A Drastic Drop in Traffic

1. 83

   hclpdposted 3 years ago

   While the traffic has been dismal for the last year or so, it has continued plunging in the last few weeks. I've witnessed more than 20% of traffic plunge in the last week alone. Worrying times ahead.

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      JerryFisherposted 3 years agoin reply to this

      Absolutely the same. Articles getting an average 120 views per day and have been for years are now consistently sitting at around 80. Tweaking them hasn't made any difference.

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      Kenna McHughposted 3 years agoin reply to this

      In the last couple of days, it's been down about 20 percent.

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   3. 93

      SerenityHaloposted 3 years agoin reply to this

      So far October is worse for me than September. It's a little early to tell which way October will go. If it continues in this direction, I'll have to make some serious changes.

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      divacratusposted 3 years agoin reply to this

      Traffic and earnings both are down

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      SerenityHaloposted 3 years agoin reply to this

      So… anyone recovering yet?

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         Shesabutterflyposted 3 years agoin reply to this

         For this month so far I'm up 1-1.5k over Aug-Sept and 2k up over July, but I'm still down 2-3k compared to Jan-April. CPMs are relatively low and despite the nice uptick in traffic the last couple weeks I'm not making much more than when views were lower.
         
         My traffic has dropped slightly the last few days, but so far nothing like the inital drop I saw a few months back. I'm assuming it's a natural ebb/flow at this point, unless something more drastic happens I'm not too worried about it.
         
         CPMs are what I'm concerned with. Increase in views doesn't matter much if it takes more than in the past to even reach payout. I need this nice boost to level out and not drop, but I also need more views than I had in Jan-April to even get close to bringing in the same revenue. Hopefully CPM's will recover soon.

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   PaulGoodman67posted 3 years ago

   There's talk that there was a big Google algo update at the weekend. https://www.seroundtable.com/google-sea … 32159.html

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      hclpdposted 3 years agoin reply to this

      With intrusive ads on all the niche websites, no wonder we're going down the hill.

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         JerryFisherposted 3 years agoin reply to this

         Yeah on a reasonably lengthy site of mine I've counted 25 ads. They're slow to load and you trip over them. Terrible experience for a reader. Google used to recommend for websites no more than two ads a page. If Maven were using Google ads they's likely be banned.

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            CYong74posted 3 years agoin reply to this

            AdSense has an auto-ads function for a while, which they heavily recommend. When I switched it on for my blog, my posts were flooded with Ads in the same way as HP. Frankly, I think what we're seeing now on HP is because of this auto-ads function.
            
            Not sure what has happened but apparently, Google no longer care much about the previous figures.

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         PaulGoodman67posted 3 years agoin reply to this

         I don't think the ads are necessarily the problem, as it's relatively easy to measure their impact, and adjust your approach accordingly, regarding numbers and placement etc.
         
         HP aren't so amateur, in my experience, that they would make such a simple error.
         
         It also isn't borne out by what's happening in the various niches, some of which are doing relatively well, despite using a similar ad set-up to the others.
         
         Understand, I'm talking about the general HP ads. Amazon Ass. ads are another matter, and likely at least part of the problem, in my estimation.
         
         As for me, the problem recently has been that whil emy overall traffic is up, earnings are still very mediocre. The cause of that is that the less lucrative niches are doing well, while the ones that earn me most money are still in the doldrums.

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            SerenityHaloposted 3 years agoin reply to this

            I'm one of the weirdos that doesn't rely on Amazon ads. Adsense has been less, but it mostly can be attributed to Google traffic. I've dropped anywhere from 2,000-4,000 daily views. I'm looking at my old hubs and seeing which ones are not performing as well as they used to and adjusting those. I'm also trying to do better about Pinterest as I think I should have more traffic from there than I do.
            
            I'm curious to see what October, November, and December will have in store. September has been the strangest month this year for me, so I'm curious to see if it's a fluke or if it will be a longer trend.

