Let us pretend that you are a patient, I am the doctor and your website is your child. You’ve come to see me because you can’t understand why your website is not showing up on Google…
What’s wrong with it?
Well my “diagnosis” would come down to 5 of the likeliest reasons this is happening and what you can do about it.
After all, showing up on Google and having your website bring in lots of traffic and money would certainly be the ideal scenario you’re looking for, right? And I do have a lot of high rankings there, so I think I am fit to diagnose why this is happening.
So let’s figure this out. But first…
Let me just say that each of these 5 reasons, while each providing you with a solution may not be best to tackle separately and perhaps, in order for your website to have overall success, that it’s better to follow a specific “big picture” type strategy for this.
Just like with the doctor analogy, if you come to me with a health problem and I analyze it based on a symptom/s, give you a pill that will stop one symptom from coming out, it will solve one aspect of the problem, but if there’s a bigger reason you’re having issues, then perhaps a pill may not be enough and you will have to look at things like living a healthier lifestyle for example and that may cure all your problems and make the symptoms go away.
That’s the same way you should look at your website’s health. I can and will absolutely give you solutions to show up on Google if you’re not already seeing that very shortly, but solving one problem may also make you neglect a bigger problem.
For example:
Just because you are somewhere on Google doesn’t mean you’re ranked high and that makes a HUGE difference, believe me. But that’s a whole other issue you need to tackle. Fixing reasons why your page isn’t showing up there may not necessarily improve it’s rank. That’s point I’m trying to make here…
The 5 common reasons your website isn’t showing up on Google (and what to do):
And some of these aren’t exactly problems, but more of a thing where you just need to wait:
1) You aren’t indexed yet.
An index means you are simply ON Google, somewhere, just not necessarily ranked anywhere, yet. Most times people look for their site by simply typing it into the search. This is probably not going to provide good results if the page is new, which is why the best way to TEST if it’s somewhere on Google is to type the URL in quotes.
For example…
If my website name is “Thepagedoctor.com” and my URL is “http://ThePageDoctor.com”, I would simply head to Google and type the URL version (with the ” ” around it) and hit search. If the page appears, you are absolutely indexed and SOMEWHERE, which is a good starting point and one that every page has to go through.
So if you do this test and it comes out positive, you’re good. But what if you don’t? Well most commonly a lack of index happens because you JUST started your page and it hasn’t been caught yet by Google’s spiders which are these things that go around the internet and find pages to index and rank.
Usually waiting about a week is enough to fix this problem as they (the spiders) will ultimately find your new page eventually, BUT there are ways to speed it up. Here are 5 ways to get indexed in Google faster.
Basically the methods there will expedite the process. It is totally legitimate to use them. I personally let it all happen naturally, but you can go about those tips I just linked to as well.
2) You aren’t properly utilizing keywords.
A very common problem I see is that besides typing up their actual domain name on Google, people don’t really know HOW to search for their page. And that usually mixes together with an improper understanding of keywords.
Allow me to explain…
Suppose I write an article on my website called:
Let’s say I published an article with that title, then I went on Google. Can you guess what I would type in order to see if it’s ranked?
Well if you said “The exact title”, you’d be right. That’s exactly what I would have to type up. Now if the results show my page, then I’ve been ranked for that keyword.
Now the problem is people don’t know that they need to type up the titles of their blogs or pages.
So consider this tip in mind:
If you write blog posts, type up the title of the blog posts to see if it’s ranked.
You will also want to read up on keywords here because just writing random titles without knowing if other people type up those same titles on Google makes them useless.
3) Your page is on Google, but is ranked very low so you just don’t see it.
Consider that you have tip #2 down, type up the title of your blog post or a page you wrote about, but for some reason, page 1 results aren’t showing it, neither is page 2 and so on and so forth.
Did something happen? Well odds are…
Your page is probably targeting a pretty high competition keyword and there’s other pages that are simply outranking you and that is pushing your page down very far into the search results, so far that it makes no sense to look for it.
So what can you do? Well first you need to discover what the rank of the keyword is. Here’s a good way to check your website’s Google ranking.
4) There is little to no content on the website.
