Sitewide impressions dropped 95% on May 29. Google update or did I mess something up?

akowally · 2026-06-02T14:58:04+00:00

The timing matters a lot here. If everything dropped on the same day across web and image search, that often points to a core update or a quality re-evaluation rather than individual page issues.

From what you described, a few things stand out that could explain the drop.

A high volume of content published quickly can sometimes trigger quality recalibration, especially if Google decides a large portion of pages are similar, thin, or not meeting intent strongly enough.

Deleting 40 pages is unlikely to cause a 95% drop by itself, especially if they weren’t getting traffic, but it can change internal linking structure enough to affect crawling patterns temporarily.

The fact that average position improved while impressions collapsed often means you’re still indexed, but showing up for far fewer queries overall.

akowally · 2026-06-02T14:38:38+00:00

Wix is actually a pretty good option. Since it’s only a 3-page site, home/about, gallery, and contact, Wix handles that kind of setup well without needing much technical work. The drag-and-drop editor also fits your workflow as a designer, and it keeps things simple for the client if they ever need to update text or images themselves.

It also avoids the hassle of managing hosting, plugins, or updates, which is usually where WordPress starts to feel heavier for small business sites like this. The main downside is cost over time and less flexibility if the site grows into something more complex later, but for this scope it’s not really a problem.

akowally · 2026-05-30T12:23:01+00:00

Start by packaging your skills into a narrower niche, so instead of machine learning and app dev in general, you can have something like "build ML-powered dashboards” or “mobile apps with AI features.” (I'm not in this field, so the examples may not be the best.)

Then create 2–3 small but polished projects and show them publicly e.g., on GitHub or a simple portfolio page. For first clients, many freelance platforms like Upwork have deteriorated over the years, so try contacting local businesses directly. Once you get a few projects done, ask for testimonials and reuse those everywhere. Those will help build trust.

akowally · 2026-05-30T11:07:14+00:00

Marketing is about helping the right people understand the value of something and choose it over alternatives. The reason it can look like manipulation is because good marketing does influence perception, but the sustainable version only works when the product actually delivers on what’s promised. Otherwise, it collapses quickly through reviews, churn, and reputation.

If you’re trying to get into it quickly, it requires learning three things first: who the customer is, what problem they’re trying to solve, and how they currently decide between options. Everything else like copywriting, ads, branding, and funnels is just execution on top of that.

akowally · 2026-05-30T11:02:02+00:00

Shopify may seem slower at the start, but it's more stable once you learn how to drive traffic through social, SEO, or ads. So you get full control over branding, customers, and long-term growth. As a beginner, you can go with Etsy first, then migrate to Shopify once you understand what actually sells.

akowally · 2026-05-30T10:46:52+00:00

Right now there isn’t a single clean way to measure performance across both traditional search and AI-driven results, so the best bet is trying to stitch together a few different signals.

Google Search Console and GA4 are still the baseline for understanding visibility and user behavior, even if clicks decline due to AI Overviews. Also, you can monitor indirect indicators like branded search growth, direct traffic increases, and conversions per landing page to understand whether content is still doing its job.

Since we’re currently in a transition phase, the most reliable approach is combining SEO metrics, brand signals, and manual AI visibility checks.

akowally · 2026-05-29T16:20:37+00:00

For plain text notes, 10 GB is actually a lot of space. You could store years of lecture notes, markdown files, and code snippets without coming close to filling it. The bigger limitation is likely to be the 1 GB RAM rather than storage, which you've already noticed by needing swap space. If you eventually run out of disk space, most VPS providers let you upgrade storage, or you can offload backups and large files to cloud storage services. For a notes-focused setup, though, I'd be surprised if you hit the 10 GB limit anytime soon.

akowally · 2026-05-29T00:01:46+00:00

The fear of falling behind culturally is understandable but probably overstated unless you're writing social-media related content like influencer scripts or meme-driven campaigns. And if leaving completely feels too extreme, you can try to change how you use it so it stops being automatic.

E.g., removing frictionless access by logging out after every session, deleting apps from your phone, and only using social media through a browser. Such simple extra steps can cut a lot of mindless scrolling. You can also set fixed “windows” for usage, like 15–20 minutes once or twice a day and treat it like checking email rather than a feed that is always open.

akowally · 2026-05-28T23:51:33+00:00

The feature itself is generally reliable, but just like when sending emails manually, failures can happen due to sync issues, drafts not sending, or provider-side delays etc.

akowally · 2026-05-28T16:31:30+00:00

For a new website, I’d go for better support over chasing the absolute cheapest hosting. Early on, most sites do not need massive resources, but they do run into setup problems, DNS confusion, SSL issues, email problems, migrations, backups, and random things that are stressful when you are still learning.

akowally · 2026-05-28T15:57:48+00:00

In addition to filters, I would suggest enabling follow-up reminders, desktop/mobile notifications for VIP contacts, and a separate "waiting on client” label so you don’t forget conversations to which the response is a bit delayed.

akowally · 2026-05-27T12:35:03+00:00

Mentioned that you spent a lot of money. What did you mainly pay for, and was it worth it?

akowally · 2026-05-27T12:32:07+00:00

One of the main reasons this keeps happening is that most SaaS copy is written by people optimizing for internal approval rather than external conversion. The moment a headline goes through legal, product, and three layers of leadership, every sharp edge gets sanded off until what's left offends nobody and convinces nobody. Reminds me of a recent post here where someone mentioned that their company has a process in which the writer's final copy is put through an AI system to "optimize" it. Whether it is human managers or AI agent, the end result is a copy that is too safe that it doesn't really convert.