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               PaulGoodman67posted 3 years agoin reply to this

               It doesn't necessarily matter much whether you use Amazon or not. Since Panda 10 years ago, Google has often taken to punishing the entire site (or niche nowadays), rather than targeting individual articles.
               
               This is why I suspect that Dengarden is doing much worse than Soapboxie. Dengarden has lots of kitchen and gardening product reviews. Soapboxie has few.

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      Kenna McHughposted 3 years agoin reply to this

      That's what it was. Well, it should go back up then. It happens whenever there's an update.

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      Okoye Chinyereposted 3 years agoin reply to this

      Thanks for this information is helpful.

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   emgeposted 3 years ago

   i do not know how accurate the figures which are given are  true. Is there any way  these figures can be verified? traffic has definitely gone down but that could be an overall policy. As far as I am concerned, I'm not really bothered about traffic at all, because either way it doesn't lead anywhere. I just write for the satisfaction I get and much of my earning is from the books which I write and the short stories which are published in other magazines which pay reasonably well.

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4. 95

   eugbugposted 3 years ago

   For me it's down 20% to 25%. The drop in seasonal Dengarden traffic should be made up for by an increase in Owlcation traffic this time of year but the effects of the last few weeks updates have been dismal.

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      hclpdposted 3 years agoin reply to this

      They need to find out those vexing ads popping left and right.

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   Kierstin Gunsbergposted 3 years ago

   Yeah, traffic is baaaaad right now for me too.

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      PaulGoodman67posted 3 years agoin reply to this

      My overall views are terrible when compared with the first 5 months of 2021, but compared with 2020 (which was an effing awful year), they're reasonable.
      
      Big discrepancies with the niches, though. Soapboxie and Owlcation now get most views in this account for me, when Dengarden used to dominate.
      
      That makes earnings crappy. And I care about earnings more than views or impressions.

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      NateB11posted 3 years agoin reply to this

      Yeah, over the past few days, I've had a major decrease in traffic and earnings. Still, as always, I wonder if it's just a normal fluctuation. Traffic is higher than it was a year ago but earnings are about the same as they were a year ago, due to CPMs being kind of low.

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         PaulGoodman67posted 3 years agoin reply to this

         I agree, I think that the most recent couple of algo updates have not been at all good!
         
         I'm not quite sure what HP is supposed to do when there's updates constantly for 4 months in a row!

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            NateB11posted 3 years agoin reply to this

            Well, what's funny is my traffic went back up. Not that it went up that much. Leads me think it's a normal fluctuation for me. This is not really my time of year for traffic. Strangely my time is usually best in summer, which I've heard for many is not a good time.

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               PaulGoodman67posted 3 years agoin reply to this

               My traffic climbed back a little, too. But that can happen after an update. It's still bad overall, though.
               
               Yes, there's a weekly cycle and an annual cycle and summer is generally bad.
               
               But not everything follows the cycle. Usually it's very obvious why, though. Gardening or travel articles etc.
               
               I also have articles like dealing with a plumbing emergency that are unaffected by seasons.
               
               However, the majority of my articles do follow the standard weekly and yearly cycles.

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               Shesabutterflyposted 3 years agoin reply to this

               This is not usually my time for good traffic either. My traffic has almost doubled the last week or two after taking a huge hit 4-5 weeks ago. I've been waiting for it to plummet back down, but I'm wondering if this is going to be where my traffic stabilizes for a bit. My top 3 articles bring in almost 75% of my traffic and those views have been pretty steady the last week. It is making up for all the blue arrows on my other articles.
               
               As a whole my account has seen an increase of almost 3k views from Sep 1- now compared to this time last year. Despite that, I still made roughly the same as last year for Sept, because my CPMs are terrible.
               
               I think Paul mentioned one of the updates seemed to help opinion pieces. I wonder if that is the reason for the boost. I'm hopeful it will extend into my normal high traffic season which usually starts Nov/Dec. and I won't see such a massive drop in a few weeks.