If there’s one rule you need to know to getting ranked on Google, it’s that you need to write a ton of content and attach that content to low competition keywords. If you do not do one thing or the other, you are really not going to get anywhere.
I run into a lot of people who complain about not seeing their page and when I ask them to provide me their page URL and look at it, well, my eyes roll and the reason they do this is because the page has NO content on it or perhaps just a small article.
Folks, if you someone who has this problem, re-read the very first sentence I just wrote for tip #4. In fact, read it 10 times because it will only help you.
Pages with little or no content have very little weight in Google’s eyes. There is simply no authority on your part to show them that you are worth ranking high for.
But the solution is to write more, better content and keyword target it. That’s how you reach high rankings, first page rankings in fact.
5) You did something bad. Black hat bad…
If you JUST started your page, then this is an unlikely scenario, but if you’ve had one up for quite a bit, had rankings and suddenly everything dropped, you may have to consider the possibility that perhaps you engaged in some black hat practices and that caused your site to de-index and lose it’s rankings.
And these things typically happen only when people engage in unhealthy ranking practices known as black hat methods.
My final thoughts:
Well there it is, 5 of the most common reasons you’re not seeing your page. And I have provided links to understand each reason better and specific instructions on what to do on some of them to utilize them fully.
Understand that in MOST cases, your lack of seeing your page isn’t because you did anything bad. The only time that would happen is if you did something pertaining to the 5th point I made, but other than that, your lack of rankings or seeing your page for that matter is simply because you either haven’t worked on your page long enough or perhaps you’re just not giving it enough time to show up.
That’s the major point I want you to understand and not think that you did something wrong.
Remember, in order to have a fully healthy page that ranks well and does well, you have to look at it’s overall health and not just one or more of the 5 points above. When you address it the overall way and do the right things, these 5 issues aren’t even going to be things you’ll need to worry about. 
If these 5 tips helped you, do let me know below. If not, tell me about your page’s situation and I’ll try and figure out a solution for you!
Hi Vitaliy, thanks for great information. These five points on page ranking have given me a second thought to check back on my site. This Black hat SEO thing is interesting and a new topic for me. If I write some answers in Quora and link them back to my site, is it part of Black hat?
No Jess, in that case, it is simply a form of linking one piece of good content to another. People share and link sites with each other all the time.
Thanks a lot for this information on why some articles may not be ranking on Google. They are really helpful to me. Most especially the aspect of locating where my page is on Google.
I have two questions though. Can this be applied to Bing and Yahoo ranking. If I am ranking on Google does that imply automatic ranking on Bing and Yahoo too?
Great work,
John
Hi John:
1) Yes, but it’s not something I worry about because…
2) You will rank on Bing and Yahoo if you rank on Google, but the rankings are usually not the same as each search engine has their own method of grading/ranking a website. But since Google is the best out of the 3, I only worry about their ranking. If that comes, Yahoo and Bing will soon follow.
Hi Vitaliy,
Thanks very much for this post. I’ve got a website myself that I’m building up content so really useful to get these top pitfalls to avoid! What’s your opinion on a website having a site map? Does it make much difference in Google’s eyes?
Keep up the good work and will keep looking out for more top tips on how to get ranked on Google
Cheers,
James
Do you mean a sitemap that you make for webmaster tools? If so, my opinion is that you should make it, but not worry about it too much. Once you make it and update your content, the sitemap will grow and if you input it on webmaster tools, it will also update on it’s own.
This is a very good explanation with the most obvious being your site has not been indexed yet. People seem to think they should be on page one from day one but as you point out is simply does not happen that way. It does take time and consistent work to get onto page one of Google. Content and keywords are the most important and easy things to address don’t you think?
Yes, absolutely Margaret, both of those things are really at the heart of any successful website out there. When you include great keywords and add to it great content, there’s no way Google “won’t” find you and reward you for it!
Great post Vitaliy. I totally agree on No.4. There’s just no way “thin” content can be ranked high. I’ve done much research in my niche and found that those with high rankings have great content, no less that 1,500 words. And those that rank lower at the 3rd and 4th pages of googles usually have thinner content.
Additionally, I also feel that backlinks should be inside this list, at least from what I’ve read from other SEO gurus. What do you think about this?
