The site that no one reads!
hello WA friends!
I'm feeling a bit frustrated, as I have been working nonstop on my site over the past couple of months, and feeling good about the content, the layout, the flow of the site. But when I did my own search based on the titles of the posts, one of them was on page 13 of google and the other one didn't show up at all, and I gave up after page 23.
According to my google analytics, organic search = 32, direct search = 28, social = 16, and referral = 11, for a total of 77 new users -- But that is all very pathetic as it is over the course of a week -- not even a day.
I am on social media, I ping all my new posts, and ask for comments and feedback. Not sure what else I could do. It is too early for me to set up an eblast campaign or any type of funnel because I just don't have the traffic.
I'm feeling really bad that I posted some stuff that I am proud of, but no one is reading it, seeing it or anything. It is going down the black hole of the internet.
Any suggestions? Thank you so much,
Amy
Recent Comments
97
I had the same question before. One thing I know that you need to look for less as 30 competing websites and some searches. In this way more people will come to you. I used Jaaxy before and thought that 100 websites wiil be okay to compete. No way, unless you have superb content and plenty of various keywords. Health niche is a tough choice but if you passionate about it go for it.
Amy, as you already know, I find your website awesome! It has got a attractive layout, wonderful pictures and very informative posts.
I'm afraid I can't give you any suggestions, because you are way ahead of me. I see though, you have got very helpful advices from our WA friends. These advices are valuable to me too.
You just may not give up!! Soon we will get Bo's Training how to get more traffic. Be patient and stay confident.
Your GoGetter-friend,
:-)
So sweet and thank you for the kind words. You're in the top 50 -- how can I be ahead of YOU...?!
I communicate too much!
Must work more focused on my website instead. You've got much more content than I do.
Difficulties to resist reading the WA blogs - could miss something out - weakness of me. Have to fight this urge!!!
;-)
Amy,
You’re site looks great. The layout is well done and although I am a viscous carnivore, your content certainly seems thorough and easy to read. It may just take more time to get the traffic you want. The only thing I might suggest is tweaking the titles of some of your posts. Maybe make some of them questions. Just a thought.
Hang in there - solid topic and you will see interest grow!
Jack
Hi Amy, your website looks so amazing and there's a lot of awesome information there. What you said here in your blog sounds not very positive. Keep the faith and keep doing what you're doing and it will come to fruition. Believe in what you do and what you put out there.
I hope I was able to cheer you up. Smile :D
Kind regards,
Arline
I checked a few of your posts. Nice layout and photos are good. Some suggestions:
- Add a video from YouTube to each post, preferably one you have uploaded yourself. If no video is relevant make one yourself using Lumen5. The Power of Video on Facebook - Add alt-text to all photos, Google appreciates it. You don't have any at the moment on the ones I checked.
- Do you check related searches and refer to them in your posts? I find that works well with rankings. I may even add a chapter on one of them to help.
Do the videos have to be my own or can I upload videos that I didn't make but that are relevant to my niche?
Also, when adding the alt-text to the photos, do I also have to change the name of the photo from the cryptic "12345.jpeg" to a name that is recognizable or as long as the alt-text is there, then the title of the image can stay whatever it is...?
Thank you.
I have read that changing the title can be beneficial too. You can rename an image in your files on your computer prior to uploading it on to your site - if you click it and hit rename. I tend to have my title and alt text the same. But otherwise, just do the alt text.
Natalie is right. I always name my images to one of the LSI keywords and use the same name for alt-text. Always add a hyphen between words in name of file.
The videos will help to rank better if they are your own. Give the video the same name as you main KW and add tags that are related.
Also add a link on your video back to your post. It all helps.
Wow what a fantastic site. You have all of the right elements there. Since it getting into the season where a large number of people are getting serious about their diets it is just a matter of time before they see yours and share it with their friends.
Wish I could tell you more. But your site is awesome.
Jerry
Your website is really impressive. From the information to the actual website itself.
