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We just lost what little bit of organic traffic we still had left ... :(

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  • Latest Post Latest Post by Kelly Burby

Dani AI

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A compact troubleshooting primer for forum owners after an unexplained SERP shift. This builds on the thread started by and the observations from and , and focuses on concrete checks that produce verifiable signals rather than guessing at causes.

First stop: Google Search Console. Check Manual Actions and Messages, then the Performance report (compare date ranges and filter by page and country) to find which pages lost impressions. Use Index Coverage and URL Inspection to see if pages were deindexed, blocked, or showing server errors. Run a handful of representative thread URLs through URL Inspection to compare what Googlebot sees versus what users see. Search Console

Forum-specific fixes that often help: canonicalize or merge near-duplicate threads, add concise, unique summaries at the top of long thread pages so each page has distinct content, noindex low-value pages (tag, author, search-result pagination), and canonicalize parameterized URLs to reduce index bloat. If many low-value pages exist, reduce crawl waste so Google focuses on high-value pages.

Technical checks that quickly expose platform issues: scan server logs for 4xx/5xx spikes and crawl rate changes; confirm robots.txt and meta robots are not accidentally blocking large sections; check for redirect chains or recent hostname/subdomain changes; and audit Core Web Vitals and mobile usability. If impressions drop across many queries, look for broad changes (hosting, CDN, major template changes) made around the same time.

For context on algorithm guidance and announcements, consult the official Google Search Central blog and overview of how Search works: Google Search Central blog — How Google Search Works.

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Member Avatar for SuperiorWD

I don't see any changes for my sites. It's pretty weird to have DaniWeb in such dire 'relationship' with good ole G', I'd expect the SE traffic to be really good for you, based on the quality of the content here and the activity. Oh, well ...

Member Avatar for Dani

It used to be, definitely. We got hit by something (it wasn't Panda or Penguin) in November 2012 that seemed to have affected other programming forums at the same time. We've been on a steady decline ever since then.

With regards to my dire post yesterday, it wasn't as dire as I had thought. Google Analytics was just much farther behind than it usually is. There was a hit, but it wasn't as terrible as I had thought. Even so, it doesn't seem like there's any increase in SERP traffic for us lately.

Member Avatar for Kelly Burby

Well, according to some rumors softer panda has hit the Google ranking but still can't confirm it there are just soo many rumors going down there about the change in the Google algorithm, it makes just impossible to decide wether it is true or......

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