The site is in the top. How to keep a position? The main actions

After long and effective work, your site finally took its rightful place in the top of search results. In response to popular user requests, it appears on the first page of Google. You get good traffic and expect that this will always go on. However, search engines regularly adjust ranking algorithms. That is why your site may lose existing positions.

What to do after the site gets in the top 10 results? Is it possible to hold positions by target requests for a long time? How not to lose your advantage and defend your place in the top?

Promoting a site to the top is the goal that all owners of commercial and non-commercial web resources strive for. The volume of traffic and owner’s income depend on the position in the search. After the site hits the top, it is necessary to take measures to maintain it in decent positions. Let's talk about the main actions in this area.

1. Continuous analysis of current metrics

In the process of maintaining the top positions of the site, you need to do regular analysis for each promoted query. We need to evaluate such metrics as the time spent on the site, the bounce rate, the number of views and conversions. Through analysis of user behavior, you can get valuable information about the attitude of visitors to your site and the information that is posted on it.

It is convenient to use Google Analytics for it. For example, if you want to see which pages of your site users visit from the search engine and how they behave on these pages, then select “Organic Search” in the “Traffic Sources” – “All Traffic” – “Channels” section and specify Langing Page as the main parameter. Here you can see not only the percentage of visits that any page receives, but also such important metrics as the bounce rate, the number of pages per session and the average session length, as well as the percentage of goal achievement (if it is configured in your account).

Google Analytics organic traffic report with landing page as a main parameter

Through an analysis of user behavior, you can learn about the problematic areas of your site and evaluate the queries that need to be adjusted. If some pages receive a high bounce rate, this may mean that users do not find the information they need. Perhaps the content on such a page has a low relevance to the promoted request. In this case, you need to change the content or select another keywords for promotion.

An analysis of the number of viewed pages allows you to understand how quickly users find the information they need. If visitors quickly go from page to page, they probably do not find what they look for. In some cases, this behavior can have another explanation: visitors want to see all the products in the store or all articles in some section.

In each case, you can draw different conclusions regarding the behavior of users on the site. In this case, you must consider the specifics of the Internet resource, its purpose and features. This will help to correctly evaluate the analysis data and apply this information for further website promotion.

2. Selection of new search queries

The more keywords will be used to promote the site, the higher will be its traffic. If the main goal of promotion is to increase traffic (news, information resources), then it is better to select low-frequency queries for expanding the semantics: for example, “how to choose the right engine oil” or “travel route in Western Ukraine”.

It is also worth paying attention to requests that are already on the site, but pages are not displayed in the top by them. Rate the quality of these keywords and the quality of the content that is used on the page. To increase the likelihood of getting into the top, you should improve the relevance of the landing pages to the request, as well as evaluate how relevant the information on them is.

If the main goal is to increase sales, then you can select queries similar to those that engage buyers. You can expand these keywords by adding additional phrases to them: for example, “door handles” – “round handles for interior doors”. Thus, you specify the request, and engage targeted visitors who have not visited the site before. As a basis, you can use such words as “cost”, “order”, “buy”, etc.

Do not forget about expanding the structure of the site. It’s possible that the new pages will cope better with requests you need than existing ones do. So, if you sell costumes for men and see that users often look for “men’s wedding suits” or “youth men’s suits for graduation”, then try to create such subcategory pages within the main product category.

If you don’t have access to specialized SEO services, Google Keyword Planner will help you to find similar queries and see their approximate frequency.

3. Gradually increase the link profile

Do not stop searching and getting natural links to your site. In the process of maintaining top positions, it is necessary to increase the value of your web resource and its link weight. It’s worth doing not only because the gradual growth of the link profile is a good signal for search engines, but also because of competition: some of your competitors are probably engaged in link promotion right now, trying to get around you in the top.

Try to place links on reputable sites with high traffic: they can give you quality traffic and increase the trust of search engines. It is also desirable that these sites or their sections correspond to the topic of your site. 

An example graph of growth of referring domains number, according to Ahrefs

4. Analyze the interests of visitors

To assess how your site meets the needs of the target audience, you need to study the behavior of your visitors on the way to targeted actions. You can use the Hotjar for this. This tool allows you to monitor the movement of users through the site and view their actions on separate pages. Using Hotjar, you can identify problematic areas of pages, and identify the reasons for visitors to leave.

Analysis of user actions helps to understand where and why problems with orders arise, how easy it is for visitors to find target buttons or contact forms, etc. So, using the “Click Map” tool, you can determine the most clickable elements, sections and links; “Scrolling map” helps you to understand how far visitors scroll through a page; and through the “Form Analysis” you can identify useless fields in the order form (those that are not filled out by users for some reason).

Example of a user activity report from Hotjar

5. Updating the site

Search engines consider updating information on the site, its freshness and relevance, as well as its usefulness for visitors. If you regularly post new materials, you can increase the value of your web resource for both people and search engines. Publish articles, news, videos, conduct polls and promotions. All of this contributes to retention of top positions in search.

Lack of up-to-date information can harm the site. Search robots will be less likely to visit it, and users will decide that the site has stopped working or is not popular. To avoid a negative reaction, you should constantly add new materials, share news and respond to comments.

