From Baby Strollers to VPNs, I analyzed 121 different industries, here’re some of the biggest winners and losers in SEO in May 2025.
Every week, I analyze traffic shifts across 100s of industries on SiteCurve – from mattresses to VPNs to dog food.
I then report on the biggest trends I’m seeing when it comes to getting more organic traffic from search engines.
Since were at the end of the month, this is going to be a May recap, especially considering there was a Google update around May 16th.
Here are the biggest patterns I’m seeing – including some surprising winners that went from zero to hero in just months.
Let’s get into it.
Big Publishers Are Struggling Across Multiple Niches
- Forbes, NY Times, Good Housekeeping, The Spruce, Tom’s Guide, Serious Eats, and Parents.com all saw significant declines (35-84%) across different product categories
- This suggests a broader algorithmic shift affecting large, generalist publishers in commercial/product review spaces
Small Independant Publishers Are Growing
- Coffeekev.com (+6,000%) – Built around a YouTube personality who reviews coffee gear, with 60K+ YouTube subscribers and 18K Instagram followers
- Coffeegeek.com (+835%) – Coffee-focused site with strong backlink authority that rebounded after Q4 2024 declines
- MattressClarity.com (+25%) – Pure mattress affiliate site showing steady growth despite being relatively small
- NapLab.com (+68%) – Another mattress affiliate promoting brands like Casper and Saatva, consistently performing well as one of the smallest sites in the space
- BabyGearLab.com (+107%) – Part of a strategic network including TechGearLab and OutdoorGearLab, focusing on deep product testing and reviews
Content Creator Authority
- Coffeekev.com (+6,000%) leverages a 60K+ YouTube subscriber base and 18K Instagram following
- Its likely personal brand authority and social signals are given coffeekev a boost despite minimal linkbuilding
Specialized Expertise
- BabyGearLab.com (+107%) part of a network of gear review sites (TechGearLab, OutdoorGearLab) focusing on deep product testing
- Niche specialization outperforming generalist approaches
Ecommerce SEO Excellence
- Maxicosi.com (+7,000%) and Viscosoft.com (+438%) a baby and mattress ecom site respectively, showing that product-focused ecommerce sites can dominate when executing SEO properly
- Collection pages and category-specific content can rank and generate organic traffic when optimized correctly
Community-Driven Content
- Facebook is starting to rank in traditional search results with page posts and facebook group content
- WholePawsDogFood.com – a brand new forum, gaining significant visibility without any linkbuilding
Mattresses
In this section, I take a look at the winning and losing websites on mattress related keywords in the month of May.
These keywords are extremely lucrative for both affiliates and ecommerce companies, which makes them valuable to track and see which sites are winning and losing in this space.
Keywords like “best mattress for side sleepers”, “saatva vs purple mattress”, etc. This performance is specific for organic results.
If you want to explore the mattress data yourself, click here.
The below is the overall leaderboard for this industry.
MattressClarity (+25%)
Mattressclarity is an affiliate site that I’ve been monitoring and seeing them go up 25% and 3 positions on the leaderboard. A relatively small site, and good to see them growing here.
NapLab (+68%)
Naplab.com is another mattress affiliate site promoting brands like Casper, Saatva, and these types of companies. They have been one of the smallest sites consistently doing well. T
Viscosoft.com (+438%)
Viscosoft, an ecom mattress site is seeing their collection pages rank and grow in visibility for keywords like “best four-inch mattress topper” and “best mattress topper for pressure points.”
Forbes (-54%)
Seeing big drops from Forbes right now, down 54% on keywords like “best orthopedic mattress” and “best pillow top mattress for side sleepers,” falling quite a bit in the mattress space.
Goodhousekeeping.com (-35%)
Similar to forbes.com, big publisher, Goodhousekeeping.com is also seeing major declines.
Thespruce.com (-51%)
Not as stark of a decline as forbes and goodhousekeeping, but thespruce has also been seeing declines since Q4 2024, nearly 51% down in the mattress space.
Dog Food
In this section, I take a look at the winning and losing websites on mattress related keywords in the month of May.
Similar to mattress, dog food is a billion dollar industry with many big players jockeying for top rankings. Seeing what competitors do in this industry to win is valuable intelligence.
Keywords like “best premium dog food”, “nutro vs blue buffalo”, etc. This performance is specific for organic results.
If you want to explore the dog food data yourself (for free), click here.
The below is the overall leaderboard for the dog food industry.