I have actually read one of your post, and just a suggestion: Make sure that your titles are attention grabbers. You don't need to be out there but just make sure you think about the readers you want to attract attention to.
As you said, you've been pinning. Look over your titles again and think to yourself: is this something I would want to click myself?
Like I said, this is just a suggestion. We all want to succeed here, and I know you will be successful. You just need to breathe and rethink new strategies.
You will make it.
Sorry not pinning. But you should try Pinterest too. It can help you drive your web traffic.
Your site is lovely! I am always impressed at how nice it looks and it just gets better and better Amy!
I looked up the keyword rank for some of your post titles. The titles are great but the keywords have stiff competition. I think that is the biggest part of your problem. With so much competition it will take a while for your posts to rise in rank. There aren't other keywords that stand out as great so you aren't picking the wrong ones, there are just not a lot of high powered options.
Perhaps you could do the keyword research to find more specialized topics to post on? I am not sure but maybe essential oils for a certain condition or the name of a certain condition even without essential oils in it like "cure for..." or "Treat..." "Natural cure for...".
Most social media is a total waste of time for me. However, I have been getting traffic by using Quora. I can't remember if you are already doing this. If not, I would recommend it. Find questions related to your products (essential oils etc) and answer them on Quora. You can add a link directly to your relevant posts right in the answer. This is a nice thing about Quora. Then, if someone else finds the answer later they can click on your link even if they are not the original asker of the question. I can say I have gotten more traffic from Quora than any other social media compared to how much time I have put in. It still doesn't get me as much traffic as organic searches but in your situation I think trying something like that may help a bit.
I wish I had another suggestion. Your site is really, really nice.
Jessica
Hi Jessica...!
I know what you mean about the stiff competition with the keywords. The issue is that I am testing long-tail keywords in Jaxxy and always choosing the ones that score well with respect to QSR and don’t have a very high amount of people searching.
So I thought I was on track with that but maybe no one is searching for the whole phrase.
Anyway I will change it up as you suggest and thank you for that genius idea. Focusing on the purpose of the post rather than the obvious name might be a good work-around.
As for Quora, I will check that out. Never used it. It sounds like Reddit...?
Thank you again for reaching out to me here...!
Amy
Yes, it probably is like Reddit but as I recall Reddit is harder to use. Quora seems easier since you can post links directly.
None of your long tail keyword phrases that I looked up had a great search to competition ratio. That is not your fault. I looked for other variations and couldn't find any better. That is why I suggested taking a different approach. I did not search for all those but I hope you can find some that work. I might be off base here...I am HOPING it will help.
I am pretty picky about keywords and only use a keyword with double digit competition if there is at least 3 digit searches or preferably 4! So hundreds or thousands of searches with only double digit competition. I guess I am lucky in that regard since there are more desperate people searching for solutions to cat problems I guess! I have to admit I don't fully trust Jaaxy's ratings. That is why I was disappointing when our WA keyword tool went away. Even in Jaaxy you can still look at the searches vs competition. It is slower though since you can only see the competition for one long tail keyword at a time unless you upgrade to the full, paid version. No one seems to notice this though!
Anyway, I hope you can get some better traffic flow soon!
Okay I'm a little confused -- what do you mean by double digit competition? I guess I don't quite have a good feel for Jaxxy. I thought I did -- hmm... What do you mean by a "search to competition ratio" -- ? Not sure all of this could be explained here? Thanks.
I use the word "Competition" because that is what it is called in the WA Keyword tool. In Jaaxy it is called "QSR" which stands for Quoted Search Results. They are the same thing though.
by ratio, I mean the number of searches on that keyword compared to the number of other sites using that keyword. You want lots of searches (preferably hundreds or thousands if you can find them) and low competition (other sites using the same keyword). By double digit I mean less than 100. If there are dozens of other sites with a certain keyword that you want to use, then it would be best if there were a higher number of searches being performed so there are more people looking for your keyword compared to the sites using it. Therefore, you have a higher change of getting traffic.
