Share your stories on recovery of lost traffic (i.e. page views)

1. 91

   yougotmeposted 9 years ago

   Greetings fellow hubbers!
   
   I've been here in the Hubpages community for more than 2 years now, and I've never been hit by the changes in Google's search algorithms. However, that was until the last quarter of 2014 where my daily page views got slashed by 80%. The traffic hasn't recovered ever since.
   
   I understand that this is just ordinary for writing sites and basically in the digital ream, but I must admit that it's beginning to sadden me; how things just vanished like that. Now, I know that I am not alone, so I sort of received an enlightenment to start a forum thread that brings more positivism.
   
   Amid all the heartbreaking news of losing traffic, I know that some of you were able to recover, and a small percentage received more traffic that what was lost. With this, I'm urging you guys (if you are one of these hubbers) to share with the community your story.
   
   -Were there any actions you did to help improve the traffic? Or did you just wait for the tides to calm?
   -How long did it take before you start seeing your traffic bouncing back?
   
   I hope this thread will help in providing sparks of hope for those unlucky ones (including me). Thank you so much fellow hubbers! Have a nice day!

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   1. 86

      TIMETRAVELER2posted 9 years agoin reply to this

      I took a 90% drop in traffic on August 25, 2014.  Since that time I have changed my entire site to make it a niche site and updated every article.  I also went into WMT and found malicious links to my site that I asked Google to remove.
      
      The result?
      
      Views have come up to about 80% of what they were, but my site is still struggling.
      
      Part of this is that HP took a 46% loss also, but the rest I cannot explain.  I was doing really well here until this happened and do not know if I ever will again.
      
      As a result, I have started a second site and eventually, if things do not improve, I will use my articles to create an ebook and terminate that site.
      
      I still do not know what happened because Google never placed any penalties or warnings on my subdomain and none of my work was spam.  In some cases, sites never come back or can take a year or more to return, so I'm in a wait and see mode.
      
      Ironically, I was not hit by the Google updates.  Go figure!

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   2. 94

      Susana Sposted 9 years agoin reply to this

      Here are my tips for recovery based on the actions I took back when I got panda'd:
      
      - identify each hub as a sales hub or an information hub.
      
      - Remove all affiliate links (including amazon/ebay) from informational hubs, unless the hub has had a sale of a product you are promoting in the last 200 views.
      
      - review every single product capsule you're showing (even on sales hubs) and ask yourself if it's actually making sales or not.  If not, then get rid of it.
      
      - make sure less than 50% of your hubs contain affiliate links/capsules overall.
      
      E.g. your hub about cockroaches. It's an informational hub and I doubt it's ever made sales of the book you're promoting. Take it off.
      
      E.g. your hub about The Fault in Our Stars. I would guess no one is buying an Abundance of Katherine's from it? Also, it's not titled in a way that is likely to make sales of the book you're actually looking at because people reading your hub would have already bought and read the book. If it's made no sales, remove the product.
      
      E.g. your Korean-Samgyupsal hub. People who are looking for recipes are not looking to buy stuff from amazon. I'd take the products off.
      
      Your hubs are great btw You've just made the mistake that so many hubbers do, and that is to add sales capsules on inappropriate hubs.
      
      If you decide to take this advice please let me know how it turns out

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      1. 91

         yougotmeposted 9 years agoin reply to this

         Thank you so much for these tips! They actually make sense, and I'm going to implement them now.

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         1. 94

            Susana Sposted 9 years agoin reply to this

            Glad to help
            
            I had (another) clean up of my pages at the beginning of December and my traffic is currently about 30% better than it was before the clean up, and that's with around 25 less pages. I hope you see the same kind of improvement!
            
            I also find I benefit a lot from having EC hubs. Have you opted in or out of that?

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2. 94

   littlethingposted 9 years ago

   When my views dropped, I waited to see what would happen for a while. I really didn't have time for much else at that point. I was also hit by the last quarter of 2014. I went and updated some of my hubs. Even if it's just changing one sentence around, and edit an always help. I started publishing and being more active on the forums. This was all in the past week, and I was seeing some recovery until the bug today. I'm still getting views, but HP just needs to fix the counters. I really hope your views go back up. The only thing I an really recommend is updated your hubs. Google likes fresher content.

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   1. 91

      yougotmeposted 9 years agoin reply to this

      Thanks littlething! I remember I used to update my hubs once in a while (which may explain why I don't get hit before), I guess I just forgot to do it over the past months. Thanks for reminding me this simple tip!

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      1. 94

         littlethingposted 9 years agoin reply to this

         Anytime! I forgot to do this for about a year, and my views steadily dropped off. Someone else, I think it was Writerfox? Mentioned this a while back somewhere, and I remembered I hadn't done it in a year! I've got reminders on my phone now to go in every 2-3 months. It's a hard thing to remember to do.  I'm glad that I could help out!

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3. 81

   Chuck Fasstposted 8 years ago

   I am a YouTuber and I took a huge hit on Jan. 1. Over a 200% loss in one day! They all said - oh, don't worry. BS! I see a pattern. Every year so many of us lose. Well. someone else out there is gaining big - that's for sure. I have not made it back to where I was a half yr ago. I have 200 vids and 800 subscribers. It takes me 3 mos. for a payout!
   
   Us creative types are constantly being sold short. We are not getting a fair shake for the incredible hours we are forced to put in. I have been a Hubber for amost two mos with 10 Hubs and I have earned $ZERO  :-(

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   1. 86

      TIMETRAVELER2posted 8 years agoin reply to this

      10 hubs are not enough for you to start earning here.  2 months is a very short time for anybody to be writing here.  If you want to earn you have to produce a good number of quality hubs that are on topics that people want to read.  I would also suggest writing in one niche because Google will then see you as an "expert" and give you a higher ranking due to your credibility.

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