A Real Mystery About My Website!

by stockman1963

Posted: 8 years ago 19 replies

WEB DESIGN

Hi all, I don't usually go on to forums and ask questions so this is a first for me. I need some different eyes and brains on my problem as I have no idea what's going on. Maybe someone here will see something obvious, or think of something obvious that I am simply being blind to.

The Scenario:

My website has the following in it's favour...
Alexa Rank: 502,307 maybe not excellent but not bad (in my opinion)
Google has indexed 900 pages of my site (there are 962 pages in total)
42,241 quality backlinks and citation score of 35 and trust factor of 10. So no spammy backlinks.
I appear on the first page of Google for many of my page titles and often in the first position on the first page: Try entering this search term in Google (when I last looked it was at the top of page 1) Faithful Little Dog Waits Outside Hospital For Owner Who Became Unwell

My site is: clickbarks com (I have omitted the dot as I am not here for link-juice, I am here for advice).

So what is my issue exactly?

My issue is that I only get about 8 visitors on average per day!

It's a dog website! Surely there are millions of people out there searching for dog related sites? Am I wrong?

Am I missing something glaringly obvious that everyone else can see? Why such a low number of visitors?

Any help appreciated guys, it's really confusing me. I have worked so hard on this site and no returns for that hard work is kinda depressing.

Maybe someone can give me that Aha! moment. Maybe I am being blind about an obvious issue?

Even if you don't reply, thank you very much for taking the time to read.

#mystery #real #website

PacoMiTaco 8 years ago

backlinks are good and an obvious foundation of healthy traffic, but if your not getting clicks, it means those links are not triggering people to react by clicking.

Are you using social media at all?
- Thanks
- 2 replies
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- PacoMiTaco 8 years ago
  
  also explain your meta data and if your using it
  
  Thanks
  
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  stockman1963 8 years ago
  
  Hi again PacoMiTaco,
  
  I use the 'standard' meta tags you would expect, meaning meta Description Etc. I don't use Meta Keywords as I was aware that most search engines don't really consider it anymore. I am not a 100% tech savvy person so if there is some other meta date you are referring to then I am unaware of what that would be. You can view my pages and select 'View Source' if there is something specific you are referring to and I am being dumb for not understanding correctly
  
  Thanks
  
  Thanks
  
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- stockman1963 8 years ago
  
  Hi PacoMiTaco,
  
  Yes, Twitter and also Instagram. I ditched facebook as to be honest I hate that platform.
  
  Thanks
  
  1 reply
  
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  PacoMiTaco 8 years ago
  
  Why did you give up on the biggest social media platform in America and most of the world?
  Facebook has the most factors and variety of factors, which means it has the most opportunities to manipulate post reach positively. It even has free organic methods available for targeting specific interest keywords/groups.
  Twitter and instagram have no where close to the flexibility of free targeting capabilities.
  I drive 100's of people/per post using facebook, 100% for free, on sites with zero history or "credible backlinks".
  
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  stockman1963 8 years ago
  
  Hi again, facebook has its merits of course, but my main question is why Google itself isn't bringing me traffic. Steven's reply may be the only reason!
  
  That is why I am here. Humiliating perhaps, but I just have to know the reason; no matter how stupid I'll end up looking lol
  
  Thanks
  
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Steven Roberts 8 years ago

Er - maybe I'm missing something but how many people search for "faithful little dog etc etc"? Exactly - no-one. You have to rank for phrases that people search for. (I feel foolish for even pointing that out. ) The question is about how well you rank for highly searched-for phrases. Probably not at all. That's how you'll get organic traffic. Sorry if I misunderstood the question.
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- stockman1963 8 years ago
  
  Hi Steven Roberts, and many thanks for replying.
  
  You are not missing anything and I was aware that I may come on here and stand in the face of my own ignorance You are 100% correct that nobody on this planet will actively search for my titles. But sites like BBC News don't have titles like: "How Can I Fix The Door Lock On My BMW Car" either. They have meaningful titles for the stories they publish. So I also have meaningful titles for the articles that I also publish.
  