For my last post there are 8,819 searches for that term per month, and 58 other sites using that keyword. The keyword is "What is the best pet insurance". 58 is high competition but since my site has a little bit of traction now and there are so many searches for that term per month, I am using it.
If you have competition of 40 on a keyword but there are only 100 searches per month it might take a long time to rank well for it. You will also not get as much traffic even when your keyword is ranked high in the search results simply because there aren't as many people looking for that term. (Of course it isn't always this simple. You could get lucky and have your posts shared on other popular websites, get popular on social media etc. and get traffic through those sources rather than organic searches. This would be a long shot though and I would not count on it).
If you want to use the WA keyword tool instead of Jaaxy you can still access it here: https://my.wealthyaffiliate.com/kw_research
Nobody else seems to care but I prefer the old keyword tool over Jaaxy.
Thank you for such a detailed explanation. Do you suggest I go back and change the names of all or most of my posts? That would pretty-much undo all the traction I have gotten, which isn't very much anyway -- maybe it wouldn't matter....?
Since you said they are on page 13 and 23 of search results, I would change them if you can find better keywords. However, I have another suggestion.
One alternative is to just start writing new content with the new keywords instead. That is probably the better solution honestly. Then you are adding more content instead of changing all your titles and keywords (which may take a bit of rewriting anyway to work in new concepts) and still having the same number of posts.
I would honestly write new content myself. At first I thought I needed really good, amazing posts and it would water them down to have multiple posts on the same topics. Now I realize content has to be high quality but you also need a serious amount of quantity for your ranking to rise and to get traffic. Adding content is the best way to do this. So, if you have to find new keywords anyway why not just write a new post? If you add a new post with a new keywords for each one you already have, you will end up with twice the content when you are done. Then you also have the twice the keywords out there to get traffic! It is a win win! And it will go much faster the second time around.
And you won't have to worry about losing any traction.
So you're saying to write new content/posts but base them on OLD posts? In other words, write about the same stuff but use new keywords?
OR are you saying to just write new content about other stuff, using new keywords?
If I write content based on old posts, there will be a lot of duplicate content, no?
Also, maybe I should take down all the content that has nothing to do with plant-based eating -- i.e. Essential Oils, and other articles i have about Thanksgiving, not getting depressed in winter, stuff like that. Maybe I just take them down... so as not to confuse the search engines --
#natniches says above: "I think the topics you're discussing are broad and you seem to talk about a large spectrum of things. This will mean the keywords you target will be broad as well and that takes a lot longer for google to understand what your site is really about and to rank you for what it thinks you're most relevant for. You may want to niche down. I mean, I can see essential oils, health related articles, vegan related, parenting...
Whereas, essential oils is a niche on its own as it is.
Other niches may things like: how to be vegan on a budget, or how to raise vegan kids... or living a raw food life... You see what I mean? I would say that's one of the reasons you're struggling to boost rankings."
I don't know how the search engines will treat all focused content vs. a new emphasis on focused content with other old content sitting in the background. I really don't know the answer to that. If the old content is not ranking well and the new content does maybe it doesn't matter so much but I really can't say.
Duplicate content means the exact same wording. If you write about essential oils and then write another blog about essential oils with a more directed focus (heal xyz with essential oil) or whatever, that is not duplicate content unless you used the same sentences.
As long as you are writing a new post and not copying and pasting from the old one, you don't have to worry about duplicate content. The message could be exactly the same but as long as the sentences are different you are fine.
Whether these are entirely new posts or not depends on what you find when you do your keyword research. If you find you need to write a post on using essential oil to treat a certain symptom or condition, it will probably be substantially different from your original post but parts will be similar. Don't worry about it, just find a good keyword and start writing.