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                  PaulGoodman67posted 3 years agoin reply to this

                  Yeah, in the last couple of years, my most popular hubs on this account have always been Dengarden.
                  
                  Now Soapboxie ones have risen to be the top of the pile while Dengarden ones have fallen.
                  
                  Earnings are terrible though, which is my worst worry.
                  
                  It's possible to see how the niches have each being doing using SEMRush.
                  
                  I blame it all on Amazon links, of course. Product reviews of kitchen and gardening products on Dengarden etc. That's why HP was recently testing a different format for product review articles, I believe.

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                     Shesabutterflyposted 3 years agoin reply to this

                     I'm a bit worried about earnings too. I've needed almost double the amount of views/impressions just to make the same as I was a year ago. I don't need the money like some of the other writers here, but it's always nice to have the extra income.
                     
                     I know the topics I write on are part of the problem as they have lower CPMs in general and my top articles have changed around a bit in the last two years, but these numbers are still much lower than I would expect all things considered.

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            Kenna McHughposted 3 years agoin reply to this

            Mine are down, too. I also noticed thst when I do research for articles on Google, the results are cliche, yawn.

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         eugbugposted 3 years agoin reply to this

         CPM 20% down on the values for last year for my account. Maybe The Arena Group are keeping a bigger chunk of revenue?

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6. STAFF

   Larry Slawsonposted 3 years ago

   My traffic is down big time as well... my top article is the lowest I’ve ever seen it before. Really hope it bounces back soon.

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7. 83

   Solarasposted 3 years ago

   Pethelpful CPM is about as low as it has ever been. Very discouraging for new writing.

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8. 95

   PaulGoodman67posted 3 years ago

   Earnings seem to be hitting new lows, for recent times, anyway.
   
   There's not much can be done by us. We're dependent on Google and HP.
   
   We can write new material and update old stuff, but it won't solve the underlying problems, as far as I can see.

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9. 83

   Solarasposted 3 years ago

   HP can jettison the "Reviews" section they snuck onto Pethelpful, right now.  How long does one keep a failed experiment visible to the world? 100+ execrable pages probably have a negative effect on one of the more profitable niche sites.
   
   Speaking of fecal matter, this stuff is still out there.
   
   From pooper scooper reviews:
   
   "The neighborhood is filled with different people. Some like dogs, others are cat people, while some might not either have or like pets. Incidents such as neighbors bickering over a dog pooping in the wrong place might be a common occurrence in your neighborhood. You must be considerate of the feelings of others and show that you’re a responsible pet owner by promptly disposing of your dog’s feces."
   
   OMG! Promptly dispose of this reviews section, and turn it over to the writers via assignments or whatever.  It's an embarrassment at the least. It could be affecting our pageviews, which are slumping.

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      EricDockettposted 3 years agoin reply to this

      HP removed the link in the footer and top menu, so unless they linked somewhere else (sneakily) those pages should fall out of the SERPs. I saw they were still listed the other day, but I can't find any now. I can't find the text you posted when I search with quotes.
      
      Are you still seeing them in search or just with a link you saved? It looks to me like they are gone. They may have hurt the site a little in the short term, but it should bounce back.

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         Solarasposted 3 years agoin reply to this

         I put in the actual URL, because Google had saved it for me.  When I just search for Pethelpful reviews, it does not come up, as you noted.

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    bravewarriorposted 3 years ago

    I agree with you entirely! I don't know why HP wouldn't have reached out to us to begin with. And how/why in the hell can they possibly think those poorly written reviews can benefit the site? Why are they still there?????????

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11. 95

    eugbugposted 3 years ago

    I recovered the traffic lost over the last month with a steep trend upwards since Saturday, however Wednesday's volatility knocked it back down over 10%.
    https://www.semrush.com/sensor/

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       PaulGoodman67posted 3 years agoin reply to this

       It's very difficult to get a sense of of any strong trend. The last 6 weeks or so have generally been up or stagnant, I was up 15-20% one week. But then it dropped 10% recently. Google is giving with one hand, taking with the other.
       
