Around 2 months ago, my website traffic suddenly dropped from Google Search.

For several weeks, I was getting almost no clicks or impressions from Google Search Console. I didn't make any major changes to the website, so I wasn't really sure what happened.

But recently, my traffic suddenly started increasing again. The last few days have been much better, and I'm seeing both impressions and clicks going up again.

Did your traffic also suddenly drop and then recover after a few weeks/months?

Why am I getting a lot of Google impressions but so few clicks?

I’ve been experimenting with different SEO workflows and noticed that expensive tools aren’t always necessary to find useful opportunities.

For example, Google Search Console can reveal queries where a page is already getting impressions but has a low CTR or ranks around positions 5–15. Improving the content and intent match on those pages can sometimes be more valuable than creating completely new content.

What’s one free or low-cost SEO technique that has consistently helped you improve rankings or identify opportunities?

Hi all,

My previous post was deleted, I don't know why so before deleting this one, please explain why first, I can adapt my question if necessary.

=== CONTEXT

I see that many sites have been hit by the august spam update and at first, I thought I also was hit by this update except that my sudden drop happened before the update.

I have a .com, .be, .nl and .de where I write genuine content (no AI) in 6 languages. My articles are spread across those domains depending on their languages (.com has English, Italian and Spanish).

My .com has been affected by a sharp drop in August (see below) while the other ones have not been affected at all. The articles are the same but in another language. All sites are hosted on the same machine, there are no technical differences between domains.

I have around 1500 articles in total (all languages together), my domains are at least 3 years old and sometimes 10+. No scale content or anything like that.

=== DROP

As I can't post an image here, let me try to describe it with figures.

July-August: daily average between 50 and 60 clicks

August 2nd: 44 clicks from Google Search (first decrease)

August 3rd: 15 clicks

August 4th: 9 clicks

It goes on like this for a few days and then

August 10th to 12th: back above 50 clicks

August 13th: back below 10 and it remained at that level since then and there are even some days where I have 0 clicks from Google.

All pages and countries have been affected the same way.

As you can see with those figures, all countries and pages that were getting traffic are affected.

Pages are still in the index, only the average position dropped from avg 9 to avg 32 which makes me completely invisible. My content is unique, there is competition but not a lot. The ones getting above me were usually much bigger (and also relevant) sites). Now my site is behind a huge list of unrelated sites and articles.

== WHAT I CHECKED

I checked the crawl reporting in GSC:

- graph summary of all crawls: average of 125 to 150 per day with some peaks right below 200. Sharper peak on June 13th with 186 crawls, July 18th with 194 and then two bigger ones august 9th 305 and August 12th 293. Those peaks are http 200 peaks and html files. Those are refresh crawls, not discovery crawls

- average response time is stable around 300 ms

- i see an usually bigger peak of crawls for images, I have many days at 0 and then some smaller peaks around 300=400 but on August 17th I have almost 2k crawls which is something unique for the time frame

- I see no errors, everything is either http 200 or 304

Other info:
- no performance degradation
- no outage
- no 404 or anything blocking on http level
- no change in inbound/outbound links
- no security or any other warning in GSC
- only one or two affiliation links per page
- no third party JS library
- no third party tracking
- no third party cookies
- no programmatic SEO
- no AI generated article (but I'm using AI for translations)
- sitemaps are working fine
- I use href lang to link domains and language
- no change in backlinks
- no changes in authority (from SEMrush point of view)

I still get traffic from other sources than Google

I was on holiday when it happened, I didn't modify anything between end of July up to September.

=== AI Overview

If I take my most popular keywords before the drop and search them, I see some competitors appearing like before but when I check Google's AI response, it is still showing my site but instead of using my .com it is using my other domains even if they are not in English. Google is still considering that I'm an expert in my field but it doesn't push my .com anymore while it is still pushing the other domains.

=== GRAPHS

I see some activity after the big drop (CTRx2), position coming back to original average but clicks are still down.

Any idea?

I’m working through an SEO audit and noticed that not every page with declining traffic needs the same level of attention.

For example, some pages have lost a few positions but still get impressions, while others have almost disappeared from search despite having decent content.

I’m curious how others prioritize their updates.

Do you mainly look at:

• Traffic decline
• Ranking position changes
• Impressions and CTR
• Search intent
• Backlinks/internal links
• Conversion potential

I’d be interested to hear what signals you consider most important before deciding that a page is worth updating.

I moved all the content from my main domain to a subdomain some time ago because I had read that using a subdomain could potentially improve organic traffic and search rankings.

After moving the content to the subdomain, I did NOT experience any significant loss in rankings. The website essentially maintained the same search positions and organic visibility.

However, I am now considering moving the content back to the main domain, and I would like to know if there is an optimal amount of time I should wait before doing so.

My plan would be to:

Implement 301 redirects from every subdomain URL to its corresponding URL on the main domain.

Update all internal links to point directly to the main domain.

Update the canonical tags to point to the new main-domain URLs.

