How to Prevent Pogo-sticking for SEO

It’s important to prevent pogo-sticking for SEO reasons.

To sum it up, pogo-sticking is when a user searches for a term on Google (or another search engine), goes to a website listed on the results page, and then quickly presses back and moves on to another listing on the search results page.

It’s not to be confused with bounce rate. Bounce rate isn’t an SEO factor for Google and others, but pogo-sticking is.

So, you want to make sure you prevent pogo-sticking for SEO as much as you can, and in this article, I’m going to break down how you can do that.

Why you should prevent pogo-sticking for SEO

You should prevent it because it makes your content look unqualified for the keyword you’re trying to rank for.

If someone is looking for information for a specific term and your website comes up as a provider, it better provides that information.

In the old days of SEO, people would keyword stuff to the point that they would try to rank content for multiple search terms. Eventually, Google and others caught on and adjusted their algorithms to penalize websites that practiced that sort of thing.

Fast-forward to the modern day, and you now must ensure you provide per the terms you’re targeting with your content; otherwise, pogo-sticking might occur, and your content could be ranked less for your targeted keywords.

If you want people to take your content seriously, you must ensure it delivers what it promises.

How to Prevent Pogo-Sticking

It’s simple, really.

You can prevent pogo-sticking for SEO purposes by structuring your content and having a strategy.

Whatever terms you’re targeting, you must ensure you deliver that content to the viewer.

But that’s not the only thing you need to do.

Put your best content first, in summary, to solve a problem fast. People want answers quickly these days. If they don’t get that with your content, they’ll hit the back button and go elsewhere. And Google sees that, and it can hurt your rankings but you’re content isn’t penalized for it.

Now you likely want to keep people on your websites for as long as possible, right?

That’s understandable. You should still solve the problem at the start or answer the users’ questions but tell a story to keep them on your content.

Summarize the answer for them but keep them reading with storytelling to learn the full information about the term they’ve searched for.

How I Prevent Pogo-sticking with my Hiking Guides (Copy my system!)

On my hiking brand, Hiking with Shawn, I post “Trail Guides,” which provide detailed information about each trail in my area.

If you search for a particular trail in my area, you’ll get a lot of listings. The listings will be my websites, the government page for the trail, All Trails, and other trail sites. So, the user has multiple options of where to get the trail information they’re looking for.

I want to prevent pogo-sticking for SEO purposes by ensuring they get all the information they desire from my guides versus all the rest.

So, I take the time to research each guide from the other websites and take notes on the information they prove.

I then provide the same information but in my own words. Then I add interesting and useful information that none of the other search results include in their content. I provide the basic information that everyone else provides, plus more.

Quality matters, but the placement of content also matters. They need to get their answer quickly. Sum it up at the start and explain it thoroughly throughout the rest of your content.

And that sums up this article. Follow the advice above to prevent pogo-sticking for SEO, and you should start seeing better search results. If you’ve enjoyed this article and would like to see more like it, be sure to follow me on Twitter for more tips.

About the Author

Shawn Gossman has created content, blogged, ran online communities, and shared a passion for digital marketing for over twenty years. Shawn believes the best way to help content creators, businesses, brands, and marketers is to give away more than you sell. The same advice is recommended for the readers who follow this blog. Shawn also offers various services for extra help in content creation and blogging.