       I don't know what HP are supposed to do. At least with Panda, there was a massive drop but then HP knew where they stood. How do you adapt when the rules and landscape are changing every week?

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          theraggededgeposted 3 years agoin reply to this

          With today's earnings drop, how I'm going to adapt to it is to stop publishing here. There's no point.
          
          Medium's the focus now.

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             PaulGoodman67posted 3 years agoin reply to this

             I'm mainly focused on Medium for the time being, but I don't see much future in it at present.
             
             It's too much hard work for one thing. It's like living on a hamster wheel. I'm traveling to Greece and England soon and while my HP earnings will continue, my Medium money is bound to shrink.
             
             I will probably end up just using Medium as an income stream, it's good for certain sorts of article, but I'll try boosting something else. I have some other projects with potential that I've neglected since I tried out Medium.
             
             I just feel very jaded by Medium. It rewards the worst in humanity.
             
             Plus, to be honest, I'm still nowhere near earning what I get at HP. Passive income still rules for me.

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12. 96

    LongTimeMotherposted 3 years ago

    I just wish the editors understood SEO and didn’t just make changes they think ‘make sense’ or ‘look good’. I’ve watched their edits knock my articles from #0 and #1 in google results for so long now that my previously reliable income has been smashed.
    
    I complained about their illogical random changes way back when editors first came on board. Their efforts haven’t improved and my traffic is pitiful compared to what it was. They’ve even changed titles (they obviously thought it was a good idea) so the article no longer delivers what the title promises.
    
    For heaven’s sake. Don’t rename something to a how to article if the text doesn’t actually tell you how to do it. Don’t change the order or rewrite content in articles getting strong traffic from search engines because they are obviously optimised already. In recent years I’ve not been able to check all the times I get messages about edits. I obviously should have.
    
    Too late to regain top spots I’ve lost. I’m still holding a few but I fear it is just a matter of time until another editor who clearly doesn’t understand how to structure an SEO-effective article butchers those as well. Sad. I think I’ll have to write elsewhere to win back top spots … somewhere that doesn’t destroy my results after I spend ages carefully choosing and placing keywords.

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       Kenna McHughposted 3 years agoin reply to this

       SEO is essential, and I am so sorry to hear this. It's also scary because I've had similar edits. They're painful.
       
       These editors should work closely with the writers. It's called teamwork.

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          LongTimeMotherposted 3 years agoin reply to this

          My top performing article (numbers wise) has had over 590,000 views. All traffic from search engines according to the stats, except for 12k from Pinterest and 12k from Dengarden.
          
          So let’s call it 570,000 views courtesy of search engines. It used to get less traffic than other articles but they’ve dropped back after edits. I genuinely want to know how many of these editors have written a single article capable of attracting over half a million views on a topic that’s not particularly popular.
          
          Another of my articles sat for years at the very top of page one on a topic with 226 million search results. I think anyone would agree that’s a lot of competition. Their ‘premium edit’ butchered my hard SEO work and it began to slip.
          
          It currently sits on page 2 which means, obviously, all that traffic it used to get has dropped. I would like to restore it to its previous version but hp threatens to remove articles from niche sites if we change them back.
          
          Do you think it is worth the risk? Would you restore your original format?

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             Solarasposted 3 years agoin reply to this

             I would compromise and restore what I felt was most important, and let them have a few things too.  I just did that to an article where they put in a table where there was once a list.  Tables are just plain hard to read, and it was the first capsule following the intro capsule. I saved the table as "hidden" and put in a list in its place.
             
