The problem
A core update took 70% of organic clicks in four months (231K down to 69.2K), with impressions falling 60% and average position sliding from 23.2 to 32. Recoveries like this usually stall because the response gets split across separate vendors: one for technical, one for content, one for links. Each optimises its own slice and nobody owns the interaction between them.
What I did
- Five workstreams, one owner. Technical and on-page SEO, semantic optimisation, topical authority, internal linking, and third-party mentions, run together rather than sequenced.
The system in one picture
- Workstream, owned and run together
- Outcome, Search Console
The outcome
Average position recovered from the post-decline low of 32 to 8.2. That is the number to judge this by: it measures whether the site earned its standing back, independent of how traffic happened to be distributed across the period.
The decline
| Metric | Mar – Jul 2025 | Jul – Nov 2025 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Clicks | 231K | 69.2K | −70% |
| Impressions | 27.5M | 11M | −60% |
| Avg. position | 23.2 | 32 | −8.8 |
Search Console. Note that Search Console lists the earlier window first, which reads like the current period. It is not.
The recovery
| Metric | Post-decline low | 12 months to May 2026 |
|---|---|---|
| Avg. position | 32 | 8.2 |
| Clicks | 69.2K over 4 months | 1.01M |
| Impressions | 11M over 4 months | 153M |
Search Console. The 12-month totals span the decline as well as the recovery, so they understate the recovered run-rate, so read the position figure, not the totals.
Why a recovered ranking no longer finishes the job is covered in my page on AI search optimization.
Frequently asked questions
How large was the decline after the core update?
Clicks fell 70%, from 231K to 69.2K, impressions fell 60%, from 27.5M to 11M, and average position slid from 23.2 to 32, comparing March to July 2025 with July to November 2025 in Search Console.
Why run all five workstreams together?
Recoveries like this usually stall when the response is split across vendors, one for technical, one for content, one for links. Each optimises its own slice and nobody owns how they interact, so technical and on-page SEO, semantic optimisation, topical authority, internal linking and third-party mentions ran together under one owner.
Why judge the recovery by average position rather than clicks?
Position measures whether the site earned its standing back, independent of how traffic was distributed across the period. The 12-month click and impression totals span the decline as well as the recovery, so they understate the recovered run-rate.
Why is the click-through rate low at position 8.2?
CTR is running around 0.7%, far below what that position normally returns. The likeliest explanation is AI Overview absorption, where the answer is served without the click. That is an inference from the gap between position and CTR, not something Search Console states.