The Perils Of Borderline Websites

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There’s a line in Google, which once crossed can be fatal for the progress of a website. Where exactly that line is I cannot say, but I do know that I have several websites that have always struggled mightily in Google’s SERPs, despite my best intentions. All I can do is speculate as to what the cause may be. Here are some of my conclusions.

• The website was launched during the days of the Google Sandbox, and always had trouble ranking
• The fact the website had trouble ranking, helped depress my interest in developing it, so the rate of content development is very low compared to more successful websites
• No innate readership was every developed
• No marketing plan other than organic search was ever implemented

When I look at the list I just wrote out, it stands to reason that this website has never been a particular great money-maker. But it does have its’ moments. When the site is ranking well in Google it can earn $300-400 monthly. When it drops, the revenue is nearly non-existent. Now that’s a frustrating development indeed.

A website like this can drive you crazy after awhile if you aren’t careful. Sometimes the website deliver great revenues, and other times it sits there dead as a door nail. It’s tough to decide what methods will help stabilize the website, but I’ve pretty much settled on the following:

1) Update content more frequently
2) Pay a small amount on PPC for very targeted traffic

I can’t see how a link campaign will help as the website relies primarily on long tail search. I’m keeping careful track of the results of my experiment, so I’ll report when I find out if anything works. My theory is that the current mis-steps on several sites I have is because they don’t have any traffic other than search engine traffic. If I’m right, re-balancing the mix should address the issue. Time will tell.

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