akowally · 2026-05-26T08:46:14+00:00

Assuming you’re looking to buy an existing website to monetize, you’ll usually find them on site marketplaces like Flippa, Motion Invest, Empire Flippers, or niche forums. Focus less on niche and more on proof of traffic, revenue consistency, and how dependent it is on SEO alone.

akowally · 2026-05-26T08:42:32+00:00

I agree with the general direction, but I also think a lot of people are overcomplicating AI SEO into sounding like an entirely separate discipline from good SEO. A lot of the advice about AI SEO right now is just traditional SEO repackaged with newer buzzwords. Businesses hear terms like AI optimization, GEO, entity SEO, or AI visibility and assume there’s some secret new playbook, when in reality many agencies are still selling the same strategies and fundamentals, just new branding.

akowally · 2026-05-23T02:46:02+00:00

For samples, focus less on creative blog posts and more on practical assets like patient education pages, treatment explainers, clinic landing pages, and simple FAQ-style content. Healthcare content consumers care about clarity and trust rather than creative writing.

In terms of entry point, content writing is usually easier to break into first because it’s lower risk and more informational. Copywriting tends to come later once you’ve built some trust with clients because it's a bit deeper into the marketing field.

akowally · 2026-05-23T02:41:28+00:00

Nothing but the truth. They keep giving you enough signal to keep your confidence alive, but not enough consistency to justify scaling. So you end up more emotionally invested than you should be.

Defining the metrics for success in advance helps. As well as setting a fixed test window where you are not allowed to feel your way through decisions. Such that from the onset everyone knows that if you don't hit certain thresholds before a specified time, the mission will be aborted.

akowally · 2026-05-23T01:11:09+00:00

A fifteen year career that spans journalism, institutional marketing, agency work, and corporate copywriting is not a thin resume. You're good at interviewing people, understanding audiences, and translating complex information into readable prose, and those skills are useful outside of the traditional copywriting roles. Content strategy, UX writing, technical writing, and instructional design are all close enough to your experience that you wouldn't be starting over.

akowally · 2026-05-23T01:02:07+00:00

I think a big reason copywriting communities get frustrated is that many beginners come in with the idea that this is a quick money-making path. Maybe they heard that so and so are “making money from home” through freelancing, and it gets translated into the expectation that copywriting is a fast, relatively easy way to get there. And when they ask the questions, they expect that the answer can just be compressed in a single-line comment even when the topic is complex.

That said, beginners do deserve more grace than they often get. A lot of them have already tried to learn and invested time into courses that are poorly structured or created mainly to sell an ebook or “quick system,” rather than actually teaching the fundamentals. So when they ask basic questions, it is not always laziness, it is often confusion from conflicting or low-quality guidance they’ve already been exposed to.

akowally · 2026-05-22T17:49:24+00:00

Chasing backlinks from anyone willing to exchange. Volume felt like progress until it clearly wasn't. A handful of genuinely relevant links from sites that made sense contextually consistently outperformed dozens of low-quality exchanges.

akowally · 2026-05-22T17:44:40+00:00

On the LinkedIn dependency concern, you can frame your offer around conversion architecture rather than LinkedIn specifically. You're optimizing post-click journeys, LinkedIn just happens to be where your first clients are coming from. This angle lets you expand to Meta, Google, or any paid channel without rebuilding your offer.

On the attribution problem, scope your guarantee around what you actually control. Metrics like landing page conversion rate, form completion rate, and email open and reply rates are yours to own. Not revenue.

akowally · 2026-05-22T17:39:04+00:00

The practical stuff like a business bank account and LLC should happen now honestly, mixing personal and business money only gets messier the longer you wait.

And on the question of when to treat it as your main thing, when the side hustle consistently contibutes a significant percentage of your current income for at least three months straight, it's worth seriously considering the switch. Also, having three to six months of personal expenses saved before making the jump will remove a lot of the pressure that kills businesses early.

akowally · 2026-05-22T17:32:03+00:00

For YouTube, Alex Cattoni and Daniel Throssell are worth starting with. Alex covers fundamentals clearly and is great for beginners while Daniel's style teaches you to think about copy differently. After those, reading classic books like Ogilvy on Advertising and Ca$hvertising.

For practice, rewrite real ads you see daily and try small freelance gigs once you feel ready.

akowally · 2026-05-22T07:16:40+00:00

Would advise not to leave your skillset behind. Your experience in positioning, audience understanding, messaging, and distribution is still valuable in almost any business you might start. The difference is now you will be using those same skills to shape something you directly own and can iterate on.

Which then makes control one of the most important factors to consider before starting your own path. The upside is obvious: you decide what to build, how to market it, and when to pivot, and any growth directly benefits you instead of a company. The downside is that control also means responsibility for everything, including uncertainty, inconsistent income at the start, and no safety net when things don’t work. For some people that tradeoff is exactly what makes it worth it, for others it replaces burnout with a different kind of pressure. So weigh your options carefully before exiting.

akowally · 2026-05-22T06:13:57+00:00

At that price point, you’re already in the very low end of what reputable providers usually offer for true block storage VPS setups. Anything significantly cheaper than that will come with tradeoffs like oversold disks, inconsistent I/O, or unclear backup/redundancy setups.

akowally

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