5 Practical SEO Tips to Get Your Dropped Rankings Back
Search engine optimisation (SEO) may be a tough nut to break. However, to consistently maintain high search-engine rankings can be even more difficult. There are just too many factors that play their roles. This is why it is quite common to lose your search engine rankings – even after you’ve achieved the top positions.
It can be painful. But the good thing is that, with a few simple tricks, you can easily get your dropped rankings back. In this post, I am going to share 5 practical SEO tips to get your dropped search engine rankings back.
So let’s get started.
Improve Your Website’s Loading Speed
This can be one of the main factors of your loss.
Your website’s loading speed is a relatively new ranking factor by Google.
Google announced in 2010 that from now on, a website’s loading speed is going to be another decisive factor for its search engine ranking.
Why is it a factor now?
It is actually quite simple. Google wants to provide its users the best possible results. Even if your website has a lot of great content, it is only going to frustrate the searcher if it takes 20 seconds to load.
So if your website’s ranking has dropped, it is a good idea to check its loading speed.
You can use the following services to test and optimise your website’s speed:
Revisit and Update
Some webpages lose their search engine rankings because they become outdated and obsolete.
If you have a piece of content that requires constant updates, it is a good idea to revisit it and update it with new, relevant information. Most likely, you will see an instant rise in its search engine ranking.
For instance, let’s suppose your blog has a post on “140 Search Engine Ranking Factors by Google”. It would have done great a couple of years back. But now Google has 200 ranking factors (as of this writing). Your webpage is missing 60 of them.
The bottom line is that your webpage is outdated and obsolete. If some other blogger publishes the complete list of 200 factors, it is most definitely going to overtake your post.
Improve Click Through Rates for Better Rankings
I know it seems odd, but it works.
Let’s see how it happens.
In the 1st point of this post, we discussed how Google ranks webpages on the basis of user-experience. If it serves its audience well, Google ranks a webpage higher in the search results. If it doesn’t serve them well, a webpage loses its ranking.
CTR or click-through rate is another important indication of how a webpage is serving its audience.
For instance, your webpage is ranked on #5 on Google’s 1st page for the keyword “weight loss”. It’s a great position to be in!
Now, let’s say, everyday 100 users search for the term “weight loss” and see your post ranked on #5. However, out of those 100, only 5 people visit your website. That’s a CTR of only 5%.
On the other hand, another webpage that is ranked on #6 (below your website) gets a CTR of 20%. Eventually, Google will realise that your page isn’t serving your audience as well as it first anticipated, and it should be dropped down. The #6 webpage, with a better CTR than yours, will eventually overtake you.
And how can you get your dropped ranking back?
Yes, you guessed it right. You need to improve your CTR.
Improve your webpage’s title, Meta description; add relevant keywords and other persuasive words. A few simple tweaks like these can dramatically increase your CTRs, and your rankings.
Be Responsive and Mobile Friendly
Is your website mobile-friendly and fully responsive? If it isn’t, this can be the biggest reason of your lost SEO rankings.
With every passing day, more and more people are using mobile devices to search the web. If your website isn’t mobile friendly, it is failing to serve a major chunk of your audience.
Ultimately, Google – or any other search engine – will replace it with a website that is fully responsive and can cater its audience better than you.
This is based on Google now taking into consideration engagement factors on your website, if it sees mobile users are clicking on your website, but then leaving right away due to bad experience, your website rankings could suffer.
Leverage Social Media Shares
It is an undeniable fact that social media shares are a great indicator of a website’s credibility and usefulness.
What if a rival website has been constantly leveraging social media shares? And on the same time, you weren’t.
Eventually, you may lose your search engine ranking to that rival website.
The solution, however, is very simple. Start leveraging social media websites to get more social shares and traffic.
More social media shares mean more traffic and an increased chance of someone linking back to your website. All these factors play a huge role in achieving better search engine rankings.
Conclusion
In the SEO world, it is very common to lose search engine rankings. But with the above practical tips, you can easily get your dropped rankings back.
It may take some time, so be patient. In the meanwhile, keep producing quality content, and promote it through the most efficient channels.
