Dengarden Articles Not Taking Off

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   eugbugposted 2 years ago

   Is anyone finding that traffic to their Dengarden articles isn't increasing? Usually at this time of year, traffic starts to climb, instead it's either declining or staying stagnant. Views are 50% down on last year.

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      bravewarriorposted 2 years agoin reply to this

      Eugene, how do you look at a year ago versus now? I'm curious to do the comparison. HP editors just went thru Dengarden in the last couple of weeks. I'd be curious to see how/if that has affected my traffic.

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         eugbugposted 2 years agoin reply to this

         I use GA. I'm not looking at Dengarden specifically in the stats (it may be possibly to filter them out, I haven't thought about how to do it), but a lot of my articles on the site seem to be stagnant as regards stats when examined individually, even though I updated them a month ago.
         I was thinking I explained this before, and found it here:
         
         https://hubpages.com/community/forum/35 … 30-or-more

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            bravewarriorposted 2 years agoin reply to this

            Yeah, it's way down. My top Dengarden article had 3,173 views between 1/1/21 and 3/2/21. For the same period this year, it's seen 2,645 views.

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      OldRosesposted 2 years agoin reply to this

      My traffic on Dengarden is down from last year, but still a significant increase from 2020.  My view is that last year, gardening (my niche) became "hot" and everyone planted gardens because they were home.  Now that people are returning to the office, fewer are gardening so traffic is not as good as last year when gardening was a big hobby.  The fact that traffic is still higher than 2020 tells me that the 2021 traffic was just an unusual blip.
      
      So far this year, my traffic is steadily increasing as it does every spring, just not as much as last year but more than 2020 and prior years.

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         eugbugposted 2 years agoin reply to this

         That sounds plausible. I'll have a look at 2020 figures and see how they compare.

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   PaulGoodman67posted 2 years ago

   Yeah, Dengarden is a shadow of what it used to be for me. Any new material I write at the moment is aimed at other niches.
   
   It's a pity because Dengarden used to be a great earner. It's also a home for very practical info, so you'd think it should be in HP's wheelhouse.
   
   Traffic dropped last summer and has essentially been pretty stagnant since then.

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      eugbugposted 2 years agoin reply to this

      Owlcation is just as bad. Views way down on last year.

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         GoodBrains2posted 2 years agoin reply to this

         Deleted
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            eugbugposted 2 years agoin reply to this

            Hello GoodBrains2

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               PaulGoodman67posted 2 years agoin reply to this

               Ooops!
               
               Yes, another one that I generally avoid writing new material for at the moment.

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   eugbugposted 2 years ago

   I wonder is it just that there's an overall air of lethargy across the world because of COVID and people just aren't very active on the Net or wanting to do any DIY/gardening?

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   ReViewMeMediaposted 2 years ago

   I think it'll pick up in the spring when people can go outside and do gardening, but winter is always low CPM so traffic might drop too.

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   eugbugposted 2 years ago

   Yes, they seem to be comparable (Overall figures for all network sites). I'll have to figure out how to separate stats by site in GA.

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      PaulGoodman67posted 2 years agoin reply to this

      It was better in the old days when Google used to give a year long graph for each keyword or phrase searched for. That graph gave an accurate picture of seasonal trends and longer-term trends for topics.
      
      Most DIY/gardening is pretty evergreen (no pun intended!), even if it can be seasonal.
      
      I believe that the general drop in Dengarden is not due to some abberrant seasonal thing or COVID related, but due to algo updates.
      
      Sometimes all it takes is a drop of one or two rankings and you lose most of traffic for an article, partly because traffic numbers Vs. ranking follow an exponential pattern, and partly because you lose authority on related keywords, not just your main one.

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   Solarasposted 2 years ago

   When searching for companion plants for Okra, The Spruce came up number one. Somehow they are killing it across pets, gardening and I suppose a host of other subjects. 
   
   HP needs to do an analysis, and let us know best practices to combat this entity. Their stuff is not actually that good.  We should be able to beat them, with all of our writers, we have an enormous, largely unpaid staff.

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      Solarasposted 2 years agoin reply to this

      Looking at their pets site: Dogs, I notice that 80% of their articles are written by 4 authors. Similarly the gardening site is a little broader with 5 - 6 authors writing 70% of the content.
      
      While the articles are well written, they are short on any actual useful information.  It entices you with things to do, but gives no info on how to do it.  By way of example, you should fertilize your fichus tree during the growth season monthly, but every other month in winter.  Does not say what kind of fertilizer is best or how much of it to use.

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         eugbugposted 2 years agoin reply to this

         They remind me of Ehow.com which ranked highly years ago, but whose articles were pretty short and crappy really. Sometimes I think Google just likes thin content and if it's comprehensive, it gets hammered.
         They do have expert reviewers who give a sense of authority to articles. I don't know whether this is any benefit though as regards Google and rankings. I wish TAG would invest in Hubpages to provide more staff and resources, rather than just leaving things to just trundle along, which seems to be what's happening.

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            Solarasposted 2 years agoin reply to this

            Yes, it seems management is treating HP and its niches like I do, passive income. lol

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   eugbugposted 2 years ago

   Still no growth in traffic compared to last year or previous years. Whatever about last year being different because people were in lockdown, I don't understand the stagnation in views this year. What's probably happening is that a steady decline in views is matching the growth at this time of year and the two cancel out.
   

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      PaulGoodman67posted 2 years agoin reply to this

      In very general terms, my views are up slightly, but CPMs are still in the doldrums.
      
      I was hoping something similar to last year would happen, but so far it's been more like 2020, unfortunately.
      
      I don't see lockdown as being particularly relevant. There are some  obvious exceptions like, say, travel guides, of course, but I'm talking generally. Over 95% of topics that people search for, they do so whether working from home or in the office. I believe that this has been established over time.
      
      It's impossible to assess the effects of lockdown by looking purely at HP traffic data, in my opinion, you have to cast the net wider. I think it's also better to look at trends in what is searched for, rather than traffic, which can be influenced by other factors.
      
      My conclusion was that lockdowns had zero or very limited effects on most keywords (though there were some exceptions, of course).

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   leahleflerposted 2 years ago

   My DenGarden views have dropped dramatically. I was notified by HubPages that one article would be moved away from the niche site due to a lack of views (and that I should update it). Unfortunately, that article is "Fall Garden Tasks" and was recently updated. It won't have great views in the spring to begin with (due to the seasonal nature of the article). Coupled with the overall drop across all DenGarden articles I have, that one might just be doomed on this platform. I hope the views recover.

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