Google’s Mueller: Don’t Overreact to Small Traffic Fluctuations

Source: Freepik_Free Photo _ Woman holding a Google icon

In a recent thread on Reddit, Mueller, Google’s Senior Search Analyst, put it into perspective for concerned users that fluctuations in website traffic are not a cause for alarm. In fact, he reminded users to keep things in perspective when looking at their site performance metrics.

The Question: Traffic Volatility

One concerned Reddit user thought the performance of his website was off, showing variance both in clicks and impressions. Many people get anxious like this and then start assuming every spike or fall is something to be concerned about.

Mueller replied with a reassuring message that “the clicks are just very small numbers, so any change by one or two will look like a big spike.” He referred to the mathematical concept described as the “Strong Law of Small Numbers,” quoting from Wikipedia, “There aren’t enough small numbers to meet the many demands made of them.”

What does this mean?

Mueller’s explanation in this direction would be that small changes show up disproportionately large when dealing with small numbers. If a website gets only a few visitors every day, then even one or two clicks may result in graph spikes or drops that look quite dramatic.

This already is less noticeable when larger numbers are used. As Mueller himself pointed out:

“You’ll note this is much less visible in impressions, partially because you’re looking at average values of 150’ish, where a handful more or less doesn’t trigger a big spike.”

Key Takeaways for Webmasters

Consider the Scale: Before freaking out about a sudden change in traffic, consider the actual numbers. A 50% drop might sound like something to be very worried about, but if that’s a change from 4 clicks to 2, it isn’t cause for alarm.

• Look for Long-Term Trends: Instead of obsessing over daily ups and downs, pay attention to longer-term trends. These are more likely to reflect real changes in the performance of your site.

• Context is Everything: Keep in mind that everything from seasonal cycles to breaking news can affect daily traffic. One day’s data in complete isolation rarely tells the whole story.

• Know that natural fluctuations happen and one should not be too alarmed with them; it is usually normal. Completely flat traffic rarely happens with smaller sites.

• Data is critical to the analysis of website performance, but much more important is how we think about that data. Overreacting to every little fluctuation can cause unnecessary stress and perhaps poorly thought out changes in strategy. 

Understanding Traffic Fluctuations: Beyond the Basics

The advice by Mueller lays a very good foundation, but there are other important factors in understanding the fluctuation of traffic.

The Psychology behind Traffic Fluctuations

The biggest challenge to interpreting data on traffic could be described as the human urge or tendency to seek patterns and explanations, even when no such patterns might exist. This is a psychological bias that may cause overreaction to small fluctuations, especially when such movements could actually fall within a range of statistical insignificance.

A data-driven approach, in this regard, includes the use of statistical methods to show meaningful trends and patterns by intuition. This would apply to the establishment of whether such traffic fluctuation is related to other variables, such as algorithm updates or seasonal changes, through correlation analysis.

The Role of Algorithm Updates

The algorithm is always changing at Google, and these changes sometimes have a huge impact on the website traffic. While one may never predict with certainty how an algorithm update could affect site traffic, knowing when major updates have occurred can help you identify possible causes of fluctuations in traffic.

Follow algorithm changes by keeping up with Google’s Search Central blog, as well as other industry news. If you happen to notice a spike in lost traffic around the time of an update, it may be worth looking into whether your site was affected.

Seasonal Patterns and Trends

This will reveal if traffic flows seasonally, during holiday seasons, or off seasons. Understanding such a pattern will go a long way in aiding your anticipation of these changes and planning for the same.

Use historical data to understand if there is seasonality in your traffic. It can also help you set realistic expectations and avoid false alarms when traffic changes at specific times of the year.

The Impact of External Factors

Other factors that may influence traffic to your website from external circles include news events, economic conditions, and competitor activity. The result could be a short-term peak or trough in traffic due to major news events or an economic crisis.

Keep tabs on current happenings and changes within your industry that may affect your target audience. This may help you understand unexpected ups and downs in your flow of traffic and adjust your marketing strategy accordingly.

Technical SEO and Traffic Fluctuation

Other factors of technical SEO include website speed, being mobile-friendly, and correct indexing. A slow, non-mobile-friendly, or badly indexed website will witness inferior levels of traffic.

Regularly audit your website’s technical SEO to identify and fix issues that may hurt your traffic. Tools like Google Search Console have great insights into how your site is performing and help you identify technical SEO problems.

Content Quality and Relevance

It all begins with quality, relevant content. Aside from the fact that your content is going to be irrelevant, poorly written, or outdated, it simply will not perform as well organically. Create and curate always new, high-value content that answers the needs and piques the interest of your audience. This helps improve your organic search ranking and results in additional website traffic.

User Experience and Engagement

A good user experience will help one keep the visitors on your website and make them visit it more frequently. Different user experiences can be caused by aspects such as the design, navigation, and loading speed of the websites.

You may look out to create a website with a smooth design in the user interface that is mesmerizing and easy to navigate, so it opens up fast, all to enhance user engagement with your website and lower the rate of bounces.

Building Backlinks

Backlinks are links from other websites to your website. And they can help your search engine rankings and drive more traffic.

Invest time in building high-quality backlinks from authoritative sites. This can be achieved through guest blogging, content marketing, and other outreach efforts.

Paid Advertising and Traffic Fluctuations

Paid advertising can indeed be an excellent way to drive traffic to your website. However, you really need to understand how this may affect the organic traffic. Heavier reliance on paid advertising can mean that organic traffic may fluctuate any time a change is made to the advertising budget or campaigns.

Develop a well-balanced approach toward organic and paid search. This will help you get a consistent flow of traffic even when your paid advertising changes.

Conclusion

While any fluctuation in the traffic could be a cause for concern for a webmaster, it would always be wise to know why this is happening and take the necessary precautions beforehand to avoid this vicious circle. This article guides you on how you can have a better, well-informed approach to handling your website’s traffic.

Sources:

• https://www.searchenginejournal.com/google-on-when-not-to-worry-about-traffic-fluctuations/526780/
• https://www.brickmarketing.com/blog/website-traffic-fluctuate.htm
• https://digitaldriven.in/google-on-when-not-to-worry-about-traffic-fluctuations/
• https://support.google.com/analytics/troubleshooter/7480067?hl=en

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