             This article, the editors did some nice things on it with images and the page description. The table thing, I think was a fad, and I don't think they will mind. But I saved the old table just in case they felt they had to have it, or the pageviews fall off a cliff after my meddling. lol

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             NateB11posted 3 years agoin reply to this

             This is something that’s mystified me too. How they can take can article that is performing exceptionally well and edit it and destroy it’s traffic. This happened to me with an article that was at the top of the SERP, it was edited, lost most of its traffic and the account it’s on now makes payout every several months. It kind of blew my mind to tell you the truth.

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                NateB11posted 3 years agoin reply to this

                Although I'm glad we have editors at the same time.

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                   PaulGoodman67posted 3 years agoin reply to this

                   While I've had a handful of bad editing experiences regarding factually incorrect content being inserted, I trust them on SEO. In fact, when they change one article, I often copy those same techniques and approaches and use them elsewhere.
                   
                   The truth is that traffic goes up and down. It's not always straightforward to assess causal relationships with limited data.
                   
                   I don't see myself as a slouch on SEO, but I consider HP much better placed than me. In part because they have much more data, so can see what's working across the site.

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                      SerenityHaloposted 3 years agoin reply to this

                      For the most part, most of my articles get more traffic when they’re moved to niche sites or edited by HP.

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                      NateB11posted 3 years agoin reply to this

                      While I agree the editing is generally good and glad we have editors, the particular case I was talking about was definitely due to an edit. But I kind of take the good with the bad in this context.

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                      TessSchlesingerposted 3 years agoin reply to this

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                         Solarasposted 3 years agoin reply to this

                         In one instance, they had remove the keyword from the entire article, except in one capsule title. Trying not to keyword stuff lol.
                         
                         I was furious.  I went back and put them back in where appropriate and it started rising in page rank for that which the article had originally been written to be optimized.

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13. 95

    PaulGoodman67posted 3 years ago

    Terrible earnings today. I always expect a dip at the start of October as it's a new quarter, but still...
    
    HP have had bad periods before, so hopefully they'll find a way through, sooner rather than later would be preferable.

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       JerryFisherposted 3 years agoin reply to this

       Yeah me too. Drastic drop in views and earnings of main articles, but bizarrely holding their page rank.

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14. 73

    TheShadowSpecterposted 3 years ago

    Same here.

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15. 83

    Solarasposted 3 years ago

    Saturday earnings were abysmal. Off another 40% of usual earnings.

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    Kierstin Gunsbergposted 3 years ago

    Woweeeee my earnings are down 50% of their "average." Wtf. Are they holding more of our earnings now? My traffic isn't great but I would typically still be earning more than I have recently.

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       PaulGoodman67posted 3 years agoin reply to this

       Yes, it's bad. Expected a small drop in Oct as it's new quarter but this is awful.
       
       And this is a relatively good time of year. What are earnings going to be like in mid-January, if things haven't improved by then?

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          Kenna McHughposted 3 years agoin reply to this

          It's terrible. HP is messing with my articles, too.

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             Solarasposted 3 years agoin reply to this

             I'm finding they have inserted a lot of tables, which is hateful.  Tables are hard to read, and hard to convert to normal text.
             
             Other than that, I do appreciate someone correcting the typos I seem to read over 30 times without noticing.

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       TessSchlesingerposted 3 years agoin reply to this

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          Solarasposted 3 years agoin reply to this

          When things are so opaque, my mind goes there too.  I miss the days when Paul would come on the forums and address our concerns, by telling us, "Yes there is a problem. Here is what we are trying to do to fix it."
          
          Does anyone know who is running HP now? What is their previous experience? How dedicated are they to the success of HP, and the writers?

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             letstalkabouteducposted 3 years agoin reply to this

             I was thinking about Paul as well during this time and missing his input. Does he still work for the Arena group? We haven't had a forum moderator for quite some time and that seems like a bad sign. It's not the same when we get a message from a nameless/faceless person.

