Why Your Website Is Not Getting Organic Traffic: 12 Common Reasons and Fixes

A professional website with useful services may fail to attract traffic from Google. There are several common reasons for this situation, including the wrong choice of keywords, content quality issues, technical SEO problems, search indexing difficulties, and the need for greater authority.

Organic traffic is the traffic attracted from search engines. Unlike paid promotions, this type of traffic can be a great source of potential customers for a website that knows how to meet the needs of searchers. However, websites need to go through a discovery phase before being indexed and ranked by search crawlers.

This article lists 12 common reasons why a website is not getting organic traffic and describes ways to address them. The advice is applicable to any online web presence, including business websites, online shops, and agencies’ websites.

1. Your Website Is Not Indexed by Google

The first step in optimising a website for organic traffic is to ensure that Google indexes the website. First of all, this applies to the pages that a business wants to be found in Google search results. If indexing is not working correctly, the pages will not appear in the search results, and traffic from there will not be obtained.

There are various reasons for this situation, including technical errors on the website, robot.txt restrictions, canonicalisation problems, or too few internal links. In any case, the cause of the indexing issue must be identified and resolved.

Ways to Address the Problem 

Open Google Search Console and check the Page Indexing report to see if the pages are excluded from indexing or included. If excluded, the reasons for this must be identified and resolved. Otherwise, you can try the following actions:

• check if the website or the necessary pages do not have the noindex directive,
• check robot.txt for restrictions,
• submit the sitemap to Google,
• check the address in the URL Inspection tool,
• ensure that the necessary pages are not returning a 404 error.

It is important to remember that the presence of a page in the search results depends not only on being in the index but also on how Google perceives the page and its content.

2. You Are Targeting the Wrong Keywords

Choosing the right keywords that searchers use is one of the most important aspects of optimising a website for organic traffic. The keywords must be relevant to the services offered and the content of the page. At the same time, they must not be overly competitive or unrelated to the business.

For example, a small web development company will have very limited ability to compete for the term “web development” and will need to use more specific terms, such as “small business website development services.”

Ways to Address the Problem 

It is necessary to do keyword research and analyse which terms can bring traffic to the website. In this case, it is important to choose keywords according to certain criteria:

• relevance to the content of the page and the services provided,
• degree of match with the search query and search intent behind it,
• level of competition,
• potential value to the business,
• degree of specificity of the term.

Based on this information, a list of keywords can be compiled for each page or article on the website. Particular attention should be paid to the search intent behind the chosen terms, as this determines the content and structure of the page.

3. Your Content Does Not Match the Search Intent

A website’s content should not only contain the necessary keywords but also satisfy the search intent behind the search query. Otherwise, the page will not appear in the search results or will be found by users who are not interested in the services offered.

For example, someone looking for “what is technical SEO” wants to find an explanation of concepts, while someone searching for “technical SEO services” is looking for a company to improve their website. In neither case does a technical SEO service page answer the query as it appears in Google.

How to fix it

It is necessary to research Google for queries matching the chosen keywords and analyse what content is ranking for these terms. Particular attention should be paid to what type of content appears in the search results: video, article, service page, comparison system, or other type of resource.

Based on this information and an analysis of what users are looking for, a website manager must ensure that the page content matches the type of result and follows the appropriate structure to satisfy the search intent.

4. Your Website Content Is Too Thin

Adding new content and articles to the website will not benefit a business if they are of low quality, contain little useful information, and repeat similar phrases. In this case, it is important to understand that thin content is not necessarily text with a word count below average. A single page with little useful information will also be of low quality and will not be found in Google.

How to fix it

It is necessary to revise the content of the website, excluding pages with advertising or irrelevant information. Particular attention should be paid to the provision of any useful information, unique examples, and advice. If possible, detailed information on the topic of the page, the use cases that the page is aimed at, and the inclusion of relevant supporting materials will help improve the relevance of the page.

For example, an IT marketing agency may publish an article advising businesses to use an SEO audit to identify the reasons for a decrease in organic traffic. In this case, the page should also tell its readers what SEO reports to analyse and how to fix the problems found.

When possible, it is desirable to give real-world examples from projects and, where applicable, clearly separate hypothetical situations from cases that have already happened and led to real results.

5. Your Website Has Technical SEO Issues

Correctly functioning technical SEO is important for the proper indexing and ranking of a website in search engines. A large number of factors fall under technical SEO, including the overall structure of the website, the use of redirects, canonicalisation, technical problems on the website, and many others.

Incorrectly implemented technical SEO will prevent Google from analysing the content of the page correctly and ranking it in search results. For example, the incorrect use of redirects or the absence of redirects will prevent crawlers from getting to the necessary pages. The incorrect use of the canonical tag or the use of non-existent pages will confuse Google.

