There is some significant chatter in the SEO industry around a possible new years update that started late December 31, 2019 and throughout January 1, 2020. The chatter is high but similar to the Christmas update chatter, the tracking tools are not showing huge signs of an update. It leads me to believe the same as I did with the Christmas update, that I doubt there was a big update on New Years.
In short, I am seeing a lot of people either happy that their traffic and rankings are way up starting New Years eve and day or people are super sad about drops in traffic and rankings. Here is some of the chatter in the ongoing WebmasterWorld and Black Hat World forums:
Another update started today or yesterday. Results will be found tomorrow or after.
For us, it's closer to a 40% increase, which is entirely normal (and always welcome) at this time of year. Not every traffic peak or dip is the result of a search-engine update.
Boom! 40% reduction in traffic, smile webmasters its time for you guys to switch professions.
I'm seeing an increase in traffic too. I was up close to 20% yesterday, and going strong today. I don't typically see a seasonal uptick at this time of the year.
I think an update rolled out too. Traffic is up 30% since yesterday. Site had lost 40% since november.
Traffic down x4-6 and Main keywords disappeared at all
Yes. All my whitehat sites have tanked. The sites which are spinning my content are ranking top. Thank you Google.
I am pretty sure what you are seeing is nothing but new year's eve effect and probably will stay like that for a couple of days . Relax happy!
Here are some screen shots from the tools, some are showing slight fluctuations around January 1st, some tools have not updated yet for the 1st:
In short, I am not confident there was an update because of the same reasons I listed around the Christmas update chatter.
(1) Googlers are probably not working to push an update or fix any issues from a push.
(2) Traffic is always different around a holidays, so looking at traffic is hard.
(3) The tracking tools do not show big changes to rankings.
In short, I think everyone should just check back in with their rankings on Monday going forward. Ignore the past couple of weeks.
Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld and Black Hat World.
