conclusively prove that it is penalized by Google because the site itself is not even targeting that search term.

And there are plenty of sites you will not find ranking highly for a 3-word phrase or more in their domain.

seniorlifeinsurance.com
funeralinsuranceplans.com
opiatewithdrawaltreatment.com


It is weak, not necessarily penalized.

have you check ahrefh for your backlinks? sometimes your backlinks might be consider as spam and google will penalize you for it

Wow! that is a massive success over night. Might be possible it was a viral post and got lots of social signals or it was just magic