How to fix it

It is necessary to do a technical SEO audit of the website with subsequent analysis of all the errors found. A large number of technical SEO tools are available for this, including Google Search Console, Screaming Frog SEO Spider, and other tools for scanning websites.

The main technical SEO issues that require immediate attention include:

• broken internal links or the absence of internal linking,
• incorrect canonical tags,
• redirect chains and redirect loops,
• noindex tags on important pages,
• the same titles on different pages,
• a lack of internal linking to important pages,
• incorrect sitemap,
• website problems in mobile view.

When analysing technical SEO issues, it is important not to overwhelm yourself with hundreds or thousands of minor problems but to focus on those that directly affect the pages and the ability of search crawlers to analyse them.

6. Your Website Is Too Slow or Has Usability Issues

Websites that load slowly, jump around on the screen, and are generally uncomfortable to use will quickly lose visitors. Google collects statistics on such websites and uses them to rank websites in search results. However, it is important to remember that website performance is just one of many factors influencing rankings.

How to Resolve This Issue 

It is necessary to test the speed and usability of the website with special tools, such as Google’s PageSpeed Insights. Particular attention should be paid to the score of mobile devices since Google often uses the mobile version of the website for indexing purposes.

After identifying speed and usability problems, a website manager should take action to fix the most problematic areas. In particular, it is necessary to optimize images on pages, use modern image formats, remove unnecessary scripts so that the website loads faster, and use appropriate caching technologies.

In addition, it is important not to optimize all pages at once but to take a closer look at the performance of the most important pages, since they may have completely different characteristics from the rest of the website.

7. Your Website Has Weak Internal Linking

Internal links are an important aspect of building a website since they both help visitors find their way around the website and signal to search engines which pages are related to each other. Lack of internal linking will hinder crawling of the website by search spiders and worsen the visibility of the website in search results.

In addition, internal links allow important pages that require special attention to get more traffic. For example, an article on local keyword research can contain internal links to pages on local SEO services, local SEO keywords, and local SEO audits.

How to fix it

It is necessary to strengthen the internal linking of the website by following some recommendations:

• linking similar blog posts,
• linking similar articles or blog posts and pages with a common topic,
• using the right anchor text when linking internally,
• linking to relevant internal pages where it makes sense,
• linking important pages from the navigation menu or other relevant pages,
• looking for great resources that have few or no internal links pointing to them.

When choosing anchors for internal links, it is important to remember that they should indicate the topic of the destination page without being too long. It is also important to remember that internal linking should benefit the visitor by helping them navigate the site and find the information they need.

8. Your Website Has Few Quality Backlinks

Backlinks are a valuable source of traffic for a website, as well as an important ranking factor. They can come from many different sources, both directly and indirectly. A link from a well-known and high-quality website will allow a young website to appear in Google search results much faster.

However, a large number of low-quality backlinks or no-follow links will have the opposite effect and may significantly slow down the growth of a website’s rating. It is important to remember that each backlink should be analysed individually for quality and relevance.

How to Resolve This Issue 

It is necessary to attract backlinks of high quality to the website. Particular attention should be paid to backlinks coming from websites with a high rating. To do this, you can study competitors’ backlinks and identify the most relevant sources for your website.

In addition, you can distribute articles containing useful information on third-party websites, develop high-quality resources that other websites want to use, and provide high-quality content to relevant directories.

When analysing backlinks, it is important not to focus only on quantitative indicators but also on the quality of individual links. It is also important not to abuse the creation of backlinks since search engines will notice artificial methods of increasing the rating.

9. Your Website Is Not Optimised for Local Search

Local search is the process of finding relevant results based on the user’s location. Businesses that provide services in specific cities or suburbs need to optimize their websites for local searches for their services.

It is important to understand that local SEO is a type of regular SEO optimisation, and therefore all the tips described above apply to it. However, local keywords require special attention since searches in this segment are usually made using a service plus a location, for example, “web design agency Melbourne”.

How to fix it

It is necessary to optimise the website for local search with specific recommendations:

• developing service pages in accordance with the cities served,
• using local keywords in page titles, content, and headings,
• maintaining and filling out a Google Business Profile if applicable,
• collecting customer reviews if applicable,
• publishing useful articles on local SEO,
• linking local service and article pages with internal links.

When developing a website optimised for local search, it is important to use keywords that combine services with specific locations since this is the way users search for service providers in their area.

10. Competitors Have Better Content for Target Keywords

The number of websites offering similar services or products is usually high. Google will show the most relevant results for a particular query, which means that competition for ranking in search results is also high.