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                TessSchlesingerposted 3 years agoin reply to this

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                   JerryFisherposted 3 years agoin reply to this

                   I agree. I think staff have mostly gone from here. I've been waiting for over a month for a 5500 word article to be approved when in the past that was a 48 hour thing at most. I wonder since Maven have taken this over that they'll just let this die a death. It's likely taking a little bandwidth that they could put to better use. Here's an idea - Why don't we start our own?

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    Solarasposted 3 years ago

    My best preforming article is off 60% since February of this year, and CPM blows.  I feel sick looking at it.
    
    I am on the verge of doing something drastic. So drastic, I can't even type the words.

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       PaulGoodman67posted 3 years agoin reply to this

       My drastic thing was to join Medium. But I don't think that you'd find it much of an improvement.
       
       And yes, I think we all miss Paul E's analysis and guidance in the forums.

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          Solarasposted 3 years agoin reply to this

          I joined Medium, but have not been very motivated to write for them.  I am confused by all of the "publications" and circulation or whatever they call it, plus setting up your own publication. 
          
          It seems like a lot of work for little return in the short  term, and still a lot of work in the long run. 
          
          My drastic thing would be to reactivate my blog by turning its content into a Wordpress site, and then migrating my hubs to it, leaving the 15 best performers on HP and seeing which one earns more income. Then going all in on the winner.  That is a lot of work too, but if my earnings keep going down here, I will literally have nothing to lose.

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             eugbugposted 3 years agoin reply to this

             You could setup a niche publication on Medium and duplicate your content from Hubpages and any other places you write onto it. That's what I'm trying to do by creating a DIY publication (Mine seems to be the only one). Medium is a somewhat highbrow writing site, so I don't know whether there'll be any interest in my mundane content, but it's worth a shot. Meanwhile I'm putting my science articles on "Everyday Science," a popular science publication. The editor there has advised me to break down my long articles (some Hubpages imports were over 20 minute reads) into smaller ones because the Medium algorithm they reckon only records a read if the reader scrolls to the bottom. Also the unfortunate problem with Medium is that older articles disappear from view on profiles or on the homepages of publications and have to be searched for by keyword or in archives. In any case, the first thing you need to do is get your 100 followers there. I just wrote a soapbox article and promoted myself and announced what I wrote about and that started bringing in lots of followers.

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             PaulGoodman67posted 3 years agoin reply to this

             Yeah, I'm not yet fully sold on Medium myself. My comment had a flippant element.
             
             I would describe Medium as "bloggy" rather than "highbrow". Although it does have an academic element, it also seems to operate more like a kind of demented Facebook at times.
             
             Eugene is right though, I believe. You'd do better with HP articles at Medium than WP.
             
             That said, problem with Medium is that they introduced rule that you needed 100 followers to start earning which is crappy for beginners.
             
             The rules and features at Medium seem to change every week. They're constantly changing direction.

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                TessSchlesingerposted 3 years agoin reply to this

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                   Solarasposted 3 years agoin reply to this

                   The Amazon email - are you referring to the requirement that the author say, "we make pennies in commission if you click on this link and buy something."

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                   PaulGoodman67posted 3 years agoin reply to this

                   Ev William's approach is to constantly experiment and alter direction in the hope that he'll eventually find a profitably model, he describes his approach thus:
                   
                   "Entrepreneurial success is almost always harder than you think and almost always takes longer than you expect….Here is the key: If you can survive long enough, and you are constantly iterating, experimenting, and improving your business, then eventually the timing will be right!"
                   
                   Medium's current "exciting new thing" is a referral program! You get them a member and receive some money. Same sort of thing that every other business that's online has been doing for many years. They're trying to pretend it's some great innovation, which I do find a little condescending.
                   
                   It's an enclosed ecosystem with an owner who's constantly tampering. And there's little gatekeeping or quality control, so there's a lot of bad info and fake news, plus it can feel a bit like Lord of the Flies at times.
                   
                   From an earning/writing perspective, I think it's okay for certain sorts of article. Rants and opinion pieces do well, for instance. So it doesn't actually have much overlap with HP.
                   