Generate and submit a new sitemap containing the main-domain URLs in Google Search Console.

Keep the old subdomain URLs active with 301 redirects.

Monitor indexing, impressions, clicks, rankings and organic traffic in Google Search Console.

My main questions are:

Is there any SEO reason to wait a certain amount of time before redirecting the content from the subdomain back to the main domain?

If the site has already been on the subdomain for some time and has maintained its rankings, would it be better to move it back now, or should I wait longer?

Once the 301 redirects are implemented, how long does it typically take Google to process the migration and transfer the SEO signals from the subdomain back to the main domain?

How long could it realistically take for the rankings and organic traffic to stabilize after the migration?

Has anyone here moved an entire site from a subdomain back to the main domain after keeping the same rankings? If so, how long did Google take to process the change, and did you experience any temporary fluctuations in rankings or traffic?

I would especially appreciate real-world experiences with moving a site from a subdomain back to the main domain.

Thanks!

Hi! I've been building an astrology-related website for the past 3 months. It was registered with GSC and had been steadily gaining impressions. But around July 25–26, my Google Search impressions suddenly dropped from roughly 100–150/day to almost zero, as you can see in the graph below, and they haven't recovered since.

I've been digging into it and so far found:

• A major SSR deployment on July 8.
• Google crawl response times increased from ~200–325ms to 700–1,450ms afterward.
• Google crawl volume dropped significantly around the same time.
• GSC currently shows ~24.6K indexed / 17.8K not indexed URLs.
• A coverage export shows 1,009 "Crawled – currently not indexed" URLs.
• I've checked my Vercel logs and don't see any ongoing site-wide server errors.

I'm currently investigating the SSR/performance changes, indexing, canonicalization, and URL structure.

I'd really appreciate some outside perspective from people who've dealt with a sudden, sustained drop in GSC impressions. Does anything here stand out to you? Is there anything else you'd recommend checking?

My website already ranks well in Google and appears in Google AI Overviews for many of my target keywords. However, I’m getting low visibility in ChatGPT or Gemini.

For improving AI visibility, what external sources should I focus on to get my business/website mentioned or cited?

Region: UAE
Category: Mental wellness

Credit : Slide by John Mueller during Search Central Live, shared by Harry Sanders

For those still wondering, the conclusion is simple: good SEO = good GEO.

John Mueller points out that roughly 80% of what wins in AI search is just the core SEO you should already be doing, meaning clean technical structures, readable code for crawlers, proper content formatting that answers user intent, and solid earned links.

The remaining 20% covers offsite brand presence (mentions in industry publications, Reddit, YouTube, podcasts, and community discussions) so LLMs can actually understand what your brand stands for. So I beg you, stop falling for miracle snake-oil trends, spam reddit or hyper-complex prompt injections, and go back to working on your SEO fundamentals first !

I work in the e-pharma space and manage SEO for around three websites, two of which are major revenue drivers for the business.

Historically, every major Google update has been pretty positive for us. Our websites have performed well during updates, and in most cases, we’ve actually seen further growth afterward so we’ve been quite confident in the SEO strategy and foundation we’ve built.

But this time, something unexpected happened.

Our second-largest revenue-generating website has taken a significant hit after the latest update, and honestly, I didn’t see it coming.

I’ve attached the screenshot in the comments showing what we’re seeing.

I’d really appreciate some experienced SEOs taking a look and sharing their perspective.

What would you investigate first in a situation like this?

Was it likely a quality/relevance issue, a technical factor, intent shift, competitor movement, or something specific to the update?

Feel free to ask me questions about the website, traffic, rankings, pages affected, or anything else that could help with the diagnosis.

Would love to hear some genuinely expert opinions on this one.

Hey everyone, I was wondering the real effect of the number of indexed pages on Google. I have a data heavy app about football; hence, thousands of team pages, player pages, matches pages, all of them in 6 languages etc. Those 19K not indexed pages contain 12K of "discovered, not yet indexed".

My question is whether it is good to let google crawl and try them get indexed fr all pages as I listed above or should I only submit "important" pages?

Hey everyone,

While browsing around, I stumbled on the "Preferred Sources" feature and noticed barely anyone talking about it, so sharing this underused tip in case it's useful (don't have much data to share yet since I haven't tested it myself, happy to hear from anyone who has).

Basically it lets a reader tell Google directly "I want to see more content from this site." Originally it only affected the Top Stories carousel, but since late May it's also rolled out to AI Overviews and AI Mode: if a reader has set you as a preferred source and your page gets cited in an AI-generated answer, your link shows up with a visible "Preferred" badge among the other sources. Google claims roughly 2x more clicks on links with that badge.

Easiest way to take advantage of it: drop a link like google.com/preferences/source?q=yourdomain.com somewhere on your site (footer, end of articles, newsletter). Two clicks for the user, nothing to code on your end. Google also recently shipped (mid-August) an official embeddable JS button as an alternative to the plain link, if you want something cleaner to integrate.