If competitors’ websites have high quality, extensive content, cover more topics, have a better structure, and provide users with greater value, a website with lower quality may struggle to appear in search results for these queries.

How to fix it

It is necessary to compare the content of the website with the content of competing websites for the keywords chosen for optimisation. Particular attention should be paid to the topics covered, the depth of the material, and the use of examples and cases. If the website has less useful information, it is necessary to revise and expand the content.

In addition, it is important to compare the structure of the pages, the use of internal linking, the relevance of supporting materials, the quality of backlinks, the reputation of the website, and other factors. Based on the results of the analysis, it is necessary to revise the page structure and improve the quality of the content.

11. Your Website Content Is Outdated

Content quality is a relative concept that extends beyond just text and website design. The relevance of the information contained, the correctness of the examples used, and the correspondence of the content to the current needs of the customers are also important factors.

In other words, content created two or three years ago may no longer be relevant and will need to be updated. On the other hand, some articles may contain outdated information, incorrect or misleading examples.

How to fix it

It is necessary to analyse website traffic using Google Search Console to find pages that used to perform well but are no longer doing so. It is important not to update content just for the sake of it if the content still serves its purpose well.

If possible, it is necessary to expand and revise the content of the pages, paying attention to questions that users ask and the problems that the page does not solve. Particular attention should be paid to outdated links or examples. In addition, it is important to carefully revise the headings and descriptions of the page and, if necessary, change them to more relevant ones.

If articles have lost their relevance due to completely changing topics of discussion, they should be deleted or revised to bring them up to date. In any case, content should always be improved to be more useful and relevant to the target audience.

12. You Are Not Tracking and Analysing Organic Traffic Data Correctly

There are many ways to measure and track organic traffic, including Google Search Console and Google Analytics. Each of these tools is important in its own way, but it is useful to combine the use of both to get an accurate picture of the traffic and its sources.

The problem may be in the absence of analysis or incorrect conclusions based on inaccurate information. A website manager must correctly interpret the results and draw the right conclusions about the performance of the website in search results.

How to fix it

The main tools for analysing organic traffic are Google Search Console and Google Analytics 4 (the new version of Universal Analytics). Google Search Console provides information on website indexing, average position in search results, clicks, impressions, and queries attracting traffic. This information can help determine which pages are performing well and what issues need to be addressed.

Google Analytics 4, on the other hand, contains information on website visitors, including organic search visitors. With the help of this tool, it is possible to track which landing pages attract visitors, how they behave on the website, what actions they take, and what conversions the website accumulates through organic search traffic.

When analysing traffic data, it is important to compare data for specific periods, for example, the last 28 days versus the previous 28 days. In addition, comparisons can be made with the same periods of the previous year if seasonality is a factor.

By comparing two consecutive periods, it becomes possible to identify trends: whether there has been an overall increase or decrease in traffic, or whether certain areas are performing worse than others.

It is important to remember that a decrease in impressions or clicks without an increase in traffic also indicates a problem that needs to be addressed. In addition, Google Search Console and Google Analytics 4 should not be used in isolation from each other but should complement each other in analysing traffic trends.

How Long Does It Take to Increase Organic Traffic?

Each website is unique, which means that there is no universal solution that would work for all sites. Ahrefs’ data suggests that on average, it takes about 12 months for a website to appear in search results and attract consistent organic traffic.

However, this factor also depends on how much optimization work is being done on the website. Some technical SEO issues can be resolved relatively quickly, but the overall visibility and ranking of the website in search results may take much longer.

A Practical Checklist to Improve Organic Traffic

If it is difficult to determine which of the 12 points described above applies to a particular case, it is useful to look at a checklist to identify the main problems.

• Check if pages are indexed and crawlable.
• Study traffic data in Google Search Console.
• Do keyword research for target terms.
• Align page content with search intent.
• Increase the quality of thin content.
• Fix major technical SEO issues.
• Optimise website speed and usability.
• Improve internal linking of important pages.
• Build a backlink-building strategy.
• Optimise the website for local search.
• Update expired but still useful content.

The first thing to do when improving traffic is to fix critical problems affecting important pages. If pages are not indexed, it does not make sense to immediately optimise the content since Google will not see the changes.

Conclusion: Turn Your Website into a Source of Organic Traffic

If a website is not getting organic traffic, there may be several reasons for this situation. Improving organic traffic involves working with keywords, content, technical aspects of the website, and measuring and analysing the results of optimisation.

By addressing these factors, businesses can attract more potential customers and ensure that their website appears in search results when users search for services related to the business.

IT Pyramid specialises in web development, digital marketing, SEO, graphics and design, and video animation. With the help of a professional website and high-quality content, IT Pyramid will ensure that its clients’ websites receive increased organic traffic and meet their customers’ needs.