Why Isn’t My Website Ranking on Google? [9 Reasons + Fixes]
You have a beautiful website, even a decent backlink profile, but no traffic, no leads and no revenue. If your website isn’t ranking at the top for key search terms – branded or unbranded – your business could stagnate or even fail. The longer you wait to fix the Google rankings problem, the more it’ll cost you in exposure, traffic, and conversions. You know the most valuable and cost-effective SEO exposure comes in the form of growing organic search engine traffic. Let’s explore some of the most common reasons websites don’t rank on Google and what can be done to fix the issues. 1. Your Website is Brand New When it comes to SEO, patience is a huge virtue. If your website is only a couple of months old, you can’t expect it to rank well for competitive search terms. Ranking #1 on Google takes time. In fact, what once took weeks and months, now takes years. You aren’t doing anything wrong – that’s just the way it is! SEO takes time. In order for your website to rank well, you need high quality content and lots of powerful backlinks. A site that’s only a few weeks old doesn’t have the robust foundation that’s required. Furthermore, Google seems to have an unofficial waiting period where new(ish) websites are suppressed until they can be thoroughly examined and evaluated. There’s even a name for it: The Google Sandbox. Experience suggests that a website will typically remain in the Google Sandbox for a period of three to six months. Though it can be considerably shorter or longer depending on the niche and quality of the website. Use this time to create quality content and flesh out a backlink strategy. The more competitive your niche, the more difficult it will be to play catch-up with incumbents. 2. Your Website (or Individual Website Pages) Is Not Indexed There is a big difference between being indexed and ranking on Google. A website must be indexed in order to appear in Google’s search results. Otherwise Google has no way of knowing your site exists. If your website isn’t indexed – or is improperly indexed, for that matter – you won’t appear in search results for any terms or keywords. If you’ve never taken the time to research how Google indexing works and what needs to be done to encourage search engine crawlers to sift through your site, now’s a good time to learn. If you’ve already indexed your site, perhaps you accidently de-indexed it by mistake? Double-check to make sure this isn’t the case. You can also click here to check your Google website rankings. 3. Google Has Penalized Your Site Google doesn’t like when people try to hack their way to the top of the rankings using spammy tactics. They have specific rules and expectations for how websites are to be optimized and structured. It’s possible that you’ve inadvertently broken some of these rules and received either a manual or algorithmic Google penalty. Google has something known as Manual Action penalties. If you previously ranked well – or feel like you should be ranking far better than you are – it could be that your site has a Google penalty attached to it. The best course of action is to check the Google Manual Actions report and correct any issues that are highlighted. Google Manual Action reports are filed when a human reviewer within the company has determined that you have a hacked site, user-generated spam, spammy free host, structured data issues, unnatural links to your site, unnatural links from your site, thin content, cloaking and/or sneaky redirects, pure spam, cloaked images, hidden text and/or keyword stuffing, AMP content mismatch, or sneaky mobile redirects. Google offers clear instructions on how to correct each of these issues. 4. Your Target Keywords Are Too Competitive It’s entirely possible that you’re targeting keywords that are too competitive and broad. For example, a new pizzeria that tries to rank for the word “pizza” doesn’t stand a chance. The same goes for a mechanic that wants to achieve a first page ranking for the search term “auto repair shop.” These are search terms that take years of hard work to capitalize on. Your website is far more likely to rank if it targets long-tail or geo-specific keywords. Instead of going after the term “pizza,” try something like “best pizza restaurant in Boston.” Or rather than rank for “auto repair shop,” you could try “collision repair for Ford trucks.” Specificity tends to produce superior results. 5. Your Competition is Performing Negative SEO on Your Website You aren’t the only one optimizing your website in the hopes of ranking on page one of Google. Every one of your competitors is doing the exact same thing. And it’s possible that they’re doing more than you are. Most people view SEO as a battle against Google, when it’s really a competition against the other businesses in your industry or niche. If you want to rank higher, you have to outperform them. This means producing a higher quantity of quality content and generating more backlinks to your pages. Work harder and smarter – eventually it’ll yield the results you’re seeking. And, despite the talk of negative SEO, most competitors are nailing you simply be performing better than you: their on page SEO content is better and their links are better. They’re outperforming and outclassing you. 6. You Don’t Have Any (or Enough) Inbound Links The right content plus authoritative backlinks pointing to this content is what generates positive search rankings for your website. If you have a lot of quality content but no backlinks, you’re missing a key ingredient. (It’s also possible that you have backlinks from the wrong sources.) Using a tool like Ahrefs or Moz, take the time to study your backlink profile. Find out who is linking to you, which pages have good links, and where you need to improve your SEO. This will take time and manual effort, but it’s