When it comes to SEO, there are only two things;
- Get to Search result page #1 and position #1
- Be there for as long as possible.
If you are doing any SEO and these two are not your top priorities, then you have to sit down, grab a cup of coffee and think!
NB: Take a look at this post on SEO for newbies
Now, if you are on Google page #1, position #1 for your hunted keyword, don’t celebrate yet. You still have work my dear friend. Pogo-Sticking may be your next enemy to deal with.
The battle for position #1 on page #1 is fierce – keyword research, competition analysis, creating great content, backlinks, etc.
But if you go through these struggles and succeed to push your entries to the most coveted position on SERPs, you have to make sure you don’t allow pogo-sticking pull your items off that position.
NB: In this post, I wrote about how to get an SEO company in Denver
Pogo-Sticking is killing your SEO! Here’s how to fix it!
What’s Pogo-sticking in SEO?
Pogo sticking in SEO is a situation where a user performs a search, clicks on a result and very quickly clicks back to the search result page, and clicks on a different result.
What this means is like the searcher telling Google “well, I’m disappointed in you. You told me this is what I’m looking for but it’s far from it”
Of course, a negative signal is sent to Google and that makes it think it made a mistake by ranking you on top because you just failed to satisfy the searcher.
If this happens over and over again, Google will seriously consider shifting you down stairs. (Well, Google here represents search engines).
You may get all the tough high PR backlinks and the keyword stuffs to get to position #1 but once searchers start rejecting your content by clicking back to the next entry on SERP, Google is smart enough to think something is seriously wrong with your content.
Given that search engines strive to satisfy their users, you’ll soon find your entries moving down to the bottom.
This isn’t good at all!
How do you measure your Pogo Sticking Effect?
Well, I have not seen any tool yet to measure your pogo-sticking effect. If you have one, please share with us in the comment box.
However, your bounce rate can be a quick pointer. Note however that high bounce rate doesn’t necessary indicate high pogo-sticking. A closer look into these two shows some interesting differences.
Pogo-Sticking – How to fix it
The only way to reduce pogo-sticking is to make sure your readers from search engines don’t quickly click back to search engine results page (SERP). To do this, you’ll have to understand what your readers want and write for them.
You can write for your readers while inviting search engines to send you traffic. The best way of course is to treat a topic in its substantial details with less of focus keyword and more of Latent semantic indexing (LSI) keywords.
LSI keywords is what helps search engines to quickly link up your articles with searchers. Write for your readers but don’t neglect SEO.
NB: SEOPressor is an excellent WordPress plugin to automatically scan and create a list of LSI keywords for your posts. All you do then is perfectly insert the keywords in your article.
Check out SEOPressor here
So here are a few things you can do to try to eliminate pogo-sticking
- Get a premium theme
Readers love a welcoming theme. Fortunately, you don’t need to hurt your wallet in today’s themes market to be able to own one.
If your blog suffers pogo-picking effect because of poor theme, you are really not thinking straight. I think your theme should be the last thing that throws your visitors off.
There are some premium WordPress themes that are worthless too. A lot of things have to come to table when choosing the right theme for your blog. That’s why I always recommend you grab premium themes from the guys of Genesis or MyThemeShop. These have won the confidence and love of their users through high quality products and support services.
Note however that getting the best theme ever does not guarantee any significant reduction in pogo-sticking. Other factors, of course have a place.
- Post introduction
Your post title is like a door into your article. Once visitors get attracted, they click to discover what’s inside.
Your introduction is the ‘Welcome’ spot. Once they are not properly welcomed, they may feel they are not at the right place. The next thing is a quick turn-back.
Your post introduction should be as important as the title. There must be a perfect correlation or connection between your title, introduction and of course body.
- Use relevant sub-headlines to hold down skimmers
Many of your readers skim across your content. One of the things that keep them on your content are the headlines. As they scroll down your page, they quickly read through your headlines to get a general idea of what’s in the content. If you fail to catch their attention through catchy headlines, you stand the risk of pogo-sticking.
- Use eye-captivating images
One of the things readers cannot escape are beautiful and attractive images. Using relevant and eye-catching, appealing or striking pictures or screenshots on your post will have a positive impact on your blog’s pogo-sticking and bounce rate.
Once someone is attracted to an image, he tends to find out what’s more about it by trying to read the text surrounded it, hence, more time on your blog and a possible Click-through.
- Avoid misleading titles
The worst thing to do to your blog is to mislead your readers. They will go away and you’re never going to see them around your blog again.
Don’t title your article as a way to lure readers to click. Once they find out your content is completely away from your title, they’ll click back in anger.
- Avoid popups on PageLoad
Many bloggers use popups these days to capture leads but it’s a stupid error to setup your popup window to pup on PageLoad.
While this quickly drives many readers away, it helps to add to your pogo-sticking. If your popup plugin doesn’t allow you to delay your popup window, you should seriously consider switching to something more professional.
> I recommend taking a closer look at Thrive Leads
To achieve more results, your window should popup once your reader makes an attempt to leave the page or once a certain position on the page is scrolled to.
An example is, when a reader scrolls to the comment box or simply when the reader spends x minutes on your blog. This helps you capture targeted leads while reducing your pogo-sticking.
Conclusion
If you find your article today on Google page #1 and tomorrow it’s off, you should pay attention to these points I have mentioned. There may be other factors though. However pogo-sticking is one factor you should not neglect.
I’ll be excited to hear from you in the comment box. Let me know what you think about pogo-picking and your SEO.
Kindly share this post with your friends on social media or link to it from your posts.