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Technically, not even kidding, I went through and cleaned up a bunch of junk pages, trimmed some thin posts, fixed a few internal links, and now my main money pages are just bleeding. Could be coincidence, but it’s always the same story with Google, right? I’m seeing impressions still there on some terms, but clicks are basically dead. One page that was hanging around page 2 just vanished. Another one bounced back for a day and then dropped again. Makes zero sense. Anyone else had this happen after pruning stuff? I’m starting to think touching anything on a site just wakes up the algo and it starts acting weird for a week or two.
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Yeah, I’ve seen that after pruning more times than I can count. Usually it’s not the cleanup itself so much as Google getting twitchy when you change a bunch of URLs/internal paths at once. If you killed thin stuff and moved links around, it can take a bit for the crawl signals to settle back down. The “impressions still there, clicks dead” thing is especially annoying, but that doesn’t always mean the page is actually gone — sometimes it’s just sitting in a weird holding pattern. That said, if a money page vanished after the cleanup, I’d be looking hard at: – did it lose internal links? – did any of the junk pages actually pass some accidental relevance? – did you change titles/H1s at the same time? – any canonicals/noindex weirdness from the cleanup? I’ve had sites where a “clean” prune looked smart on paper and then traffic dipped for 2-3 weeks before stabilizing. And I’ve had one where it never really recovered until I put a couple of those links back. Google’s real consistent about being annoying, I’ll give it that.
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Yeah, pruning can absolutely do that for a bit. I’ve had pages look fine in GSC and then just fall off a cliff for no obvious reason after cleanup. The annoying part is you never really know if Google’s just reprocessing the mess or if you accidentally cut some dumb little internal path that was propping up the money page. Sometimes it comes back in a week, sometimes it doesn’t. Google loves making it look like a “quality improvement” when it’s really just chaos. If you changed links + trimmed pages + touched titles all at once, good luck figuring out which bit pissed it off.
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Yeah, that’s usually the part nobody wants to hear — once you’ve got a bunch of pages shifting around, Google can take a while to stop wobbling. If the money pages lost internal support even a little, that can absolutely show up as “still indexed, but dead.” I’ve seen that more than once after pruning. Not always instant either, which is the fun part 🙄 I’d be checking logs / crawl stats before assuming it’s just a temporary tantrum. If Googlebot’s hitting the cleaned-up areas a lot and not reweighting the important pages yet, you can get that weird limbo for a bit.
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Yeah, pruning can do that, but I wouldn’t jump straight to “Google hates cleanup” either. If you killed off a bunch of junk pages, it’s pretty common to see a short-term wobble while the internal signals settle. The bigger thing is whether those money pages lost crawl paths / link equity or got their surrounding topical cluster thinned out. That’s usually where the damage is. I’d be more worried if the page that vanished was already borderline and the cleanup removed the last bit of support holding it up. Google can be annoyingly sensitive to that stuff.
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Yeah, I’ve had that exact “cleaned up the site and everything got worse” thing happen more than once. Could be just the usual Google wobble, but honestly it’s hard not to think it’s punishing you for touching anything. I’ve seen pages come back after a week or two, and I’ve also seen stuff just quietly never recover because the internal linking got a little too “tidy” and the money pages got less juice. If the impressions are still there but clicks are dead, that’s the part that annoys me most. Feels like the pages are still hanging around in the index but Google’s basically decided they’re not worth showing properly. Classic nonsense.
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Yeah, I’ve seen that after pruning. Usually it’s not some mystical “cleanup penalty,” it’s more like you removed a bunch of the quiet scaffolding and the money pages lost context / internal support. What I’d check first is logs and internal crawl paths, not impressions in GSC. If Googlebot’s still hitting the money pages but the surrounding cluster got thinned out, that lines up pretty well with “still indexed, worse rankings.” If you also changed canonicals, redirects, or accidentally orphaned anything, that’s where it gets ugly fast. The part where a page pops back for a day and then drops again is pretty normal Google nonsense, honestly. Doesn’t mean much by itself. I’d want to know if the page lost links from the pages you trimmed, or if those junk pages were carrying more topical relevance than they looked like. That happens more than people want to admit. If you did a big cleanup all at once, I’d typically stop touching it for a bit unless you find a clear mistake. Otherwise you just keep mixing signals and never know what actually caused the drop.
