Discover Victory Thread

1. 98

   EricDockettposted 7 weeks ago

   I'm posting this with the hope that we can document Discover moves and semi-accurately understand how the changes are impacting traffic.
   
   If you have seen a notable improvement to your traffic since your article moved from a niche site to Discover, please mention it here.
   
   For the purposes of this thread, I am defining "notable improvement" as a sustained increase of 10 or more views per day to a single article over several days with Google as the traffic source.
   
   You don't have to give specifics if you don't want to. Just a "Yes, I have seen a notable improvement based on that criteria," is good enough, and maybe mention the niche site it moved from.
   
   Edit: If you have noticed a notable drop, I guess mention that too. Let's not get too positive.
   
   Thank you. Carry on.

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   1. 96

      viryaboposted 7 weeks agoin reply to this

      Great idea.

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   2. 84

      bravewarriorposted 7 weeks agoin reply to this

      My traffic sources stats are never the same as what shows in My Account; they're (traffic sources stats) lower historically. That said, 54% of my traffic comes by way of Google. I'm looking at my overall history. I haven't had anything moved from a niche site to Discover since before the announcement was made.

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   3. 73

      Miebakagh57posted 7 weeks agoin reply to this

      I just noted how HubPages is moving some of our stories to dot discover.                                  However, the issue of traffic is that of or with Google.                                           Your idea sounds nice and great.                                    More so, I'm not on that site.

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2. 94

   Glenn Stokposted 7 weeks ago

   This is a great idea, Eric. Examining my log, 16 hubs have been moved to Discover and none of them have gained views since the move. On the contrary, most of them have dropped to just 1 view per day.
   
   I see you asked Lisa the same question I had asked her about how she measured the traffic changes to determine the move is working. She had yet to answer that question.

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   1. 98

      EricDockettposted 7 weeks agoin reply to this

      Have you noticed if they are indexed under the new Discover urls?

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         Glenn Stokposted 7 weeks agoin reply to this

         I checked several of them, Eric. Some do already show the discover URL in the SERPs, but others still show the niche URL.

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3. 96

   PaulGoodman67posted 7 weeks ago

   I know that many people are aware of this already, but it's important to remember that when there's a change to a page, Google doesn't usually acknowledge it immediately.
   
   At the earliest, it doesn't usually happen until the spiders next crawl the page and relay the new data back to Google. This can take days or weeks.
   
   The above is the best-case scenario, though. Often it takes months before articles are reassessed by Google and the changes are fully acknowledged.
   
   It could easily be several months before we know what effect the Discover move has had on traffic.
   
   What I'm getting at is that an article's traffic might change but that doesn't necessarily mean that it's caused by Discover. There can be a tendency to overextrapolate in this sort of situation.
   
   Further, we've got another core algo update coming in the next few weeks. The core updates often have a dramatic effect on traffic when they hit.
   
   Having said all that, like Glenn, I can't say that I've noticed any changes so far.

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   1. 98

      EricDockettposted 7 weeks agoin reply to this

      Of course, you are right. It usually does take a while to note a change, and at the very least it takes Google time to index the new url and work everything out.
      
      However, there are cases where the change of domain can make an immediate difference in traffic once Google digests the new url. I see it when my articles get zero organic traffic on Discover, then immediately show up on page one of search and starting drawing Google traffic when they go to Pethelpful. I've seen it in other cases when moving articles around.
      
      That's what I am trying to document here, because in the short term, it is the only thing we have to go by.
      
      And because Lisa said HP has noted an improvement in traffic and earnings. If they are seeing it, we should be too.
      
      Even in the long term, unless HP is willing to share information, without comparing notes we have no idea if it is working or not. Overall traffic to Discover is going to go up, probably by a lot, simply because so many articles are moving over.
      
      Without a sample set, there is no way to know what the heck is happening, and the only samples we have are our own articles.

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   2. 94

      Glenn Stokposted 7 weeks agoin reply to this

      Paul, I wish Lisa and the entire TAG team would understand what you just said here. They are moving too quickly with this latest strategy.

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      1. 96

         PaulGoodman67posted 7 weeks agoin reply to this

         Rightly or wrongly, I sense our articles have become guinea pigs in a lab!
         
         At least the question about whether all the niches would go to Discover was answered in the newsletter.
         
         Some are not being moved, although it's not yet decided which ones.
         
         That explains why a small proportion of articles were sent the other way and moved from Discover to a niche.

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            bravewarriorposted 7 weeks agoin reply to this

            Paul, HP has been a guinea pig all along! Do you not see that?

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4. 96

   Rupert Taylorposted 7 weeks ago

   I've checked several ex-Soapboxie articles and can detect no upward or downward trend. Based on what others have said, it's too early to see movement one way or the other.
   
   Only about 2 percent of my 1,000+ articles regularly hit double digit views daily. There used to be lots more and we all have experienced that decline.
   
   I have never written here with the goal of getting tons of views; I selfishly write about what interests me as a way of entertaining myself with meaningful brain-enhancing activity. Sometimes readers flock to my articles, sometimes they don't. I'm okay with that.

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   1. 96

      PaulGoodman67posted 7 weeks agoin reply to this

      I definitely got more drawn into the money-making thing. I think part of it was that early on, I felt like I was writing some good articles but they got no views.
      
      When I started creating more Google-friendly headers and picking my topics carefully, I was rewarded with more views and money. Once you start earning a reasonable amount on a regular basis, you don't want it to go away.
      
      It didn't stop writing on topics that interested me, though, even though often they didn't earn anything.
      
      It's all been a great learning experience and I've loved most of my time here. But now it feels like we're entering the end times.

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      1. 84

         bravewarriorposted 7 weeks agoin reply to this

         I agree with you, Paul. I stopped writing with the intention of posting on HP yeas ago. When HP was HP, I wrote and posted regularly. It was refreshing and encouraging to receive feedback from the community. Once HP sold out to Maven, then TAG, all went to hell and I was no longer inspired. I'm still not inspired. That's very sad to admit as someone who loves (used to love) writing and sharing my experiences with the online world. The new generation of HP is killing inspiration and depriving the world of what awesome content freelance writer have to offer.

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5. 98

   Shesabutterflyposted 7 weeks ago

   My ex-Soapboxie article still has the niche url, no idea when it was moved however as I never received a notification from HP about the transfer.
   
   That article, nor any of my previous Discover articles, have seen 10 views steadily for a long time. Honestly, I'd be happy with any sort of up tick, but for now I'm not seeing any notable changes.
   
   I thought I had an article on Feltmagnet, but I don't know how I would confirm this. The url comes back to Discover, either because it was moved earlier this year and I missed it, or Google has already recrawled the site.
   
   I currently have 18 articles (2 that I believe are recent moves), and a total of 29 views over the last 7 days. The 2 recent transfers account for half of those views, however the stats page is not currently working for me and I can't confirm if those are Google views or internal. Either way, 7 views in 7 days is not what I would consider a good uptick.
   
   I do not know who's benefitting from this move, but it has not been me. Although, I can't say that I expected to given my article's lackluster views over the past 2 years or so, and the company they now keep.

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6. 84

   Venkatachari Mposted 7 weeks ago

   Shauna, your phrase "guinea pig" offered me some smiles while reading its use in our spoken language from a page on Learning English at this link: https://learningenglish.voanews.com/a/g … 67519.html

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      bravewarriorposted 7 weeks agoin reply to this

      interesting, Venkatachari!

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      Miebakagh57posted 7 weeks agoin reply to this

      Thanks Venkatac. The link is a study. It have hint me how to handle these two words 'guinaa pig' in English Language.

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