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A featured WebmasterWorld thread has a webmaster who is upset that although he has remained the number one ranking for a competitive term in Google for 8 years or so, he has seen his click-through rate from Google dwindle down and down as time goes on.
He said, over the years he first noticed AdWords ads push down his organic listings. Now, he is not only being pushed down by AdWords but also by the Google local listings (Google Places). You also often have Google Shopping results push down listings as well.
His CTR has dropped and that number one listing has become worth a tiny fraction of it was once worth. The webmaster said, "I'm surprised on how useless the organic result become so fast."
Tedster shares some interesting data, one from AOL's data leak in 2006 and one from Chikita's recent report:
- The 2006 AOL click rate for #2 was 3.5 times less than #1
- The 2010 Chitika click rate for #2 was 2.0 times less than #1
But Martinibuster tries to see what can be done to help the webmaster, he said:
So here is one way to deal with a specific situation that may or may not relate to the OP. If the phrase is directly or indirectly related to products, but it's not an explicitly buy type of phrase (example: cheap widgets), then I can almost guarantee you that those advertisers are bottom feeding that phrase and it may be possible to push them out.
Has your number one listing become less valuable over the years? What are you doing about it? Buying adds, doing local, adding shopping feeds or blog entries?
