Issue with excellent ranking for keyword in plural and really bad ranking for keyword in singular.

Google doesn't rank sites - it ranks pages.

Not surprising. The combination is a longer-tail keyword and more likely to rank higher than the general "hangmatta".

But, presumably, what you really want is for potential buyers to find your page. To that end, the words hammock or hammocks aren't the best keywords. If you target buying keywords like "buy xxxbrand hammock" or "this length xxxx" hammock" you might have more success.

The domain name is such a small, and according to Google, non-existent ranking factor that it cannot be the word in their domain name.

My guess is that it is backlink related. What anchor text is in the backlinks to your site and more important, the actual page that targets the singular?

What I really wonder, though, is why do you care? The word "hängmatta" gets 20 searches per month. Why in the world would you even be targeting such a word? If 100% of the people who saw your listing clicked on your site (they won't, even in the first position), that would be less than one person per day. I wouldn't target that word if there were ten times as many searches!

I think you're missing the trust of the comments.


Let's get it away from hammocks, so emotions do not get into it.


Let's use shoes as an example.


People who Google things use different phrases depending on where they're in the buying stage.


When I google shoes, I am not buying, just curious to see what Google brings up.
When I google walking shoes for men 9 wide, I'm ready to buy.


The stages between them get searches like:
walking shoes for men
sports shoes for men
cheap sport shoes for men
nike shoes for men.


Back to your thing:
ranking for hammock, in your language, gets you people who're not in the buying stages.


You want people who're googling:
cheap hammocks for backyards
where to buy hammocks

and such.


If you sell locally, you want buy hammock city name.


Ranking for hammock, in other words, does you no good. And, it is harder to rank for. And you'll end up ranking for it even if you do not go for it (if you end up ranking for enough other keywords).


In April, Google rolled out an update. What's happening to you might be related to that update.


Here's a link to an article about it on Search Engine Journal: https://searchengineland.com/google-...ing-out-395916.

Yes, it IS about SEO. No one can tell you why one particular keyword is not getting the traffic you believe it should have.



If you have had little traffic for 'at least a year' - what traffic did you have before that time? For how long was the traffic acceptable?

Did you try to use ahrefs for analyzing?

These days usually we see Google treat the singular and plural as much the same as it understands they are both the same thing, so in theory you shouldn't have this issue.

But it's Google, and they do confusing and strange things sometimes.

The thing that I would be interested to know, if you have the data, is how much sales these broad keyword searches are actually resulting in for you?

Because broad terms like "Hammocks" are not typically buyer intent keywords but people looking to browse, learn information, or at the very start of their buyer journey and nowhere near ready to pull out their credit card and purchase.

So even if you did rank for this big broad term it might not result in any sales anyway, and that's the end goal right?

So unless you have specific data that shows this broad keyword is driving sales I wouldn't get too hung up on it, as I suspect it will not be a huge sales driver anyway.

Ranking for "best Hammocks for X" (i.e. sleeping, camping, trees ect) type keywords typically will convert into sales better.

Although you have provided some details regarding the issue you are facing. Still, more data is required to tell the exact reason behind this phenomenon.

I am quite sure, for the singular keyword your competitors are doing better SEO than you. That's why they have moved ahead.

I am not intending to dishearten you but if you don't take proper care of your SEO campaign now; you may lose your current rankings also.