On the other hand, do not chase the frequency of posting content to the detriment of its quality: if you add articles every day, but they are irrelevant to the site’s topic or not interesting for users, then such an update can harm the positions.

6. Analyze competitors and their SEO strategies

Neither businesses that are just entering the market nor experienced players can do without a detailed study of their opponents. Why is it so important?

First, you can track the main trends in SEO promotion in your niche that have already shown effectiveness and use them to your advantage.

Secondly, identifying the advantages and disadvantages of similar websites allows one to develop the most effective marketing strategy. After all, one can take into account certain mistakes of competitors and avoid them.

Also, studying competitors will help:

• to determine the optimal list of keywords for your target audience;
• to adjust content and link building strategies;
• to better understand certain SEO "tricks" for the selected niche, etc.

What is included in competitor analysis:

• Studying websites that are in the TOP of search engines: this includes analyzing the quality and frequency of keywords, the structure of the web resource and its content.
• Researching links that lead to a competitor's website, analyzing the expertise and authority of these resources.
• Detailed analysis of your biggest competitors’ social networks.
• Monitoring reviews, including those on Google My Business, and taking into account the most common mistakes.
• Identifying potential threats from competitors and developing a strategy to counter them.

An example of analyzing and comparing competitors' domains in Serpstat

Based on the results of this analysis, you can not only optimize keywords and content, making them more relevant to your target audience, but also find new ideas for your marketing strategy.

To analyze competitors, you can use various SEO tools such as Serpstat, SimilarWeb, Ahrefs, etc. or order such a comprehensive service from our agency.

7. Regularly monitor technical issues and fix bugs in the Search Console

Google Search Console is a free service from Google that allows website owners to track how the search engine interacts with their web resource. Search Console can analyze indexing, traffic, search queries, external links, and technical problems.

As a matter of fact, a search engine can perform many operations with a website, but the three key interactions are: crawling, indexing, and displaying relevant pages in the search results (ranking). And it is during the crawl that Google can detect errors that can affect the indexing and ranking of a website.

For example:

• while crawling, Google may detect invalid links to pages that are not subject to indexing, an incorrect site map;
• search engines also check the website for errors in micro-markup, compliance with quality and usability indicators (Core Web Vitals), etc.

At any of these stages, it is very important to regularly check the Search Console to spot bugs in time. The sooner you fix them, the lower the risk of a negative impact on indexing and website rankings.

Report on errors related to the site code in Google search console

Why it is so important to monitor Google Search Console:

• This has a positive effect on the indexing of the website and its overall reputation in the search engineі.
• Improving SEO promotion: some errors can negatively affect SEO: for example, duplicate pages, canonical URL errors, or problems with micro-markup. Fixing them will help improve your website's position in search results.
• Ensuring the correct functioning of the website: errors on pages that load slowly or load incorrectly can lead to a negative user experience and reduced conversion, so they must be fixed in time.

8. Check the quality of your website's link profile

Periodic analysis of the link quality is an important step to ensure good search engine rankings and prevent possible penalties:

• Use Google Search Console or third-party services to check which resources link to your website. Assess the quality of these links, their authority, and level of expertise.
• Maintain diversity, it is important to have different sources of external links: websites, blogs, forums, social media, etc.
• Regularly check your link profile and update it, remove harmful or useless links.

Various services can be used to monitor links: Google Search Console, Moz Link Explorer, Ahrefs, or SEMrush. These tools will help you get detailed information about your link profile, identify problems and opportunities for improving SEO.

9. Improve your website's reputation on the Internet (SERM)

Building a website's reputation is a process that needs to be managed. For this purpose, there is SERM (Search Engine Reputation Management): tools that help you search, control, and create correct information about yourself on the web.

Potential customers often look for reviews of products or brands. And one negative comment can influence their decision much more than ten positive ones. Bad reviews spread faster than wildfire, but it takes effort to get customers to see good comments.

It is great if a company starts working on its reputation even before entering the market: creating a positive information field and attracting potential customers on social networks.

SERM covers a whole range of activities:

• posting feedback on external platforms: forums, blogs, etc.;
• removing negative information from search engines (search engine optimization);
• reacting to negativity, work with comments (preferably as quickly as possible);
• collecting and publishing positive feedback and motivating customers to leave grateful comments;
• any monitoring of mentions of a company or website;
• identifying reputational problems and eliminating them (e.g., paid reviews from competitors).

SERM methods are very diverse: they include special services (YouScan, SERMometer, etc.) and the integrated work of company employees. As a rule, reputation specialists work closely with PR, marketing and SEO specialists. You can order this service from our agency. Constant monitoring and creation of a positive information field is not a one-day task, which is why you should entrust it to professionals.

Promotion to the top: keep moving!

As you can see, after putting a site on the top, work on it is not finished. You should develop and improve your site so that it remains among the leaders and can compete well with the others. No matter what success you achieve, there is always something better to strive for while working with the site. Improve the quality of your web resource and keep your defense, preventing your competitors from moving it out of the top.