To start with at least, I would start writing new posts. You can get more input and decide later to take down the old ones or leave them up. Don't take them down now though before you have new content. And even if and when you do take the old ones down, I would probably just turn them to draft mode rather than delete them in case you change your mind!
I see what you are saying, and I can't thank you enough for all the time you have put in to helping me with sorting this out.
For my next post I would like to find a good keyword or keyword string that works, and perhaps I can private message you to ask your opinion based on my findings? Would that be okay?
Thank you....
Awesome thank you. Hey -- just noticed your Ambassador status...! WOW that's amazing and quite an inspiration for me.
Good for you! thank you again...!
Hi Amy,
We both started in WA about the same time. And, 120+ posts and 130,000+ words later, I am still striving for the big "reader break" where folks flock to my site.
I know in my heart and soul that it will happen. I know in my heart that Google isn't giving my website the break it deserves.
But, I also know in my heart that I am stubborn enough to say, "I don't care if it takes another year - or 2 - or 3 - or whatever - I will keep moving forward - I will not quit - and, I will succeed.
In other words, Amy, "keep on - keepin' on" - I like your website and I feel eventually, it will happen for both of us.
I did notice one minor thing you may want to look at, though. I saw images on your website placed on the left side of pages. Google bots read from left to right and will not see and index the text to the right of those images. I suggest you move your images to the right of your text. You can use the middle, too - but, the point is to let Google read ALL your text for indexing.
Just my "off the top of my head" thoughts.
Be well!
Jim
Hi Jim,
Thank you for that — I had no idea. Do you think I should go back in and change the photos on ALL my posts or just the recent ones?
Okay I also see what you are saying and will just keep going. Patience is not a virtue of mine, but if you could do it then so could I.
Thank you...!
Start moving the images in your most recent posts and pages to the right side - then work backwards through the rest of them.
Bottom line: Every image on the left side of a post/page will block the text immediately to the right of it.
Rob (Boomergp08) gave me this guidance and I try to follow this religiously.
Jim
I'm on it. Thank you...!!!!
And my favorite line: "I know in my heart that Google isn't giving my site the break it deserves" -- that is hysterical.... you need to trademark that. :-)
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Amy,
I went to your site and it does look nice. We know the problem is not about your site layout because that would reflect in your retention and bounce rates. The problem is getting people there in the first place. I was trying to do some research on how you can solve the problem, and here is my conclusion...1) Most readers in your niche are looking to solve a problem (Examples: aching knees, cold and flu, headaches, etc.) The preventative health niche struggles, and you're content titles appeal mostly to the preventative reader (which is very few and far between). I used to work Public Health for 9 years and people didn't want to do preventative things for their health. They say, "If it's not broke, why fix it?" Also, your headlines are targeting very high competitive keywords (as others have mentioned). It would help if you narrowed your niche. Instead, popular sites in your niche seem to target a problem (PCOS, Arthritis, Cancer, memory loss, etc.), and pound on how their diet plan can solve that problem. Maybe you can reflect on why you chose to go to the plant based diet, find the problem it solved, and see if there are low competition keywords in that niche.
Have you check Google Search console or noticed a trend in what "searches" are bringing people to your site? Maybe you can see if you can exploit the things people are already coming for?
As far as social media, I tried to go to your social media links you have here, but they didn't work. I would suggest rather than posting on your social media walls, to go to your social media pages and search for groups in your niche. Post in the groups. The power of the social media is in paid advertising and group posting. Hopefully this helps.
Thank you --
I don't understand why my social media icons aren't working, since I made sure the widget has my URLs to the pages. Weird.
Yes I understand the rest of what you are saying.
Very overwhelming to me, but I get it -- I have to re-think this.
The problem of course, is how can I go in and change headlines of my posts? Won't that screw up what little SEO I have going?!
Thank you again,
Amy
No. Changing titles should be only for the better. You should probably do that and use different keywords to optimize those posts. The thing that may mess things up is changing urls. If you decide to change urls make sure to make redirect urls.
Okay cool and thank you!