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Personally, personally, yeah, that’s the part that always makes me side-eye these cleanups. I’ve had sites where pruning obvious junk helped, and I’ve had others where the “cleaner” version just bled for a couple weeks because the money pages lost all the messy little support pages around them. Google seems to love acting like it’s “settling” when really it’s just reacting to a bunch of signals you changed at once. If impressions are still there but clicks died, that usually smells more like ranking/placement weirdness than a total deindexing thing. The page 2 one vanishing and then bouncing back for a day is annoyingly normal too. Not saying it’s fine, just saying it doesn’t automatically mean you broke the site. I’d be looking at whether you nuked any pages that were internally feeding those money pages more than you thought. That’s usually where the damage is. From what I see,
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To be fair, sure. Yeah, that “Google’s punishing me for cleaning my room” thing is annoyingly familiar. Half the time it’s not even the prune itself, it’s the weird little support stuff you didn’t think mattered until it’s gone. Then the money pages just sit there like dead fish. I’d be suspicious of anything that changed internal paths or took away a bunch of contextual links. Google loves pretending it’s smarter than that, but it’s usually just reacting to the mess you made. Could be wrong though. Sure.
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Kind of feels like yeah, welcome to the fun part of “site cleanup” where Google acts like you kicked its dog. I’ve had pruning help, but I’ve also had it torch traffic for a bit cause the junk pages were doing more work than they looked like Honestly,. If you changed internal links and cut thin stuff all at once, I wouldn’t assume it’s some penalty thing — more likely you yanked a bunch of supporting signals and now the money pages are floating around with less context. That page 2 → gone → back for a day thing is classic nonsense too. I’d stop touching it for a bit unless you know you broke a canonical/redirect/orphan situation. Otherwise you just keep feeding the machine more chaos. Sure. Okay then.
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In my opinion, yeah, I’d be a lot more suspicious of the cleanup than “Google woke up angry for no reason.” If you pulled a bunch of junk pages at once, especially with internal link changes, you can absolutely mess with how the money pages get seen for a bit. Doesn’t mean you’re doomed, but I wouldn’t hand-wave it as pure coincidence either. That page 2 → gone → back → gone thing is the kind of garbage I’ve seen when the site’s signals got shifted around too much. Annoying as hell, but not exactly rare. I’d leave it alone for a while and stop making little tweaks every day.
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Yeah, I’d bet money the cleanup shifted the support structure more than anything else. I’ve seen this a bunch — prune a pile of junk, fix some links, and suddenly the “important” pages lose a bunch of the little internal signals they were leaning on. Google doesn’t exactly handle that gracefully. I’d give it some time and not keep fiddling with it every day.
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From what I see, Yeah, that’s usually the part people hand-wave and then act surprised when traffic gets weird. I’ve seen cleanup nuke a site for a bit just because the “junk” was propping up the rest of it more than anyone wanted to admit. Internal links especially — you trim a bunch of crap and suddenly the money pages aren’t getting the same crawl path / topical nonsense / whatever Google was using. I wouldn’t call it a penalty unless you actually broke something. More likely you shifted the whole damn structure and now it’s wobbling. If it were me I’d stop touching it for a while and see if it settles. Constant tweaks after a prune usually just make the mess last longer.
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Yeah, I’d still blame the cleanup before I blame some mystical Google mood swing. I’ve had a couple sites do the same thing after pruning. Usually it’s not the “junk” pages themselves, it’s the links and crawl paths you accidentally took out with them. Money pages can look fine on the surface and still lose a bunch of the weak internal support they were leaning on. The impressions-with-no-clicks part is the annoying bit though. That usually smells like ranking shuffling / snippet weirdness / intent mismatch more than a straight deindex. If a page was hanging around page 2 and then vanished, I’d check whether it’s still getting crawled and whether it got pushed down by something fresher or just lost internal prominence. Honestly, I’d stop touching it for a bit. Every time people start “fixing” it again right after a prune, they just keep stirring the pot.
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Yeah, that “impressions still there / clicks dead” thing is the part that makes me think something got reweighted, not just “content got worse.” I’ve seen cleanup do that too, but usually because the site was leaning on junk pages more than it looked like. Google’s annoyingly good at using the mess as part of the system, then when you remove it everything shifts for a bit. I’d typically stop poking it for now, honestly. Every extra tweak after a prune just makes it harder to tell what actually caused the drop.
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Yeah, that sounds like a cleanup side effect to me, not some random “Google woke up angry” thing. I’ve seen the same pattern when a site was quietly propped up by a bunch of crap pages and weak internal paths. You remove that stuff and suddenly the money pages aren’t getting the same crawl frequency or internal weight, even if they didn’t change much themselves. The “impressions still there, clicks dead” bit usually means the page is still in the mix but it’s not holding position cleanly anymore. What I’d check first is whether you nuked any links that were basically doing more work than they looked like. Also worth looking at crawl logs or at least GSC crawl stats if you’ve got them, because sometimes the page is still indexed but getting visited less often, and then it starts drifting. Page 2 -> gone -> back for a day -> gone again is very “re-evaluation / reweighting” behavior, not necessarily a hard penalty. If you already did the cleanup, I’d honestly stop touching it for a bit. Every little follow-up tweak after a prune just makes it harder to tell what actually caused the wobble.