                   Articles are kind of bloggy and evocative, polarizing stuff does well. Rather than the more neutral, balanced, authoritative tone for HP. That's why I don't think most HP articles will do well there. But as it's little effort, there's certainly no harm trying it, as Eugene is doing.

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                      Solarasposted 3 years agoin reply to this

                      Do you have to write in the first person, "my thoughts," "My outrage" or "my experience" - it seemed like what they wanted for their contest, which I am not comfortable with.

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                         PaulGoodman67posted 3 years agoin reply to this

                         It's not obligatory, so in theory no - but in practice you're generally expected to give a personal take, so that means the answer to your question is yes.
                         
                         It's an odd place. On the one hand, there are long academic style articles that are well-researched and somber. On the other hand, there are articles that are just personal attacks and rants against other writers, like it's some puerile social media battleground.
                         
                         There are some people that make four figures but many of those seem to  write there virtually full-time, so they're often still not really making much if you treat it as an hourly wage.
                         
                         And the rules and algorithm keep changing so it's pretty insecure.
                         
                         I'm trying to figure out a strategy of making a viable income stream there without working too hard!

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             JerryFisherposted 3 years agoin reply to this

             I had the same thought except to duplicate just one article to a single wordpress .com (not org) domain, as an experiment, to see if it ranks the same and then apply Adsense to it. At least I'd be collecting 100%. Not a lot of work in that if it worked (and then kill the HP article) but if it requires a lot of SEO then I couldn't be bothered. What I can't work out at the moment that like everyone my main articles are down 30% plus in the last three weeks or so with no real recovery, yet are still first page ranking. Maybe somehow in the latest algorithm update, google killed a lot of keyword associations? Brandon is another one who seems to have disappeared who was great at answering this stuff.

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                PaulGoodman67posted 3 years agoin reply to this

                You should try it you think it'll work. I feel like I've gone down that road in the past using Amazon links and Adsense and it didn't really work for me. Adsense is moribund, in my opinion, a shadow of its former self.
                
                When an article is riding high in the SERPS it's often seen as authoritative by Google, so is given authority on related keywords as well as the primary one. The article doesn't have to drop far in Google's esteem to lose some of its authority and therefore lose the traffic from the related keywords. That's how I understand it anyhow.

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                Solarasposted 3 years agoin reply to this

                Don't bother with Adsense.  They pay pennies.  There are others like Mediavine and another someone mentioned, that is paying $20 CPM.  (Maybe they will weigh in on who that was again.)  They help with ad placement for you too, but it can't be on blogger, needs to be developed in wordpress.
                
                Edit: Media vine requires 30K impressions a month before you can join their network.

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                   JerryFisherposted 3 years agoin reply to this

                   Thanks to you and Paul. I think I'll just keep editing here in that case. At least it's a solid base without starting from scratch again. Fairly dispiriting to keep on editing when there's seemingly nothing left to edit. But I guess all of us that have been on here for years remember the good days when HP was just HP and we lay on the beach with a passive income for years with zero drop in traffic. Maybe those days have gone now from all over the net and we have to work for our money now?

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                      Solarasposted 3 years agoin reply to this

                      One problem is the scumbaggery of other writers on the internet.  In checking out who stole my number 1, I find they copied my entire article, and interspersed each sentence with 5 words or phrases, to "Make it theirs." Another form of spinning.
                      
                      sick

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    PaulGoodman67posted 3 years ago

    Tessa, there was a series of Google algorithm changes in the summer. Some niches are up, but some, like Dengarden, are down.
    
    I believe the drop in some niches relates to the ongoing corporate war over the share of retail income, which began with Panda, when the big retailers complained to Google that sites like HP were taking too much of the pie.
    
    HP are trying to find a way around the Amazon issue.
    
    I remember you writing about how you don't believe in critical thinking.
    