  If that is the only reason that my traffic is close to zero then I'll need to do a major rethink on my title strategy
  
  So Steven, I thank you for your honesty and I stand myself on trial here on this forum amongst people who WILL see obvious things that I am missing. I greatly appreciate your reply.
  
  Thanks
  
  1 reply
  
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  Steven Roberts 8 years ago
  
  Hey Stockman1963 - I'm sorry if I came over a bit condescending. It wasn't my intention and I hope you get the traffic your site deserves. Until more people know about your site you are dependent on paid traffic (ads basically) and organic traffic, a good chunk of which could come from search. Which means a close look at choosing good high traffic keywords (loads of advice on this forum about that) and then SEO for those keywords (as above). Shouldn't be difficult with an authority site that you seem to have built. Good luck and sorry if I sounded discouraging. We should be helping each other on here.
  
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  stockman1963 8 years ago
  
  Hi Steven,
  
  My reply didn't dig at you at all. It is I who is actually ashamed at my own lack of knowledge in an area that I have little knowledge of. I know about dogs and I knew how to setup my site. After that... clueless!
  
  So I came on here to get advice from people who do have the knowledge that I am missing.
  
  So I saw nothing in your reply that I would take offence at. I actually welcomed your reply as I need to be made aware of what I am missing - even if a child of 5 maybe able to see it and I can't lol
  
  Thanks
  
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Steven Roberts 8 years ago

[DELETED]

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- stockman1963 8 years ago
  
  We do indeed!
  
  It's pretty crazy building up an authority site and then not having any knowledge on how to attract organic traffic to it. Perhaps its rather like saving up for years for a porsche and then wondering if learning to drive would be a good idea after already buying it.
  
  My main issue I guess is that the stories I publish lend themselves to descriptive titles (like a news site), so that is possibly the noose around my neck. I have little scope to be able to engineer my titles in to high traffic keywords. That is most likely the issue.
  
  So, my plan I guess is to continue what I am doing and gain a following using as many sources as possible (paid and organic) and just be patient. My site is only 5 months old also, so it's still an infant really. I'll stick at it.
  
  I knew that this forum would be full of great people. I was right
  
  [ 1 ] Thanks
  
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megamind22 8 years ago

Another thing you should consider is your keywords or meta tags.

Are the content or pages optimized with good keywords? (ON PAGE SEO)

Does the keywords have high volume searches per month?

Are they low competition easy rankable keywords?

Things are the things you need to put in place to bring in the traffic you want apart from building lots of backlinks

Hopefully this helps. Good luck.
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- stockman1963 8 years ago
  
  Hi megamind22,
  
  Yes, that helps thank you, and I am very grateful for your advice. After the very helpful replies I have had I am certainly looking at the keyword angle more along with the on page SEO angle. As explained in one of my earlier messages, my trouble appears to be that I have to give detailed titles rather than keyword-rich titles. If I am posting an article about a specific dog who did a specific thing then my title has to reflect that. So this I think is the issue I am having being able to target keywords that people search for.
  
  Perhaps an idea would be to add a certain number of news articles and a certain number of product-related articles - kind of mix the content types between those two. Then certainly in the product type articles I could certainly use highly searched for keywords and long tail key words also.
  
  Thank you for reading and thank you for your advice
  
  Thanks
  
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SuzieRoonie

8 years ago

I just ran your website real fast through ahrefs.com you rank but for keywords no one is really looking for or where the volume is really low...your title tags and post titles are a little odd as well:

http://www.clickbarks.com/dogs-101-gordon-setter-eng/

Dogs 101 Gordon Setter is not really well optimized...and your page content is really lacking...on this page there is barely a paragraph of content.

Content is key to getting traffic --- but I would start with doing a real keyword analysis and reoptimizing your core areas like post titles and title tags/meta description so your posts talk about what people are looking for....

Example: Gordon Setter Dogs - Breed Information

That was people know exactly what they are going to learn on your post.

....and you may hate Facebook ---- but if you have a dog website, kind of crazy to not use it. (This is coming from someone who has an animal related website)....

Thanks
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nbatioco

8 years ago

You ranked for the keyword you said above, however if they aren't the keywords use to search in search engines then they won't work.