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Yeah, that’s pretty much the classic cleanup mess. Not saying the prune caused it *directly*, but if you cut enough junk, the site can definitely wobble for a bit while Google reassigns whatever little weight was being passed around. The “impressions still there, clicks dead” part is usually the annoying sign. I’d stop touching it for now. Every extra tweak just muddies the water more.
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Usually, in my opinion, in my opinion, Yeah, I’ve had that happen. Cleanups can absolutely shake shit loose for a bit, especially if the site was leaning on junk pages more than you thought. The part that’d bug me is the page 2 -> gone -> back -> gone dance. That usually isn’t “content suddenly got worse,” it’s Google thrashing…
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Personally, yeah, that’s not crazy. I’ve seen cleanups do that too, especially if some of those “junk” URLs were quietly feeding crawl paths or just keeping the site’s internal graph a bit denser than it looked on paper. The annoying part is you can’t really tell from GSC alone whether it’s just reprocessing or you actually cut off something useful. If the money pages lost a bunch of internal links, even “low value” ones, that can be enough to make them wobble for a while. Google seems to recalc that stuff in bursts instead of smoothly, which is why you get the page 2 / vanished / brief rebound nonsense. I’d be looking at: – internal link counts before/after – whether any old URLs were getting real impressions and got 301’d/404’d – crawl stats for the money pages – if the canonical / noindex setup changed anywhere by accident And honestly, if you just finished pruning, stop messing with it for a bit. Every extra tweak right after a cleanup just makes the whole thing harder to read. Google already acts weird enough without us helping it 😒 From what I see,
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Realistically, yeah, I’d be a lot more suspicious of the cleanup than “Google just being weird” tbh. I’ve seen this exact dumb pattern when a site was propped up by junk pages more than anyone wanted to admit. Cut enough of that crap and suddenly the money pages don’t have the same support anymore, then Google starts flailing around for a bit. I wouldn’t touch it again right now. Let it settle or you’re just feeding the mess. Honestly,
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I mean, from what I see, Yeah, I wouldn’t just hand-wave it as “Google being weird” either, but I also wouldn’t panic yet. If you cut a bunch of pages and trimmed links, it can absolutely mess with how the site hangs together for a bit. The part that matters is whether those pages were actually doing anything useful or just looking ugly in a crawl report. Google doesn’t exactly give you a clean read on that. I’d check the obvious stuff first: did any of the removed pages have links pointing into the money pages, and did any of those URLs used to pull impressions? If you 404’d or redirected a chunk of stuff and the internal linking got thinner, that’s enough to make pages wobble. The page 2 -> gone -> back -> gone thing usually looks more like reprocessing / recalcing than “this page is dead forever.” Also, if you changed canonicals, noindex, or even just moved templates around while cleaning, that’s where I’d be suspicious. Been burned by that before. Thought I was just pruning junk and ended up making a bunch of pages look less important than they were. Honestly though, if the cleanup was recent, I’d stop touching it for a while. Every extra tweak just muddies the water. If it’s still ugly after a couple weeks, then yeah, start comparing before/after internal links and crawl data.
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I mean, yeah, I’d be suspicious of the cleanup too. The “impressions still there but clicks dead” part is the annoying bit — that usually smells like ranking wobble / reprocessing, not a clean drop-off. I’ve had pages do the exact page 2 -> gone -> back for a day -> gone thing after pruning too much stuff around them. Honestly, if you cut a bunch of internal paths and some of those junk URLs were still doing more than they looked like, Google can get weird for a bit. Doesn’t mean the site’s doomed, just means it’s probably re-evaluating the whole mess and doing its usual stupid bursty thing. That’s how I look at it.
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Yeah, I’ve had that happen. Not every time, but enough times that I don’t really trust a “cleanup” to be neutral anymore. The annoying part is it can look exactly like you described — impressions hanging around, clicks falling off a cliff, one page disappearing and then teasing you for a day like Google’s messing with you on purpose. Sometimes it’s just reprocessing, sure, but sometimes you really did cut some of the site’s dumb little connective tissue and the money pages get hit harder than expected. I’d be way more suspicious if the removed stuff had any real internal links into those pages, even if the pages themselves were trash. Google seems to care about that crap more than people want to admit. Also, if you changed templates or nav while cleaning, I wouldn’t ignore that. Seen a site go sideways just because the “thin” pages were quietly doing more work than everyone thought. Honestly though, the worst thing now is probably touching it again every 2 days. Let it sit. Google loves making a mess out of fresh changes.
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Well, yeah, I’ve seen that too. Usually it’s not the cleanup itself so much as you accidentally cut some weird little internal path Google was leaning on. The “impressions still there / clicks dead” bit is the part that makes me think it’s just wobbling, not fully gone yet. I’d leave it alone for a bit honestly.
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