Insights, Tutorials & Best Practices

SEO Strategies

A ranking dropped: what to rule out, in order

Google publishes a debugging guide for Search traffic drops. It names six causes, and backlinks aren't among them — the word doesn't appear on the page. That's not an oversight, it's a boundary: the guide covers Google's side of the glass. Here's the full elimination order, from measurement artifacts to the box almost nobody opens, with the rewrite saved for last.

Andrei

Aug 14, 2026 • 10 min

SEO Strategies

Why your SERP position is three different numbers

Your browser puts you third. Your rank tracker says seven. Search Console says 11.2. Same keyword, same page, same morning — and none of the three is broken. They answer different questions, and Google documents most of the difference itself. What each number measures, two things I checked live this week that contradict the standard advice, and the one figure worth putting in a client report.

Andrei

Aug 14, 2026 • 11 min

SEO Strategies

How to read Ahrefs metrics: which numbers are counted, which are guessed

DR, UR, organic traffic, traffic value, KD. They sit in identical gray boxes and look equally authoritative, but half of them are calculations over Ahrefs' own index and half are models of data only Google has. Ahrefs published the error bar on the second half itself: a median deviation of 49.52% against Search Console.

Andrei

Aug 13, 2026 • 12 min

SEO Strategies

What backlink monitoring costs (and what drives the number)

Pricing pages quote tiers; you want to know what your portfolio costs to watch at the frequency your work needs. Every price here came off the vendor's own page on 2 August 2026, with the arithmetic run at three portfolio sizes - including the sizes where our own metered pricing is the more expensive buy.

Andrei

Aug 02, 2026 • 8 min

SEO Strategies

What is a backlink manager (and do you actually need one)?

Search "backlink manager" and you get three different tools: one that watches your links for loss, one that scores toxicity and builds a disavow file, and one that runs outreach. Here's what the term really covers, what Google thinks about managing links at all, and the honest test for whether you need one.

Andrei

Jul 03, 2026 • 7 min

SEO Strategies

AI Overviews vs featured snippets: what's the difference?

Two boxes can sit at the very top of Google: a featured snippet that quotes one page, and an AI Overview that writes its own summary from many. People mix them up constantly. Here's how they actually differ, whether they still show together in 2026, and the honest answer on whether you can optimize for either.

Andrei

Jun 26, 2026 • 8 min

SEO Strategies

What is a Google AI Overview? How it works and who gets cited

You search something and Google answers it itself, in a box above the links, citing a few sites that aren't yours. That box is an AI Overview. Here's what it actually is, how Google decides which sources it cites, and the honest truth about whether you can get in, from a team that built a free checker for it.

Andrei

Jun 26, 2026 • 8 min

SEO Strategies

Page Authority vs Domain Authority: which one actually matters?

"What's your DA?" is the reflex question on every link-buying call, and it's the wrong one. Google ranks individual pages, not whole domains, so the page-level score is closer to how search actually works. Here's why Page Authority beats Domain Authority as a signal, and why you still shouldn't chase either.

Andrei

Jun 24, 2026 • 6 min

SEO Strategies

DA vs DR: what domain authority and domain rating actually mean

A link seller's list has a DR next to every row and a price that climbs with it. But Domain Authority is Moz's score, Domain Rating is Ahrefs', they're built from different link databases, and Google uses neither. Here's what each one measures, why the same site gets two different numbers, and what they're honestly good for.

Andrei

Jun 24, 2026 • 10 min