    I'm a rationalist, I think one's chances are improved considerably by taking an analytical approach. Because, lets face it, only a small percentage of people make much money at HP or Medium. It's difficult to achieve and difficult to maintain.
    
    Genuine diversification is good. I scrape along with Air BnB, writing online, and selling t-shirts. (The Air Bnb being the main source and the most reliable)
    
    I'm not reliant purely on HP and Medium, because the publishing world has not found a profitable model since the internet began.
    
    When considering something, I try to work out what's worth my while, and how much effort to put in. I enjoy writing, but I like to have a life, too.
    
    There's a business term called "scaling up". The thing with say, HP is that I can, in theory, create 10% more hubs and get 10% more income. The same goes for the t-shirts. With Air Bnb I can get an addition built and expand the business that way.
    
    I'm wary of incomes where you can't scale up. The earnings max out and plateau. You can then end up working your arse off just to survive.
    
    I'm still exploring strategies for earning at Medium.
    
    People can make their own decisions. I like passive income and the opportunity to scale up when possible.

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    EricDockettposted 3 years ago

    If anyone wants to take a minute to actually look at the Arena Group website, you'll see there are three pillars the company has rebranded around.
    
    1. Sports = Sports Illustrated
    
    2. Finance = The Street
    
    3. Lifestyle = HubPages
    
    And similar sites, of course.
    
    HubPages is listed as one of the three core focuses of the new approach, not only on the home page, but also on the "Our Brands" pages.
    
    It seems unlikely that Arena would state that HubPages is a main part of their new business model if they were planning on abandoning the site
    
    In fact, doesn't that seem more like proof that Arena plans to invest in HubPages for the foreseeable future?
    
    It is hard to imagine that HubPages isn't a hugely profitable part of their business. Content is free. Editors and supervisors work across multiple Arena products, which is why they don't have as much time to focus on HP like they used to.
    
    I do think HP is dropping the ball in many ways and I wish they would make better decisions. It is hurting individual writers for sure. However, that doesn't mean HP as a whole isn't profitable or that it is on the way to failure.

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    NateB11posted 3 years ago

    When I look at both the earnings stats here and my Google Analytics stats, there is no major change in traffic/earnings for me compared to same time last year. Indicating to me that it's a relatively normal fluctuation for some people and maybe traffic drops are not an across the board problem.

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       PaulGoodman67posted 3 years agoin reply to this

       It's very bad when compared to the first five months of this year.
       
       But yes, it's similar to what stats were like from Sept 2019 to Dec 2020, but that was actually a terrible period for HP.
       
       So it depends on which comparison point you use. I still see what's happening as bad myself.

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    charleskikasposted 3 years ago

    Found this thread after starting a new one with the same question. I see that it's not just me experiencing declining traffic, (50%) or more in the past 3 months or so. Tweaking articles and crossing fingers. Thanks everyone for the suggestions here.

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    JNalbach419posted 3 years ago

    I’ve actually seen in increase in traffic recently. Whenever I see a drop in traffic I know it’s time to go back through and update my articles which seems to help.

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    PaulGoodman67posted 3 years ago

    The October 18th Google algo change seemed helpful. I'm so jaded now, I'm waiting for another one to come along and wipe it out. There hasn't been this many changes before ever! It's not just me saying that, SERoundtable and SEMRush too!

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    eugbugposted 3 years ago

    October 21st, Semrush volatility trend heading upwards again it seems which is usually a bad sign.

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       Shesabutterflyposted 3 years agoin reply to this

       Does that mean the likelihood of another update is high?

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          eugbugposted 3 years agoin reply to this

          The Semrush volatility graph is in the orange most of the time it seems. I don't know whether all the peaks correspond to updates.
          https://www.semrush.com/sensor/

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             PaulGoodman67posted 3 years agoin reply to this

             Yes, I don't think volatility graph is predictive, plus updates can go on for ten days or two weeks and overlap with others, so it really only tells you how much activity, in terms of things like rankings moving around, is happening at any specific time.

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