Reason 1: your website changes

Most webmasters update their web pages regularly. As long as the changes are only small, this won't have a big effect on your rankings. However, if you re-design your web pages or if you optimize a page for a different topic then search engines might re-calculate your search engine rankings.

Many webmasters believe that Google has a filter for changed web pages (the so-called 'sandbox'). If you change your web pages, Google will temporarily downrank your website to make sure that you are not spamming them.

Solution: If you have web pages that have high rankings on Google for important keywords, only change these pages with great care. Make sure that most pages of your website are relevant to the topic of your site. Relevancy to the topic is as important as relevance to a particular keyword.

Reason 2: the links to your website are problematic

If you have an old website with a grown link structure then it's not likely that your site rankings will drop because of a link change.

If the links to your site are mainly paid links or automatically created links then it is likely that your website has been penalized by Google. Sudden changes in the link structure of a website make a website suspicious.

Solution: If you still use shady link building tools or services, stop it now. The links that point to your website must make sense to website visitors and search engines. If you don't work on your links that point to your website then your website will be replaced by websites with a better link structure.

Reason 3: the websites of your competitors change

Everybody wants to be on Google's first result page. For that reason, it's only natural that other websites will be listed better than yours if you don't work on your web pages.

Many websites target the same topics as you do. If these other websites have better content and better links than your site then it's only natural that these sites get better rankings.

Solution: You must offer better content than your competitors. Make sure that you offer many web pages that are relevant to the topic of your website and that you have better links than your competitors.

Reason 4: your web pages contain spam

Search engines don't like spam. If search engines find out that you use cloaking, hidden text, doorway pages or any other spam technique on your web pages then it is extremely likely that your website will be penalized.

Solution: Don't try to cheat Google. It's simply not worth it if you want to develop a sustainable business. Remove all spam elements from your web pages. Just because your website hasn't been penalized yet doesn't mean that search engines won't find the spam elements in the near future.

Reason 5: technical problems

Your web server can be the reason for a ranking drop. If your website is down when the search engine spider tries to access your website then search engines cannot give your web pages high rankings because they don't know your pages.

Some websites display the correct web page in the web browser but the server returns an error code. In that case, search engines won't index the web pages.

Solution: Make sure that your website is hosted on a reliable server that has no downtime. The website audit tool in SEOprofiler will inform you if there are any technical issues on your web pages that can cause ranking problems.

Almost any website owner will see a significant ranking drop sooner or later. Don't panic if this happens to you. Try to find the reason for the ranking drop and then act accordingly.

The tools in SEOprofiler help you to make sure that your web pages get the best  rankings possible. Try SEOprofiler now and see for yourself.

Article by Axandra
SEO software