WholePawsDogFood.com (+Infinity%)
Maybe one of the more interesting findings, is this forum website. Went from nothing to gaining serious search visibility in just a few months. If you’re thinking about starting a forum, you should do it.
Facebook.com (+25%)
Facebook continues to see growth with facebook group pages starting to rank and gain visibility in traditional search results.
Wagwalking.com (-35%)
Wagwalking is a dog walking app that was publishing content targeting commercial keywords like ‘wellness dog food review’ and promoting offers like dog food on chewy.com. Seems like this is backfiring a bit for them.
VPN Software
In this section, I take a look at the winning and losing websites on VPN related keywords in the month of May.
Arguably more lucrative than mattresses is selling VPN software. The competing websites in this space are digital savvy implementing the most cutting edge SEO tactics to own #1 rankings.
Keywords like “best vpn for netflix”, “does a vpn hide your location”, etc. This performance is specific for organic results.
If you want to explore the VPN site data yourself (for free), click here.
The below is the overall leaderboard for this industry.
You’ll notice the estimated traffic figures are quite low for the VPN industry tracked in SiteCurve.
This is because Google does not provide monthly estimated traffic (MSV) for VPN keywords in its API, therefore we use a floor of 10.
The traffic numbers are purely to help compare sites and not an indication of actual traffic.
Top10vpn.com (+46%)
Small bump in visibility for this affiliate website after seeing multiple months of declines.
We’ve only been tracking competitors in the VPN space since April 7th, but you can see top10vpn.com has been struggling a bit and needed this slight win.
Tomsguide.com (-46%)
Similar to forbes, nytimes, a ‘generalist’ site Tomsguide.com seems to be seeing declines.
Though if you check their ahrefs chart, it doesn’t look like much is happening, mainly because were only looking at their performance in the context of VPN.
PCworld.com (+250%)
Interestingly, PCworld.com saw a bump on May 16th’s update gaining rank on keywords like ‘best vpn service’.
I would have expected them to be lumped in with sites like tomsguide.com.
Espresso Machines
In this section, I take a look at the winning and losing websites on espresso machine related keywords in the month of May.
I like tracking competing websites for espresso machine keywords because you tend to see advanced SEO tactics by ecom and affiliate businesses given how expensive these machines are.
Keywords like “best espresso machine “, “espresso machines for home”, etc. This performance is specific for organic results.
If you want to explore the espresso machine site data yourself (for free), click here.
The below is the overall visibility leaderboard for this industry.
Coffeekev.com (+6,000%)
In this niche, I saw a lot of sites like coffeekev.com, a small publisher exploding in visibility. This site in particular is built around a youtube channel personality that reviews coffee gear.
He has 60K+ subscribers on his youtube channel and 18K on instagram. These social signals could be helping give this site a boost.
Coffeegeek.com (+835%)
Similar to coffeekev, except this site has more backlinks boosting its authority. They were doing well up until Q4, 2024 then saw declines and are surging back in this latest update.
Nytimes.com (-52%)
Another example of a massive site that has been dominating for years seeing declines.
Seriouseats.com (-70%)
Again, big entrenched site losing visibility in this latest update.
Strollers
In this section, I take a look at the winning and losing websites on baby stroller related keywords in the month of May.
I liked tracking baby strollers because again, they are expensive products with websites utilizing advanced SEO strategies to own the #1 rankings in this space.
Keywords like “best baby stroller “, “strollers for 3 year olds”, etc. This performance is specific for organic results.
If you want to explore the espresso machine site data yourself (for free), click here.
The below is the overall leaderboard for this industry.
Babygearlab.com (+107%)
Another small independent publisher seeing gains.
I’ve covered their SEO strategies in a YouTube video I published last year. The owners of this site also run techgearlab.com and outdoorgearlab.com, which all are doing quite well.
Maxicosi.com (+7,000%)
Maxicosi is a Shopify ecommerce store executing their SEO strategy nearly perfectly and seeing gains right now.
Though, I’m not sure what happened last year after a major algo hit that lasted from May 2024 to October 2024.
Parents.com (-79%)
Again, big site seeing declines in this latest update. Parents.com is no exception here.
Nytimes.com (-84%)
Similar to coffee niche, nytimes.com seeing declines in the baby stroller niche as well.
You can see the majority of the declines stem from their ‘best travel stroller’ and ‘best overall stroller’ pages.
Thebump.com (-34%)
Just like parents.com and nytimes.com, thebump.com a big publisher, seeing slight declines around stroller related keywords.
