Google Update or Seasonality? How to Tell if Your Site Was Hit!

[@NadalieBardo]

This right here is ALWAYS the question. Whether we're talking Google search traffic or Pinterest. Cannot wait for our Bootcamp!

[@sheknowsseo]

Woo!

[@SydneyBrown-u5o]

Literally such a great explanation video with actionable steps. I initially thought I might have been hit by the update because my traffic has been lower over the last week or two, but after following the steps you showed I think I'm able to deduce that my traffic loss (and impressions loss without losing rankings--rankings actually slightly increased) is mostly likely because a lot of my content focuses on Alaska cruises (summer thing) and Mount Rainier National Park (also most popular in the summer). Working on putting out more content cover additional seasons! Thanks for another awesome video :)

[@sheknowsseo]

@@SydneyBrown-u5o so happy to help!

[@jamiechancetravels]

Thank you, this has made me feel infinitely better. On one of my guides, the impressions and clicks have fallen yet GSC shows the post has gained a position within the top 10 over the last 28 days! I feel a lot better and perhaps this is all seasonality - just waiting for my summer Southern Hemisphere views to kick in now

[@sheknowsseo]

I'm so happy to hear that. Hopefully it gets tons of impressions once the seasonality shifts

[@zaraaitken9036]

Had this conversation with myself only last week. Panicked that I had been hit by the update a little, but then realised my main blog posts that rank highly and get alot of traffic are summer destinations, which are tailoring off. Checking the rankings and no shifts at all. Just seasonality. Fingers crossed my winter content starts to take the place of the summer 😅

[@sheknowsseo]

Love that you figured that out!! Gotta definitely start writing some seasonal posts for all seasons to cushion the blow for next year

[@kristinaa2412]

This is such a good and helpful video! I was feeling down about my traffic but there are a lot less impressions now than before, so it seems seasonal. One question, though, why did this align with August 16th-ish, when the Google update started? Coincidence?

[@sheknowsseo]

@@kristinaa2412 could be coincidence. End of summers, typically when people are going to start looking at fall content and winter content. That’s why I started the video off saying this was such a bad time of year for it to happen because it immediately makes it look like it’s a guaranteed to be an update hit if you lost traffic

[@Deborismable]

Would you recommend embedding KZbin directly to the blog posts ? I read that it'll slow the pages down... appreciate your advice 🙏🏻

[@sheknowsseo]

Yes I do. I use WP KZbin Lyte (free) or WP Rocket (paid) to speed this up. Make sure it's not in the first load (aka the screen that first shows up when the page loads on mobile/desktop) unless it's like the entire article and there's no other text. It's worked a treat for me :)

[@sheknowsseo]

To clarify why those plugins work: they don't preload the video. They make it kinda like the thumbnail photo is what's embedded, not a video. So then the wholeee video doesn't need to load before the page load is complete :)