Chadrack
Hi everyone. Welcome to yet another insightful time on our Community Time-Out.
Today we will be discussing yet another very interesting topic. As usual, I trust you would share with us your insights on this subject matter and we all would come out with something new!
Search Engine Optimization Rule #1 Questioned?
Our subject for discussion today has to do with search engine optimization. As we all know, the purpose of SEO is to get our webpages not just on the first page of the SERPs but if possible, rank at #1!
However, in the past few weeks I’ve had cause to ask a few questions.
Now, I’m an SEO enthusiast and very passionate about optimizing every post that I write. In fact, I'm such an ardent believer in search engine optimization that my content writing service focuses mainly on SEO web content writing and not just any type of marketing content!
Also, because of my interest in SEO, I have a few programs for monitoring my blogs' SEO stats. And, I can authoritatively report that this blog is doing great on the search engines with about 55% of the blog’s traffic coming from the search engines.
Specifically, here is a graphic from a program I’m using to monitor the SEO strength of the blog with a few results from specific pages:
And here is another one:
Again, that is impressive, right? But now take a look at this one, please note carefully the page ranking at #354!
Please for better viewing, click on the images to enlarge.
Now, can you notice that apart from the ones ranking on the first pages, traffic is also coming from others, like this one ranking far down the SERPs at #354?
My concerned in this discussion is really these ones ranking far below in the SERPs.
Ok, let's look again at the #1 rule of search engine optimization:
SEO Rule #1 – If you want to drive traffic from the search engines you must rank on the first page or better still, at #1 else no one will found your site and therefore there will be no traffic!
You have heard this so many times, right? Of course, everything I have ever done in the name of SEO had been driven by that rule!
But now, from the results shown above, a few questions have been on my mind. These are:
1.   Do you really need to rank ONLY on page 1 to drive traffic from the search engines?
2. What must have prompted these searchers to abandon the first, the second, the third and even the tenth pages of the SERPs and go looking for and clicking on a link in the 354th position?
3. What lesson can this really teach us about optimizing our webpages for the search engines? Or, what insight do we gain from this?
After pondering on this for some time now, I’ve decided to bring it out for us to discuss on this platform today believing that someone will have some insights that will help us all.
And so, permit me to step aside here while you make your contributions. Post your responses and insights, or any other question you may have from the results above, in your comments below. So, let the discussion begin!
(Community Time-Out is our weekly discussion program where we seek answers to pressing questions that have to do with internet marketing, blogging, social media, online marketing and any other topic that has to do with running a successful business online. If you want to contribute a question for discussion please use this form.)
Being in first page of search with specific keyword isn’t important to get traffic from search engines. I’ve been getting SEO traffic from page 5 to 10 with specific keywords.
BTW, which tool do you use to monitor the SEO strength of your blog?
@Ehsan Ullah,
Sorry, missed this out. I’m using StatCounter for this particular report.
@Ehsan Ullah,
It is really definite that not every one who rank at number one is getting the clicks! What I really want to know from this is what will make a searcher to go down to a page in #354 leaving all the rest?
Can you really offer some explanations here?
Hello Chadrack,
First of all I would like to congratulate you that your site is showing on #354 😀
I personally feel that SERP is mainly based on keywords gaming. We must do keyword research.
I have few example articles of my blog in which I played with keywords and ranked good.
1. Onpage seo basics ( showing #4 in google search page )
2. Hand gestures ( showing #11 in google search page )
3. Redirect Google images traffic ( showing #1 in google search page )
4. Run android os on your pc ( showing #3 in google search page )
5. Format Factory (showing #11 in google search page) and so on…………
All I mean to say is, Keyword research plays a major role in ranking in SERP.
@Mohammed Abdullah Khan,
Thanks for congratulating me for ranking at #354 🙂
Frankly, I agree with you that keyword research is necessary to rank high on the SERPs. As you can see on the other two graphics, many of my pages are ranking on the first page with some at #1, #2, #3, #4 and least at #7!
My point in this post was to really know why someone will take the time to browse the results until he gets to #354! That is really what beats me in this post. I was thinking may be you will have some ideas you want to share with us. Or don’t you seeing that you are really good in this SEO of a thing!
Pardon for the late reply.
High there its been a long while since my last visit to your site, it proves that SERP is very important, SEO will do the trick, cause they are the one responsible for creating one site into its fullest potential.
Hey Chadrack,
We know that the person must have been really desperate to get the answer 😉
Anyways, I think it is because your page came up in the first page (especially with G+ around, if you follow someone and they have posted something related on their blogs, that is going to show up first before all other results – preferential treatment to people we follow). In that case, the person clicks the link and follows to your blog (and your tool may record the actual ranking instead of what G+ did).
Of course, I agree with the concept though. We still have a chance, if our pages show up on the first 2-3 pages (but, I highly doubt if anyone has enough patience to go more than 5 pages of Google).
It is always good to get rank on the top position and on first page at least.. but that doesn’t mean the sites which are not on first page cannot generate good traffic.
As you asked here, how one can go down to a page in #354 or what are the things which make him to go there??
The question is really good and it also forces me to think about it!!
Well written piece, unique and good advice for candidates. No question! Uniqueness is key! According to me you described that in very good way. You are so smart and this is a great post! Thank you for the great tips. Wow I didn’t know this! And I love your blog!
I’ve heard so many times again and again Chadrack that in order to get your information viewed you have to be on the first couple of pages. Well that might be true for a lot of people but if I don’t find what I’m looking for on the first couple of pages I’ll continue to go deeper.
I will usually go as far as page 10 to find what I’m searching for. Now #354! I won’t go 35 pages deep but obviously your content is being viewed from other sites which I’m assuming the social networking sites in order to get traffic to your blog. That is unless your analytics are showing it’s coming from Google. That’s interesting.
