How long did you wait for a new site to rank in top 3 for the main keywords

[nvc]

Hello everybody,
I've started very niche website targeting low volume keywords. Competition is serious but not so much. The main problem is with the so called "parasite SEO" where the big newspapers are trying to make money from gambling. My site is 9 months old and I am still not ranking in top 3 for the main keywords. Yes, I am on first page at the end despite having more quality backlinks than my competitors. When do you think I will get out of the Sandbox and start ranking next to the others.
How many months did you wait for your new websites to rank well?
Thanks

[vanq]

Your question is very trick, because each market is different and has challenges that vary. Based on what you said, there are big sites ranking and indeed this is something hard to beat because they have authority, although are not focused on gambling. I would suggest that you compare your content to theirs and try to understand if perhaps there are topics you don´t have in yours. Or, analyze the SERP, see if there is a featured snippet chance, as well as add tables, bullet links and other elements to your content to get some rich snippets, in a way your site can be highlighted.

For a site that is 9 months old, being on first page is already a very positive milestone.

[wonderpunter]

depends on the keywords.. depends on the quality of your site and content, btw 2-3 years would be norm for hig competition keywords

[Cash Bonus]

As wonderpunter said, you need to rank for quality of keywords and content on your sites. It took me over a year to actually start seeing some good results. I'm struggling at the moment, though.

[chaumi]

Started to type an answer, and realised Vanq has pretty much said it.

Without seeing the site and through a wild guess (and ofc I could be wrong), my bet here will be your site isn't covering the subject well enough - either to satisfy searcher intent or search engine requirements to meet that intent.

If you don't know how to do what Vanq suggested to the best effect, hit me up and I'll explain.


PS "or search engine requirements to meet that intent"

In those few words lies a thousand elements. You may be able to improve some and rank higher on low-competition keywords, for more competitive, you probably need to meet a lot more of them. And the ones you'll never resolve are those outside of your 'control' (example - why G favours the newspaper pages) until that situation changes.


PPS Time is largely irrelevant. You cannot base any ranking positions or performance on a specified measure of time other than (in theory) a site becomes naturally more trusted over time (if you populate it effectively and various other 'authority' signals take effect). If your site structure and pages are perfect already, then it's likely other factors are playing their part in keeping you down, or there are other signals you're not giving off.

[baldidiot]

Unfortunately there is no set time until you rank, it relies on loads of factors. Tbh it might never rank in the top 3. We've also seen sites rank in 6 months. As a random stab in the dark I'd say it takes a good two years to really get a site established from scratch.

Bear in mind also that seo is a zero sum game. It's not just about what you do, it's about what others do as well. There's only 10 spots on that first page...

[nvc]

Thanks all for your answers.
I know there are a lot of factors that affect SERP and know that it's also important what other sites are doing. But let's say that I am doing everything perfect (great content, all of the topics are covered, quality backlinks, social signals, internal links are made perfect), then when should I expect to get our of the Sandbox and my site to have no filters. We all know that Google don't rank well new sites and after year or 2 the site starts to rank much better.
I am seeing very positive signals so I think that I am on the right way - impressions are increasing, clicks are slowly increasing, average position is dropping but I guess it's because of the new keywords. I just wanted to hear how other new sites are ranking.

Regards

[chaumi]

I think this is partly the problem :

"when should I expect to get out of the Sandbox and my site to have no filters"

First you don't know you're in a 'sandbox' and have 'filters' applied. No one outside the algorithm developers would know that (and even they may not)

So it's basically unanswerable to any real level that will help. The closest you might get is for someone with a similarly structured site targeting similar-level keywords in the same or similar geos to comment on their experience, and because of all the myriad influences that might be affecting those sites and yours, the info would be pretty much useless other than possibly a very loose indicator.

[baldidiot]

No one outside the algorithm developers would know that (and even they may not)

Bit of a random sidenote, but your comment made me think of something Matt Cutt once said in one of his videos - no one knows the full algorithm (or rather, the sum of the algorithms), not even at google. There's teams that work on different bits and they all plug in to form the results, but there's no one person or department that has an overview of the whole thing.

[chaumi]

Yeah that's why I said "and even they may not". The theory that no one person would know the whole workings seems logical - too much money involved. Just imagine!

[NoDepositCasinos]

It's difficult to say because it depends on a variety of factors, some of which are beyond your control.

However, I believe that two years is a reasonable estimate, and the results you've achieved in just nine months are impressive. Personally, I would focus more on my site's impressions, clicks, and conversions rather than its positioning.

[CasinoComparador]

From my experience, you cannot set a time frame. You have to work on a daily basis, trying to follow the way inch by inch. Check if your domain rating is growing and DONT think you are "perfect". There is always a room for improvement.

For instance, nowadays you could push your "E-EAT" creating strong author profiles, showing your expertise and giving Google signals of your experience.

At the end of the day, the competence is hugh and a new site has to do better things than the ones you see in the industry right now... so you have to be innovative and trying to do things in a better way than the top ranked sites.

Patience and work, that's the only receipt.

[Irene_C]

I also agree with Vanq.

For such a young site you are definetly rocking!

But yes, iI would try to have a broader view, and rather than focusing on keyword would expand on user painpoints and try to address them, so as Vanq was saying is there anything your competitors are doing diffirently?

I think we are really used to thik about keywords but a site that is built ensuring user experience goes beyond and above keywords ranking.

[PaulEchere]

Time is probably not the most significant thing here - a website can be around for 10 years and stay on the 20th page unless it is being consistently worked on and improved.

Here's an example that I can share from my experience - a website that I started a bit over a year ago in an oversaturated and an extremely competitive niche niche had 0 traffic for the 1 year.

I did not invest any funds into link building at that point. However I was consistently (not as often as I should have though) publishing content and targeting different keywords that I thought had potential. As mentioned, the niche and geo are oversaturated (as well as quite profitable) so 29 out of 30 KWs I targeted didn't have any success. Eventually I stumbled on 1 that did, with the niche and geo being profitable - it imediately started making some money. I then used that money to work on link building, so things started picking up quicker.
tldr: the more shots you take - the more chances you have to hit the target.

PS: probably it might not be worth the effort to focus on some keywords that have been dominated for many years by older and more reputable websites, there's probably a better way to put that time to good use.

[Stanpopz]

Depends on the top 10 what kind of sites are there, you may never start to rank

[yesindeed]

Out of experience, I had a chance to rank first for a very competitive phrase in just a few weeks after the page was up. I was quite shocked when I saw 25k visits in a week from that phrase. Had no backlinks, no internal links. I will never understand how search engines work.

Now I am busting my butt to rank in the third page...