No! Absolutely not Isaac, those “gurus” and their backlink talk is nonsense. Backlinks have already been shown for years to cause SEO problems for websites because many use them the wrong way and that leads to their websites losing their rank. I would be VERY cautious of ANY guru who recommends this sort of approach.
I found this to be quite helpful.
I have been consistency working on my site for 3 months and my site trust is very slowly going up but I plan to continue working at it for as long as I can.
I searched my site in Google using the method in the first point you made and I found the result there. I also just uploaded my 40th post there today so I am feeling confident that things are going to start happening soon.
Nice man! 40 posts and 3 months is a great milestone to cross with Google. I would not be surprised if in another 3 months, you tripled your traffic.
Your post is very informative. It is now clear to me, the importance of keywords. My question is, if the the title of the page or post matters a lot, does it mean that the content’s keywords are not important? If important, at which rate? Does the frequency of posting per week and number of words in an article matter? To what extent?
Keywords within the content (body) are very important. In fact, the overall body weights more heavily over the long run on that page/post’s SEO than the title. The title acts as both a magnet for Google to rank it on the targeted keyword and also for people to see it and click on the search result to visit your site.
As for how often you should include the keyword, I would say sparingly. As long as your content reads well and the keyword isn’t used in a way that makes it sound like you’re just plugging it into the content for the sake of SEO, you should be fine, in other words, write naturally and include the keyword in the body whenever it’s relevant to do it.
As for posting frequency, the more often you can do it, the better. My personal preference is once a day.
Excellent tips. The main thing is patience and persistence. Keep posting frequently and eventually your site builds more influence and will then be able to start ranking higher. It does take a while thought mind you. I’m still in the process of trying to rank but I know that if I keep doing what I’m doing I’ll get there.
You are right Hannah, keep posting as you said, and keep posting, while targeting keywords, that will speed it up.
Good tips. If you follow all the steps it still takes time. Even PPC ads are worthless the first month or two until google learns to trust them or your website. People just aren’t very patient. But you’re right about the content part for sure. More quality content, the better your rankings are gonna be.
Hi Russell, I will have to disagree with you about the 1-2 months of Google and PPC. The way Google accepts your site through SEO and if you advertise on their adwords Network (PPC), are completely different things.
I would say, from experience that if you have a website with SOME content, not a lot, you can get ads up and showing on Google within hours. However, take that same (some) content and you will find that it does not rank high naturally, 2 different parts of Google, with 2 different outcomes.
Of course, there’s also the question of IF Google will accept your website inside their ad network and that’s a whole other issue to figure out, as I’ve seen in most cases, it’s NOT easy. Typically local business websites have a good shot of showing up, affiliate sites like mine on the other hand…do not.
However, you may also want to consider Bing ads as the alternative. In fact, I’ll say that it is a fantastic network, that has it’s own issues certainly, but overall, affiliate marketing websites like mine are very welcome there and I rarely have issues, and if there’s any, it’s mostly technical on Bing’s end.
Otherwise, they’ll approve ads for even the newest sites almost instantaneously in some cases (but this is for ads, NOT organic results). I run A LOT of ads for this site on Bing and I’m seeing great results.
Thanks for this clear explanation and tricks to be able to position my website in google. I will apply your 5 recommendations immediately. I would like to be able to position my website well in Bing, do you consider that I must follow the same steps indicated here?
Another thing I would like to ask you is if you have any advice regarding the number and position of the ADS that you would admit on your site, how can you filter ads that have no real relation to the topic of your post or site?
Hi Cristina, for Bing, although they have their own webmaster tools available, if you follow the steps for Google specifically, your site will also appear on Bing.
As for ads, I assume you mean adsense correct? Well in any case, you do bring up a VERY good point, which is actually why I am against running such ads on my site. So that would be my answer. In my opinion, it is far better to monetize a website via affiliate marketing and selling your own services vs putting up adsense ads.
Hello.
I just wanted to say thanks for the information you’ve given here! The doctor’s analogy is very clever and certainly made it easier to picture as a tangable thing rather than just something going on that we can’t see.