~Adrienne
@Adrienne,
Must say I’ve personally gone up to page 10 also but this one really got me thinking. I just couldn’t figure out what made this person to go that deep and I was thinking someone will help me here. But so far no one has been able to give an explanation that I can agree with! 🙂
Of course, traffic is coming from the social sites and other blogs but these particular ones are basically search engine traffic.
Hi Chadrack,
I really like your blog and this was a great post. I am still a beginner when it comes to SEO, but everything I’ve learned so far has said that you need to rank in the top 3 on page 1 or you’ve completely wasted your time. I agree with Adrienne in that I’ve gone farther and have searched through maybe the first 8 or 10 pages, but not much more than that. It is a very interesting question!
Jess
@Jess Brown,
Thanks for the comment. Well as a newbie to SEO with results like these would you say there is some flaws on the advice from these SEOs?
I would say you are definitely on to something here. I’m sure it doesn’t happen frequently, but there are people who would dig that deep. I hope it is true that you don’t have to rank on the first few pages…maybe I have a chance then!
Also, as for the person, maybe it was a someone who was extremely inexperienced with the Internet and didn’t know any better. 🙂 Crazy as it sounds, there are still people out there.
Maybe the person read your post and then later couldn’t find it for whatever reason and was very desperate to find it again. You do have great content here. 😀
@Jess Brown,
Hey, you made some very good points there. Yes, it could right that the person is very inexperienced about using the search engines. But I must say he/she must have really have much patience prowling through that content! 🙂 And about maybe the person was looking for my content I think that sounds really flattering. But if that is true then I must give an award to this person. LOL!
But I really think there was something the person was looking for that he/she did not see in those first pages. What is really baffling me is the patience of clicking from one page to the other when we all agree that people will only spend seconds on a page and if they do not find what they are looking for, they would click the back button!
Ok, this is a rare case, I agree. Thanks for the reply and pardon me for replying this late.
Hi, I’m a newbie so don’t have much experience under my belt as yet but am really pleased to hear I don’t have to kill myself trying to get rank just on page 1 to drive traffic from the search engines. Isn’t there enough for us all, the web is world-wide after all!
@Eve,
Oh yes, this shows you can still drive some traffic even when you are not ranking on the first page. But, all the same the higher the better. So it is not bad if you can find a way to rank higher but it shouldn’t really be a do or die affair!
Thanks for adding your comment.
Hi Chadrack.
I have two thoughts on this post.
1. With all of the algorithym updates that Google has made over the last few years, SEO as such has become far less important that just writing epic quality content. I truly don’t believe that you need to spend hours analysing statistics and going to great efforts to trick the search engines into believing that you deserve to be ranked number 1 on page 1.
A whole industry was created around SEO (most of that being black hat), and in response Google has gone to great lengths to ensure that its users get the best possible experience and the most relevant results.
2. There is a big difference in results between being logged into Google and not being logged into Google. If you are logged in to Google your search results will tend to display results that have been created by your friends or contacts on Google Plus.
Try it for yourself. Do a search logged in and then do exactly the same search after logging out. In almost all cases you will find that the results are vastly different. So to sum up you might be ranked 354 when someone you are connected to searches logged out of Google, but you may be on page one if they are logged in.
@Scott Dudley,
I agree with you on both points. However, I want to make this clear also:
1. Google updates did not in any way kill SEO rather the updates have improved SEO. The search engines are still using the same metrics to rank sites and not just having good content. Where good content in is the area of social media sharing. The more your content is share on social media, the higher the reputation the content is ascribed.
But note that when the search engines is ranking the content they look for certain criteria which in most cases it is the keywords. It is the keywords that the searcher enters that will determine what content the search engines returns and not because your content was very good!
2. Yes, Google is personifying its search results returning different results for different people depending on whether they are logged in or not. But despite this, the result I’m referring to here clearly shows that the page was ranking at #354 when that person located it and clicked on it. The result is not on my end. The stat recorded the ranking of the page.
This is where I became curious. How many minutes do you think this person may have spent trying clicking from one page to the other? Did you see my point?
It is always good to get rank on the top position and on first page at least. However, I wonder whether it is the best or not?
@business card
Thanks for the comment but I would have loved it if you let us know why this person spent time clicking to the 354th position!
Hi I didn’t actually realise anybody out of the millions of people there are on the web actually got to page 35. All I can say is there was a lot of rubbish on the other 34 pages. I would of given up long before then.just goes to show you……
Thanks lee
@Lee,
I agree with you. I too would have given up after the first 2 pages! But could all the other results be rubbish? Don’t you think there was something this person was looking for which he/she did not find in the other results?
All online marketers has a chance of ranking on Google as long as they are practicing the a consistent and good SEO method. Posting a fresh and unique content and use of social media are some of the secrets.
@Link Building Services,
This is what Google is really trying to make us understand with the many updates. SEO is not really a thing that is to be gamed. Do the right thing and the search engines will reward you with high rankings. Thanks for the comment.
Hi Chadrack!For me being in the no.1 spot is important.Almost everybody who search chooses to check the first result they found on search engines.
@AddieRonald from How to start your own Blog,
Of course, everyone wants that coveted position. But not every one can be there at the same time. Or don’t you think so?
All online marketers has a chance of ranking on search engine as long as they’re practicing the a consistent and good SEO method. Posting a fresh and unique content and use of social media are some of the secrets.
SEO is very hard but you tips is support to increase traffic.
in google factors serp is more usable, because this is the main fact for any website.
I find it helpful to focus on those low-ranking results, as they bring in traffic to a site and you can easily and quickly increase a #300 ranking to < #50. You don't only need to focus on your site's main keywords, these long-tail ones can bring in a surprising amount of traffic as well.