Why does SEO take so long for a new website or a website that has not been updated or has not been kept fresh?
SEO, which is short for Search Engine Optimization, is a process by which a website gains traction, ranking and visibility in the search engines.
If any given website has been consistently cared for – as in regularly updated and kept “fresh”, that website will not suffer too much when algorithms change or when new competitors appear on the scene. There will be ups and downs, fluctuations if you will, in ranking and exposure, but these are nothing that will be detrimental to the website overall or to the business that it represents.
On the other hand, if a website is brand new, not well connected, or has been neglected, it will take at minimum several months to quite possibly a year worst case scenario to get up to speed.
No cause for despair – this is the cycle of life – no magic band aids, no magic pills, no instant amazing results. This is due to several factors such as algorithms, competition, building your reputation in terms of domain authority and trust.
Let’s look at what is involved in this process.
DOMAIN AUTHORITY – QUALITY CONTENT – THE RULE OF CONSISTENCY
What is domain authority? Let’s think restaurants on Main Street.
Restaurant A, who has been established for 15 years, everyone knows the quality of the food, the service, and the relevancy of their prices in relation to such.
You, Restaurant B, you’re the new guy on the block. No one really knows much about you, and so in that sense, you can’t hold a candle to Restaurant A.
Restaurant A’s domain name has been out there for 15 years. Yours has been out there a month or so.
The search engines need time to get to know your website through crawling and indexing and will not prioritize yours over others simply because you’re new. Hence it takes time for them to establish your website’s value, inbound link quality, structure and establish your level of authority.
To establish authority there needs to be organic back links or organic internal links, consistent publication of quality content, and some measure of user engagement metrics. The process of establishing domain authority takes time. Rome wasn’t built in a day.
Now, what if your website has been out there for a while but you have not consistently updated your content, have never updated your content, or your content is not relevant and evergreen?
Then, your website has become, in the eyes of the search engines, quite stale. Hence your website gets kicked lower and lower down the ladder because you are not providing content of value and interest.
Giving it a one time boost doesn’t work. Search engines will crawl and when not finding fresh content on a consistent basis, you get penalized and get dropped lower in favor of other websites who keep the freshness level up.
WEBSITE and CONTENT FRESHNESS
Freshness involves posting consistently in a blog with relevant evergreen content. It also is dependent on periodic tweaking of page content, even if minor updates.
Freshness can also involve consistent posting of videos, if that is part of your website strategy.
This valuable relevant content in your niche tells search engines that your website is active, consistent, and trustworthy.
You are NOT trying to throw out tons of content just for the sake of doing so, but instead publishing content with thought and purpose for your audience.
This can take days, weeks or months to be detected.
SEO RESULTS TIMELINE
Every website, the business that it represents, and it’s situation is completely unique to the next. Having said that, here is a very generalized timeline for seeing SEO results.
- 1 – 6 months: Search engines start indexing your pages. This holds true for all websites. You will see minor improvements in search engine ranking and visibility for less competitive keywords.
- 4 – 9 months: Your search engine visibility improves as your consistent, quality content and organic linking improves.
- 9 months and beyond: Solid improvements are noticeable in traffic, search engine visibility, and in your phone ringing due to consistent efforts and improvements.
OTHER FACTORS
- New websites and neglected websites newly updated are corralled into the Google Sandbox. This is a place of probation while the search engines assess the quality and relevance of said website. Your website WILL struggle to rank at all simply because it has not built a reliable track record.
- Your competitors have been caring for their websites for years and have invested in quality SEO. They have established niches for themselves, with organic niche keywords and have created consistent, quality evergreen content around those niches. ANY chance of you outranking them is slim and none without putting in the sweat equity and effort of building your own quality SEO.
- Some of your competitors may also run sponsored ad programs. While we advocate for a completely organic SEO approach, if your competitor has the budget, they will outshine and outrank everyone else for as long as their ad campaign runs. Once the budget runs out, everyone is fair game again.
- Lack of Google Reviews is another important factor that does contribute to your overall authority, trustworthiness and ultimately your search engine visibility and value.
- Local SEO adds a complex layer to the entire process, however, is of huge value if your business targets local audiences, clients and customers. Consistent utilization of your Google Business Profile, Reviews and geo targeted SEO done correctly adds authority and value. And takes time.
- Technical SEO is yet another deciding factor that should not be ignored. Technical SEO consists of schema markup, site speed, mobile responsiveness, broken links, Open Graph, Knowledge Graph, X Cards, image SEO, structured data, and redirects.
WHY IS SEO A LONG TERM COMMITMENT AND INVESTMENT?
- Because it is user centric to the sustainable growth of your website and your business. It delivers an invaluable return on your investment.
- Consistency and quality content are key to producing quality results.
- Patience is not optional it is required.