Google is the world’s most popular search engine for a reason. When people “search” for something on Google, they generally get the results they want. Google works hard at this, which comes down to its ranking factors.
But, what really matters to Google? The truth is that the things the search engine deems “important” tend to change, which is why you need to stay on your toes. What was a top-ranking factor several years ago or last week might not be today. Likewise, there might be a new ranking factor used by the company that can make or break your business.
Here is what you need to know about the top ranking factors today, and how you can optimize for them.
What Are Ranking Factors?
SEO is short for search engine optimization, which refers to the process of making your web pages more likely to rank the highest on a search engine. If we’re being honest, that pretty much means how you can rank better on Google since that’s what just about everyone uses.
So, how does this work? Ranking refers to how your content shows up on the search engine results (SERPs). When you have a #1 ranking, that means people searching for a particular term will see your results first, with the exception of answer boxes, promoted results, and featured snippets.
Since most people never make it past the first page of Google, your goal should be in the top ten results. But, your click-through rates will improve significantly as you get closer and closer to the #1 spot.
To decide who gets these spots, Google uses a set of ranking factors.
When people want to find information, they type it into the Google box or say something to their voice-enabled device to start a search. Google uses its self-designated list of factors to determine whether your page qualifies as being relevant and high-quality. The top-ranked ones are shown first, and so on.
Types of Ranking Factors
Before you can focus on optimizing for organic search, you should also understand that Google uses several different types of ranking factors. In fact, there are three kinds:
- Technical ranking factors - These are measured on your website but are more focused on site performance elements.
- On-page ranking factors - These are related to the information quality and keyword focus of the particular pages on your site.
- Off-page ranking factors - These are factors related to pages other than your site that link to your pages.
Technical Ranking Factors
Before you can begin to focus on things like tags and keywords, it’s vital that your technical SEO is in order.
Google crawls and indexes websites so that it can make an initial determination about quality and usability. If the search engine finds troubling areas, this is likely to hurt your rankings.
Here are some of the technical SEO ranking factors that Google uses and the ways you can optimize for them.
1. Page and Site Speed
Consumers dislike slow web pages, and Google is in the business of giving consumers what they want - speedy results. If your website takes too long to load, it’s going to hurt your rankings.
You can measure your page speed with Google PageSpeed Insights. The tool also provides suggestions for improvement.
2. Usability on Mobile
Google uses mobile-first indexing when it crawls websites, so your pages need to be optimized for mobile. You should do this anyway since most of today’s web searchers are using mobile devices. Testing your performance is simple with Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test tool.
3. Internal Linking Structure
Your website’s structure should make sense and be simple to navigate. In addition to being fast and intuitive, it should have an internal linking structure that is well-organized.
Your internal links not only help the search engines make sense of your content but also your readers. So, if you have a Pillar Page about credit cards, it would logically link to different topics, or clusters, related to credit cards like travel credit cards, cash-back credit cards, and no-annual-fee credit cards.
On-Page Ranking Factors
Many of Google’s ranking factors are more page-specific. These include:
4. Keyword Selection and Use
The keywords you choose to target for your content can impact your rankings. Ideally, you’ll research keywords and choose ones with some search volume but not too much competition. Instead of “stuffing” keywords into content, they should be included naturally.
5. Meta Description
Every page should have a meta description, which is a 160-character description of what your page is about. This is what appears in the search engine results and may also be used by Google for a featured snippet.
6. Title and Header Tags
Your chosen keyword phrases should be used in your title and header tags since Google will look for these and use them to learn more about the topics on your page.
7. Image Alt-text
Instead of simply loading images and forgetting about them, you can optimize them for search engines and help your rankings. Every image comes with an alt-tag that you can label to describe your image and potentially include relevant keywords.
8. URL Structure
Avoid using meaningless URLs on your website that are a jumble of numbers and characters. Instead, choose an SEO-optimized URL structure that tells visitors and Google what is on your page. For example, www.yoursite.com/blog/credit-cards.
9. Content Quality
Google also uses the quality of your content as a ranking factor. How does it measure this? It may look at the publication date to see how “fresh” the content is. Alternatively, the search engine is likely to drop your rankings if people visit your page and immediately leave, meaning you have a high bounce rate and low-quality content.
Off-Page Ranking Factors
When someone else shares or refers back to your content, this can help your page’s rankings. This is referred to as your off-page SEO. Google measures this with one factor:
10. Backlinks
A backlink is a link to someone else’s site instead of an internal link to another page on your own site. If another site references one of your blogs or statistics, giving you a link, this is a backlink and a “vote of confidence” for your brand.
Part of your inbound marketing strategy should be making sure you are optimizing SEO to improve your “search-ability” and visibility. Connection Model specializes in helping clients improve their results in organic search. And we invite a conversation about how we can apply our services to help your business. Contact us today to get started.
Written By: David Carpenter
