I’m Ranking! Am I Ranking? Who’s Ranking? What’s Ranking?

byParthaB

4.2K followers

Updated 2 years ago

Okay, this post follows on from a few recent blog posts I’ve read and a fairly in-depth conversation I had with Lizzie yesterday.

Let me put this in a nutshell for you.

IF ←- And I mean IF

Your keyword research is on-point, and I really mean IF..

You should rank more-or-less STRAIGHT AWAY for your CHOSEN KEYWORD

OR

You should rank more-or-less STRAIGHT AWAY for another search term that GOOGLE DEEMS YOU RELEVANT FOR.

And this is EVEN with a new website.

Oh yes, even if your website is in its first week or two, IF your keyword research is good enough, you WILL rank for SOMETHING.

HOWEVER

As you will soon start to realise, and if you check under QUERIES in Google Search Console, ONE article has the ability to rank for 100s, potentially 1000s of keywords.

And it is this process of ranking for 100s and 1,000s of keywords TO ONE ARTICLE that brings you traffic.

And it is this process of ranking for 100s and 1,000s of keywords TO ONE ARTICLE that TAKES TIME!!

I honestly think the Income School guys said it best, approximately 4-5 years ago, although I have changed some of the figures below based on my own experiences.

An article written on a brand new website will take approximately 8-9 months to reach 90% of its FULL traffic potential.

An article written on an established site will take approximately 5-6 months to reach 90% of its FULL traffic potential.

An article written on an authority site will take approximately 2-4 months to reach 90% of its FULL traffic potential.

Let me explain this so it’s even easier to understand;

You write ONE article (all figures are made up/approximates, do NOT come to me telling me your articles aren’t following this trend), this ONE ARTICLE ranks as follows:

Month 1 - you rank for 1-3 keywords

Month 2 - you rank for 7-11 keywords

Month 3 - you rank for 99 keywords

Month 6 - you rank for 267 keywords

Month 12 - you rank for 1,116 keywords

ALL to just ONE article.

Are you now starting to understand the difference between ranking and an article reaching its FULL TRAFFIC POTENTIAL.

This is also why I say that “exact match keywords” simply don’t matter anymore.

Google doesn’t CARE.

Google is far more intelligent and sophisticated than the days of “exact match keywords” being a thing.

You write an article based around ONE keyword.

Over time, Google will find MORE search queries that your article is RELEVANT to and rank you for those keywords too.

This is what TAKES TIME.

This is WHAT brings an increase in traffic.

Just because you’re ranking for the main target keyword after a day or two, doesn’t make you a genius.

It simply means that your choice of longtail keyword is GOOD. Well Done, I am proud of you!

However, you WILL eventually start ranking that same article for many, many, many, many different (but related) keywords.

This is why I say to target UNDERSERVED TOPICS (not everyone else is writing about this topic… BORING!!! How many of you start a new website and then write exactly the same stuff as millions before you have? Original, Unique… hmmm. NOT so much).

This is why I say to target “search terms” that have “weak competition” on page one of Google (websites with Domain Authority UNDER 20, Quora, Reddit, Forums, Social Sites, Groups, etc.)

There may not be a great deal of traffic according to a keyword tool (honestly, THEY REALLY DON’T KNOW - ALL keywords tools will pull data from the Google Keyword Planner, as this is seen as the most “accurate” tool for search volume, as it takes data directly from Google itself - BUT Ahrefs conducted an experiment for over 72,000 keywords, over 54% of results gave the WRONG search volume for a keyword).

So, DON’T choose a keyword based on search volume/traffic.

BUT

If the keyword you have targeted makes sense.

If you have used your OWN PERSONAL JUDGEMENT and believe this is a topic that people in your niche would be interested in…

WRITE THE ARTICLE.

You should rank more-or-less immediately (as long as you’ve done your “weak sites” analysis of page one of Google).

You may not get much traffic INITIALLY.

But next month that ONE ARTICLE will rank for MORE SEARCH PHRASES.

The month after that the same ONE ARTICLE will rank for EVEN MORE SEARCH PHRASES.

You get the point.

So, if you’re NOT ranking, or your articles are NOT increasing in traffic with each month (up to the 8-9 month mark)

GUESS WHAT?

Your choice of keyword was poor.

Do NOT trust every single bit of information a PIECE OF SOFTWARE tells you.

Use your own eyes, check Google, check to see if similar topics are being discussed on social groups, forums, Q&A sites.

THIS is how you know whether a keyword is worth targeting and whether it will INCREASE IN TRAFFIC month-after-month.

Here’s a quick clue:

Y'all targeting:

Best of “keyword”

How to “keyword”

“keyword” vs. “keyword”

This is fine, but these are NOT the types of articles I would be writing until at least 3-4 months into my website’s journey.

Here’s me targeting:

Why Does “keyword”

Can I “keyword”

Should You “keyword”

Is it OK “keyword”

Why Can’t “keyword”

And you’re all wondering why I’m getting 1,000s and 1,000s of visitors to a new website within the first few months.

CHOOSE KEYWORDS THAT NOT EVERYONE ELSE IS TARGETING.

CHOOSE KEYWORDS THAT HAVE “WEAK COMPETITION” ON PAGE ONE OF GOOGLE (use your own eyes, never believe everything a PIECE OF SOFTWARE tells you, especially when ahrefs have PROVEN that 54%+ of the time, even the most “accurate” keyword tool GET’S IT WRONG).

You can check out Lizzie and my conversation, and see how we have used the power of Google Search Console to discover the variety of different keywords an article is ranking for.

And then using this information to write more articles THAT WILL RANK to form part of a topic cluster.

As ALWAYS:

Write for PEOPLE and STOP writing for machines (trying to please Google, trying to please an SEO plugin, trying to find “high traffic” keywords via a keyword tool)

If you’re ranking for a keyword straight away, well done, but that simply means your choice of keyword is good (as it SHOULD BE).

However, that’s not the end of the line for that article, your rankings for that one article, and the traffic you will receive to that one article.

There’s SO much more to it than that.

Thank You For Reading

Partha

p.s. My NEW 32-Day old website (yes, JUST 32 days) has already notched up 1,763 page views - that's mainly down to YOU, thank you!