Use this SEO checklist if your web traffic is dropping

Why is my web traffic dropping?

This is the most common question I get from publishers: Why is my traffic dropping and what can I do about it?

It’s a multitude of things and reasons that are leading to drops for media companies, but there are answers and hope.

We’re seeing a variety of actions that are leading to recovery of that traffic and growth in some instances.

So, if your traffic is dropping, here are the things I’d check on and do that are mainly focused on growing your SEO organic traffic again:

Check basics on Google Search Console

There are a few things you should look at:

Is your site map being sent to Google? If not, you should resubmit it. This is one way Google indexes and sees your content.
Are some of your most important pages not being indexed? You can spot these under headings like “Crawled — not currently indexed” and “Blocked by Robots.” If they shouldn’t be blocked, resubmit them to Google.
Google Search Console’s core vitals: This will flag pages that are slowing down your site. Identify those and talk to your CMS or developer on how to make improvements.
Use Google’s Page Insights: Run a site speed report and find areas for improvement.

Identify stories that are dropping

It’s not difficult to identify stories that have lost the most traffic in a specific time period in Google Analytics 4. I find this especially useful to do after Google rolls out one of their updates.

Find the stories with the biggest drop-off and update the text if it’s outdated.
Optimize key areas like the headline, meta description, headers, links, and photo naming conventions.
Check to see if keywords have lost traction using a tool like Ahrefs keyword explorer and update them accordingly.

Do you have bad links?

See if any of your links are getting penalized. Google has this thing called Manual Actions Report that you can find in your Google Search Console.

This is where they flag links that they are punishing you for.

Look for spam-like content, often from paid content placements.
Check for penalties and follow Google’s recommendations to correct any flagged issues.

Use SEO best practices for new content

Going backwards to make sure your content is well optimized is important, and addressing technical issues on your site is too. But most importantly, you need to ensure that every new piece of content follows SEO best practices.

That all starts with high-quality content, creating helpful information, and when possible, personalizing the content. Always remember, Google’s E-E-A-T focus.