Just like what Suzie said. You need to analyze or start keyword research if you haven't done it before.

Also the platform you hate have more groups for dogs owners which is your main market, join in those groups, start socializing with them.

I also assumed that since you created this niche you are a dog lover, joing groups for dog owners is not a hassle for you.

Originally Posted by SuzieRoonie

I just ran your website real fast through ahrefs.com you rank but for keywords no one is really looking for or where the volume is really low...your title tags and post titles are a little odd as well:

DOGS 101 – Gordon Setter [ENG] | ClickBarks.com
=
Dogs 101 Gordon Setter is not really well optimized...and your page content is really lacking...on this page there is barely a paragraph of content.

Content is key to getting traffic --- but I would start with doing a real keyword analysis and reoptimizing your core areas like post titles and title tags/meta description so your posts talk about what people are looking for....

Example: Gordon Setter Dogs - Breed Information

That was people know exactly what they are going to learn on your post.

....and you may hate Facebook ---- but if you have a dog website, kind of crazy to not use it. (This is coming from someone who has an animal related website)....

Thanks
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stockman1963 8 years ago

Hi nbatioco, many thanks for your reply

I just gave a lengthy reply in my previous post regarding one aspect of Facebook that I didn't like. So here is another aspect... Whenever I have opened a Facebook account it wants me to use my real name. Nothing wrong with that I guess, apart from the fact that I work for a company who enjoy spying on people's Facebook accounts. So I have joined in the past using a false name. Then using that false name has caused issues if I wanted to pay for Facebook Ads as my name didn't match my bank account name - so Facebook blocked me from using paid ads.

Whenever I try use Facebook I hit problems!

If it wasn't for my employer I would just use my own name, but I work for an online company who don't like us creating other online sites so I don't want to reveal that I have my dog website.

I'd love to use Facebook actually but I hit obstacles every time I use it.
- Thanks
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stockman1963 8 years ago

Hi SuzieRoonie,

Many thanks for your reply. I'll certainly agree that my title tags and post titles are a little odd. When I started my site I didn't really know if I'd continue it and just forged ahead (almost throwing it together). Over it's first 3 months of development I changed many things and it kind of became very disjointed and illogical. Also, as its a Wordpress setup and I was inexperienced with Wordpress I found myself adding and removing Plugins constantly and each had its own way of handling titles and tags Etc.

I think this disorganized start to my site hasn't done me any favours. So my aim for the last month and moving forward, is to try get some consistency going.

I'll also answer everyone's comments about my hate of Facebook here as it's being mentioned frequently... I moved from the UK about 5 years ago to go live in another country. I kept my bank account in the UK as it was simply easier to do so. In the last 2 years I have tried to use Facebook Ads 3 times and on each occasion Facebook pretty much told me that I was a criminal trying to commit fraud! They just couldn't fathom how someone could live in one country and have a bank account in another country. So yes, I have had Facebook accounts over the last 2 years for my site and on each occasion Facebook has treated me like a piece of crap. So the hate/hate relationship between myself and Facebook is mutual. And by the way, I did try to appeal and argued my case but their single-minded ignorance wouldn't budge. Me and Facebook don't get on.
- Thanks
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desireedavid 8 years ago

Do you use title tags, alt tags, and image tags? Use keywords in these tags. For example, for this article Faithful Little Dog Waits Outside Hospital For Owner Who Became Unwell, use the title tag "dog waits outside hospital for sick owner".

Use relevant keywords. A lot of people read dog articles, and you should be getting more views. Do you use call to actions at the end of your articles?

How many words per article do you post? Are you the one writing your content?

How are your social media pages doing in terms of following and subscribers? Do you do email marketing?
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- 1 reply
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- stockman1963 8 years ago
  
  Hi desireedavid, thanks for replying.
  
  I am the only person creating content for my site, yes.
  
  That in itself is hard as I work full time and my site is not my employment. My site is an interest and a passion but not my main occupation.
  
  Content therefore is up and down. Sometimes I have time to write a good amount of content and sometimes I only have time to embed a video and write a brief intro.
  
  So yes, my content is based upon the time I have to add that content.
  
  Not ideal, but life is life.
  
  Thanks
  
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