How To Analyse Your Website In Case Of A Major Google Rankings Drop

An SEO analysis is necessary to see whether a website is doing well or not. With an accurate website SEO analysis, one can know if their Google rankings have dropped dramatically and take the necessary actions to regain their position on the top of the search engine results pages.

Although fluctuations in Google rankings do happen, it is never a good sign when they significantly drop. For this reason, one must be proactive in analysing their website’s SEO every day and quickly find solutions to problems.

Most professionals use the methods below to isolate the main cause of the problem and get their SEO back on track.

1. Look for 404 pages

SEOs focus on analysing the status code that their pages return – or if they return a 200 status response code, ensuring that there are no 404 pages on their website.

They should also make sure that bots are able to crawl and interact with their website. If the search bots are unable to crawl and index the webpages, it’s possible that the webmaster accidentally set the restrictions too tightly; this should be resolved as soon as possible.

2. Check title tags, meta descriptions, and headings

Although these three do not directly affect one’s search engine rankings, they should still be included in an SEO analysis.

SEOs should ensure that all their page headings, title tags, and meta descriptions are well-optimised and are displayed correctly in the search engine results pages. Meta descriptions compel searchers to click through a link, and so publishers should ensure that they are relevant and persuasive.

3. Check for Google Algorithm updates

Quality algorithm Panda and link algorithm Penguin are now both included in Google’s Core algorithm system. The search engine company also updates these two in real-time, so SEOs must be always on the lookout for changes every day as this provides them with new information that can be used in their website SEO analysis.

To stay up-to-date with Google algorithms, businesses should visit popular SEO news websites and even social media platforms like Twitter to know what the SEO community is discussing.

4. Check Google Search Console

This is a free service that Google provides, which allows businesses to analyse, maintain, and optimise their website’s visibility in the search engine ranking results.

With this tool, users can easily see any crawl errors, URL errors, server errors, and more. They can also submit an XML sitemap for webmasters to study their site’s structure and check if there are any issues with the number of links submitted and indexed by Google. If these numbers do not add up, there is a possibility that the search bots do not have access to their important pages.

5. Check Google Analytics

SEO professionals turn to Google Analytics to see if their site traffic significantly dropped or to view user metrics like bounce rate, pages per session, or time spent on pages. Moreover, this tool helps SEOs learn how searchers find the website, their search intent, the device they use (whether desktop or mobile), as well as customer behaviour.

If your website is facing a significant drop in rankings, you can make several changes to prevent your traffic from going down the drain. By following the methods mentioned above, you can quickly see what went wrong and fix them on the spot.

However, business owners usually can’t find the time to monitor and maintain their site rankings – much less conduct a thorough website SEO analysis. Here at Position1SEO, we can provide you with an in-depth SEO audit, as well as effective search engine optimisation services.

We will first do some initial reports, then provide you with follow-up reports on a regular basis so you can see your website’s improvement. We will also handle the task of boosting your site traffic and search rankings and ensuring that your SEO strategies up-to-date with the latest trends in the industry.

If you’re interested in working with us, just email office@position1seo.co.uk or dial 0141 404 7515.