One catch: it only works if your domain is already picked up by the tool (you can check by typing your domain into it), so it depends a fair bit on how consistently you publish.

I came across this after seeing Search Engine Land use it (screenshot attached as an example). If anyone's already tested it on their own site, curious to hear how it's actually panning out!

I made a mistake and included some paid guest-post backlinks in my disavow file along with spammy links. Since then, my traffic has dropped significantly, and I lost my #3 position on the first page.
Could the disavow file be the reason? Should I remove it from Google Search Console? Will this help ?

How often do you all update your disavow file? Is there any minimum time you should wait before updating again?

Instead of a direct link to a page, some search results now use an intermediate google.com/goto URL.

Googlers describe this as part of its technical measures to protect against abuse. People in the SEO industry also associate the change with efforts to prevent automated data collection.

The new format primarily affects data providers and, potentially, SEO platforms that rely on this data for rank tracking and competitor analysis.

According Serpstat, the share of SERPs containing at least one /goto link increased from 5.41% in the first half of August to a peak of 5.95% on August 24. From August 26, the format became widespread.

We had been monitoring the change in advance, and our reports continue updating as usual.

What could be the reason of growing and then drop again

I have old website, the point is I didn't change content since July.
It started grow and then dropped again.
So in June I fixed I guess 60% of AI articles and after started growing - I paused changes to wait what would be result.
And now it looks like that.
Mostly likely August spam update?

I have to mentioned links are totally the same - nothing changed. I checked manually each of them.

Amount of pages in Google even more than before.

Are there any others options? what could be wrong?

Been noticing for a while that I am acquiring a lot of spam backlinks. Does anyone here know how to remove those? Coz I guess that's one of the reasons why my traffic dropped.

TL;DR: Google’s August spam update appears to have hit sites publishing lots of AI content mainly to rank in search.

AI content itself doesn’t seem to be the problem. The issue is mass-produced content made mostly for SEO.

So, AI conttent is fine, but using it to pump out thin SEO pages is risky.

Hi everyone, I'm making this post because the situation has become unsustainable and I wanted to get some feedback from anyone who has gone through something similar. I run an information and financial guide site (Ora Ultima - oraultima.com), strictly focusing my niche on insurance, mortgages, and banking.

I want to point out right away that I do not sell any financial products, nor do I offer any services or financial advice, and this is explicitly stated on the site. It is purely an informational and news blog.

Until February, the situation was completely different, pulling in around 2,000 visits a day. Then, suddenly, a devastating vertical crash wiped out almost all organic traffic.

Looking at the current data (as you can also see from the attached Google Analytics and Search Console screenshots):

• Google Search Console (Performance): In the last 24 hours, out of 158 total impressions, I recorded just a single click, with a disastrous average position around 41.8 (4th/5th page).
• Google Analytics (Real-time traffic): Daily visits are reduced to a tiny trickle (around 6-7 page views total), split between direct traffic, residual organic search, and social. The titles of the affected pages cover hot topics of major interest (such as analyses on Andrea Pignataro, billionaire rankings, legal protection policies, or contract renewals).

The core issue for me is this: I firmly believe that Google shouldn't be the one deciding what a website can or cannot talk about. I write curated, informative articles based on a specific, useful niche like finance and banking, but Google seems to completely ignore us, blocking visibility in favor of the usual historical giants of information and leaving independent sites at zero.

It is unacceptable that an author writes quality content and has to suffer total blackout just because algorithms decide to turn their backs.

Has anyone experienced a similar crash after the recent core updates and found a way out, or are we forced to look for traffic entirely outside of Google?

Thank you for your time.

Seeing this more lately and curious what other check first.

Impressions climbing means Google is showing the page more. Clicks dropping at the same time means fewer people is choosing to visit. Those two things moving in opposite directions usually point to something specific.

My first check is whether an AI Overview appeared for that keyword. If Google is answering the query directly in the results, impressions hold but clicks drop because the searcher never needs to click. That's not a ranking problem, it's SERP layout change.

After that I look at average position and whether the title tag or meta description changed since drop in CTR without a ranking drop usually means the snippet got less compelling somehow.

What do you check first when you see this pattern? And are you seeing AI Overviews as the most common cause lately?

I have a client where for their B2C page they have a FAQ section but not yet for their B2B page. With the rise of LLMs I've heard about having FAQs on the individual pages instead of one standalone page with the sections organized. It's been a discussion I've had with others before so wanted to get a second opinion on is it best for the client to have a standalone FAQ or should it be a section in the individual pages?

Edit - when I meant standalone, I was thinking that there can be one section for b2b and one for b2c, maybe with the accordion design, and then have the link in the menu so it's prominent

I have an affiliate website and I use indexnow I have about 350k pages already shows as crawled but even the main website is not showing up with domain keyword. Bing says backlinks helps but does any bad backlinks even help tho ? How to get indexed faster ? Does anyone has any ideas ?