Traffic Drop while Rankings Intact

[eseehroVcirE]

For the past 10 days, traffic to my site has dropped by 65%, even though the rankings are intact (I check my keyword rankings twice daily using 2 different programs).

At first, I thought someone hacked my site and put in a search redirect, but I went thru all the pages on my site thoroughly and nothing's been changed.

Any idea why this is happening?

[vjslav]

Might be a seasonal thing? I am seeing some decrease too, not by 65% tho, more like 20-23%

[eseehroVcirE]

Originally Posted by vjslav

Might be a seasonal thing? I am seeing some decrease too, not by 65% tho, more like 20-23%

That was my next thought, but in my niche (a local service niche like 'new york electrician' and 'los angeles plumber'), I've never seen a seasonal fluctuation before. I've had drops like this for 1-2 days a couple times, but never lasting almost 2 weeks.

[TheFBGuy]

Originally Posted by eseehroVcirE

That was my next thought, but in my niche (a local service niche like 'new york electrician' and 'los angeles plumber'), I've never seen a seasonal fluctuation before. I've had drops like this for 1-2 days a couple times, but never lasting almost 2 weeks.

You are seeing it now.

[ichl13]

What are you using to track traffic? Could be a problem with that

[eseehroVcirE]

Originally Posted by TheFBGuy

You are seeing it now.

Yes, that's a possibility It's just surprising since I haven't seen it in 3 yrs.

[eseehroVcirE]

Originally Posted by ichl13

What are you using to track traffic? Could be a problem with that

Google Analytics. Plus the server logs (Urchin). Both of them show the same thing.

[Bindu Dwivedi]

Originally Posted by vjslav

Might be a seasonal thing? I am seeing some decrease too, not by 65% tho, more like 20-23%

I am agree with your point . it could be seasonal things.

[eseehroVcirE]

For argument's sake, let's say it's not seasonal. What else could it be?

[RevSEO]

Could be the recent local algorithm updates Google's released. I'm seeing many keywords that weren't local, now producing local results. I'm also seeing fluctuations in localized searches become even more "local".

This could be causing it, since you still see yourself in the same position while others may not be seeing you at that spot at all.

[eseehroVcirE]

Originally Posted by RevSEO

Could be the recent local algorithm updates Google's released. I'm seeing many keywords that weren't local, now producing local results. I'm also seeing fluctuations in localized searches become even more "local".

This could be causing it, since you still see yourself in the same position while others may not be seeing you at that spot at all.

Sorry, duplicate. See next.

[eseehroVcirE]

Originally Posted by RevSEO

Could be the recent local algorithm updates Google's released. I'm seeing many keywords that weren't local, now producing local results. I'm also seeing fluctuations in localized searches become even more "local".

This could be causing it, since you still see yourself in the same position while others may not be seeing you at that spot at all.

I never check rankings on my own system. I use rank tracker and custom proxy scripts to check my rankings from other IPs and locations - basically, I see what others see.

(For example, go to proxify.net, load google.com, type in your keyword and you'll see what others see. This is what I do, except on a much larger, automated level to check for 100s of keywords from multiple locations.)

[RevSEO]

Originally Posted by eseehroVcirE

I never check rankings on my own system. I use rank tracker and custom proxy scripts to check my rankings from other IPs and locations - basically, I see what others see.

(For example, go to proxify.net, load google.com, type in your keyword and you'll see what others see. This is what I do, except on a much larger, automated level to check for 100s of keywords from multiple locations.)

That's great for a "general" scope from various irrelevant IP addresses. If this is a localized keyword, in which people are searching from that localized area than the search results will be different than those searching from a different city.

If that's not it, and you are sure about that then you may have been "hacked" even though you don't think you have been. I recently had wordpress websites affected with a UniqText.com hack. Basically this would redirect the first visits from Google search results to another site. After the first time that happened the users wouldn't see the redirect and they'd hit my own site.

If you are using Wordpress check your domain.com/wp-include/functions.php file.

If you have something that looks like this in the first few lines, then you were hacked. Remove it and you'll be back to normal.

Here's a screencap of my traffic, the last one is when I removed the hack and traffic is back to normal.

[eseehroVcirE]

Originally Posted by RevSEO

That's great for a "general" scope from various irrelevant IP addresses. If this is a localized keyword, in which people are searching from that localized area than the search results will be different than those searching from a different city.

If that's not it, and you are sure about that then you may have been "hacked" even though you don't think you have been. I recently had wordpress websites affected with a UniqText.com hack. Basically this would redirect the first visits from Google search results to another site. After the first time that happened the users wouldn't see the redirect and they'd hit my own site.

If you are using Wordpress check your domain.com/wp-include/functions.php file.

If you have something that looks like this in the first few lines, then you were hacked. Remove it and you'll be back to normal.

Here's a screencap of my traffic, the last one is when I removed the hack and traffic is back to normal.

Sorry, I should have specified that I'm using IPs local to my search area.

After seeing that the rankings were intact, my first thought was that I'd been hacked. I'm not using wordpress, just plain html, but I still went through the entire server files with a fine toothcomb and didn't find anything.