If there’s a type of blog entry that is potentially getting traffic from search right now, its undoubtedly your old blog entries. As we all know, search engine traffic takes time. No one really writes or puts out something, and then expects search engines to start sending traffic to that content as soon as its published. That’s why its really more long term and that I always tell people to just do the basic search stuff, but not get too obsessed with it. In short, do other online marketing stuff as well and don’t really on Google.
In this blog entry I would just like to share some rambling stuff regarding search engine traffic here in this blog. As you all know, I haven’t been blogging actively for quite a while now and in fact I’m not that much into the game anymore. So understandably, the traffic that this site is getting is considerably lower than ever. And because of that, its easier for me to spot the increased search traffic that I started getting.
While the traffic increase for the past 18 months is not massive, its very evident that I started getting more traffic from search and that comes with me not posting that much during the period of increase. And the traffic is still consistent as of this writing. More search traffic when not posting too much, amazing? No.
The truth is even if I am posting consistently, I would still get the same (or more) amount of search traffic because the content that are getting the hits from search are old blog entries.
Now I’m not really a search guy. I wrote before about writing for search engines but I don’t mostly work with doing SEO stuff. I love putting out content and engaging but I’m not a search guy. However, the reason I started getting more search traffic is quite a bit surprising.
About 3 years ago I wrote a cheesy post about the best birthday gift for the girl that I love (or more accurately I have a crush with). That was college days so please understand that I was dealing with puppy loves and whatnot. :p. Now, I noticed that I started getting like 10-20 hits a day regarding keywords related to that blog entry. I was obviously surprised because the article was not written in a way that one would expect it would get traffic.
So when I got convinced that I had to do something to get better traffic, I studied the Analytics and Webmaster Central data even more. And then I edited the said blog entry to try to ‘massage’ it more and eventually get better rankings. I’m not really able to follow it closely because of work but for the past 2 months, I realized that I’m now getting 30-50 hits from search from keywords that are related to that blog entry. It was fascinating because I never really expected it to get traffic from search at all. Also, its on the first page of Google right now when you search for ‘best birthday gifts for girls’ which I thought was amazing.
And now there are some other keywords that I never intended to rank for that are ranking well and are getting me some traffic.
Moral Lesson
So what’s the moral lesson of this blog post? The lesson is to never underestimate traffic from search engines. But another is that when you feel like you are starting to get some, don’t be afraid to make modifications to that specific blog post. You have all the data to look at from Google Analytics and Google Webmaster Central and it reveals almost everything to help you. Do some tweaks and those little tweaks can definitely help.
My stance on not getting too caught up with doing SEO is still the same and I don’t still consider myself as a guy doing search engine optimization primarily but it definitely gives me some things to experiment for now. And getting search traffic and maximizing it is something that I know will be useful in the long run.
How about you? What’s your no.1 tip in maximizing search traffic?
Would you say that after the Panda update, the traffic from you old posts improved?
Chris|SeaBreezeCottagesMoalboalCebu´s last blog post ..Born To Be Wild Episode: Sardine Run in Moalboal Cebu
Melvin Reply:
May 20th, 2012 at 3:22 pm
I would initially say no, but as I’m writing this I can clearly see a much improved search traffic since the Panda thingy. I’m not really that knowledgeable with Google Panda and stuff but the increase in traffic on some pages/posts is just surprising considering that I did not make any adjustment of some sort to those pages.
So perhaps the answer is yes. 🙂
Was the traffic any good for you? My initial thought is that most of it would bounce as they would be looking for specific information on types of gifts. You could capitalise on the traffic by adding Amazon products maybe?
Mike´s last blog post ..Google Analytics – What is Keyword (Not Provided)?
Melvin Reply:
May 20th, 2012 at 3:24 pm
Yes I just started adding that around a month ago. So far I’m still sort of experimenting with different programs and whatnot. But you’re definitely right regarding the type of users that are coming from those keywords. Its typically a one read and bounce result and the rate is very very high.
I’ll be asking the same question as Mike here. It’s true that you could have gotten the traffic, but was there a good effect on your bounce rate? Yes, an old blog post can get traffic because some of them may still be useful in the future. But what if the people are looking for something they can actually buy rather than just looking at suggestions, or something?
= Gerald Martin =