I’ve been searching around google for info like this for a few hours now and just kept getting irrelevant things until now where I’ve read what I actually wanted.
Thanks.
No problem Jaime! The truth is, most SEO problems have simple solutions, which is why the topic I’ve targeted here has pretty simple solutions!
Hi Vitaliy,
Super article! I’ve only had my website up and running for a few weeks now and I know how scary it can be to not be able to find your site.
Great tips on keywords and I had to look up black hat just to make sure I’m not doing anything wrong (phew! I’m not).
I strongly recommend using Google Search Console to monitor your traffic, crawl errors and the indexing status of your posts and pages. Also, without fail use Fetch as Google for every post and page you publish to get indexed.
Sophia
Hi Sophia, thanks for weighing in on this. Just to be clear for anyone who may be confused, you are referring to Google Webmaster Tools. I’ve written a tutorial on using that program here. Thanks again.
Your article has let me know why some articles rank fast and why some don’t. In my own case, I am afraid when you mentioned repetition of keywords severally in one content. I admit I am guilty of that, Is there any way I can correct that in the already published article?
Hi Matron, if you “overuse” keywords in an article, it’s not going to be detrimental to your overall SEO and you CAN correct this. Just either:
1) Remove areas in your content where the keyword is overused and just use a different term of phrase.
2) Just add more content to your article to dilute the percentage of time a keyword appears. For example, if you target a keyword and use it say 20 times in a 1,000 word article, add another 1,000 words to the same article to make the keyword appear 1% of the time.
Understand that in the end, as long as your content is GOOD, you can and SHOULD write in a way that’s comfortable and reads easily for people who land on your page. If you do this, then it really won’t matter if you overuse a keyword.
You give good training in this article. I didn’t know the term “black hat” and I’m glad to know I haven’t been doing those things.
I noticed that my G+ posts are ranked higher than my actual site posts. Why is that?
Thanks for all your hard work!
Blessings,
Mike
Your G+ posts are personalized which is why they show up on Google. They will not show up that high for other browsers which is why you cannot depend on them Mike. You will need to access Google from a browser where you are not logged in to see your site’s real rank.
I like your articles, they keep me learning about what I’m doing wrong and what I need to change. I am new to all of this “getting ranked” and yada yada. I do have a question. You say I need to target keywords; when I do that, do I have to write multiple posts focused on that one keyword or does the fact that the one post with that keyword is part of a site with all kinds of content help that particular keyword rank better? Hope you can decipher that.
Hi Jeff, the second thing you mentioned is the right one. You need NOT write multiple articles targeting the same keyword, one good one will do.
I think you have partly answered some questions I had about why some pages are not ranked while others are. I like the point #2 about “keywords”. Sometimes I take the time to play about with the keyword tool and discover some low competition keywords that have pretty good traffic.
Like a month ago I wrote an article on music and the keyword had very low competition, when I read this article I paused and went to the Google search engine to look for it and I scrolled up to the 5th page and I can’t find it.
What do you think may cause this? I took a week to write this article and it has over 2,500 words so I expected it to rank very well. I’d like to hear what you have to say about this.
Hi, well there’s a few clues to what the problem may be based on what you said:
1) You said you wrote an article on music. This is a very broad topic so chances are there are a lot of articles competing against the same keyword your article is DESPITE the fact that it’s low competition.
2) Some keywords may give you what I call a “double negative” meaning they can show low competition which is one negative (actually a positive) and the other is that no matter how much you write you will not be able to rank for it because there are a certain number of high authority websites occupying the first page and it’s going to be VERY difficult to bypass them.
3) How old is your site and this article? How much content does your site have? If all of this is new, and I mean several weeks to a month, then it’s absolutely normal for you to NOT spot the article ranked high on Google yet. Your authority simply hasn’t built up to the point where it will be seen for the more competitive terms, but it will come with more content being produced.
4) Have you checked out keywords that are LSI versions of the one you’re looking to rank for? Check out my article on LSI and then check Google for them.
5) You said you used a keyword tool. Which one was it? Chances are the keyword tool you used has a search feature where you can type up the term, your URL and ask it to find it on Google very quickly, versus you having to do it manually every time. You may want to try this and if not, I can recommend a good tool.