If you were a new website owner or anyone who has recently launched their website, your first distinct thought would be – “How to bring traffic to my website&rdquo? The clear answer is simple. Your website should rank on the most used site, Google.
The more difficult question is – “How can I rank on Google?” This is where the requirement to understand Google ranking factors and SEO arises.
This post will walk you through some top Google ranking factors for SEO in 2023, plus some handy suggestions to nail those parameters and boost your ranking.
What are Google ranking factors and their types?
If you search well for a query on Google, the absolute most relevant answers appear at the top of the page, while the ‘not too relevant answers get buried at the bottom. This is nothing but Google ranking factors at play. Google has numerous factors, so it uses to rank the results of a search term. These can be classified into 4 buckets:
On-page Ranking Factors
These ranking factors deal directly with what’s on your webpage. They constitute content quality, keyword optimization, and image optimization.
Off-page Ranking Factors
These ranking factors work outside your website. They, for the large part, revolve around backlinks that get created when your website is associated with another website. Some elements are the count of linking domains, page ranking of linking pages, the relevance of links, the authority of linking pages, etc.
Technical Ranking Factors
Technical ranking factors comprise various website and server optimization elements that help Google spiders crawl and index your internet site more effectively. Prevalent technical factors include page speed, SSL certificate, core web vitals, etc.
EAT Ranking Factors
This is arguably the leading and most potent ranking factor out of the four. EAT represents Expertise, Authority, and Trustworthiness – which Google measures to judge your website’s genuineness. You will obtain a spot among top-ranking pages if your content scores well in all three areas.
Let’s now go deeper and understand the Google ranking factors in detail.
Though you can find multiple factors that Google considers to judge the content for a search query, there are certain essential ranking factors every content marketer should consider.
Listed here are the top Google ranking factors as a possible master to push your website to the top of search results —
Consistent publication of high-quality content
When you have quality content, then the chances of one’s website ranking on the top of SERPs are high. So, what’s quality content?
Simply put, it’s original, engaging content with reliable information for visitors. As you know, the net is already overflowing with countless websites, many of which offer similar content. Therefore Google values and rewards dozens of websites that provide a certain amount of uniqueness within their range.
How to enhance this factor
Embrace the topic cluster strategy. To the unversed, a topic cluster strategy is a model where you create several unique contents on a broad subject area. It works on a hub-and-spoke framework with pillar pages, cluster pages, and internal links. This way, you have a solution and a unique way of organizing all your content around a keyword.
Scalenut’s AI content marketing tool has a topic cluster feature that automatically suggests topics for pillar pages and cluster pages and aids keyword research.
EAT (Expertise-Authoritativeness- Trustworthiness) and accurate information
Google runs on a tool called Search Quality Rater that helps evaluate webpages’ standards and authority. EAT is just a criterion that falls underneath the purview of the Quality Rater. Google will rank your website based on what authoritative your content is and the degree of expertise displayed by your writers.
Google may also check for the accuracy and reliability of the information. Every bit of information you offer on your website must be up-to-date because the audience is always searching for new information, and it’s your duty as a content creator to provide them with the same.
- How to enhance this factor
- Ensure that a material expert continuously publishes your content.
- Do not copy-paste content from other websites.
- If you offer any statistics or data, ensure it’s from a dependable source.
Rankbrain
The Rankbrain algorithm is the brain behind Google’s ability to provide perfect answers for every query. This algorithm is powered by machine learning principles and evaluates your website based on the following criteria:
- Click-through rate (CTR) – it’s the rate at which users click your website link.
- Bounce Rate – the rate at which the audience leaves your website and dates back to the results page.
Dwell time is the total time the user spends on your website.
Your CTRs and dwell time must be high, while the bounce rate should be low. When that happens, the Rankbrain algorithm understands that your content is relevant to that specific keyword search, pushing your web page’s rank higher on the SERP.
How to enhance this factor
Understand the user intent and write for the reader. The best way to do this is by using Scalenut’s social listening feature. This feature highlights what users are discussing around your topic on different forums like Quora, Reddit, and Google.
- Ensure that your website has content relevant to the search phrase and the keywords.
- It should provide a revealing response to the question asked by the user in the search.
- Maintain a covert tone throughout the content piece instead of adhering to a monologue narration. It could increase the dwell time of one’s website.
On-page optimized for the targeted keywords.
On-page optimization covers dozens of measures that you perform entirely on your website. It primarily involves optimizing page-level components such as title tags, headings, and meta descriptions and influencing search intent with relevant keywords.
How to enhance this factor
Use the power of NLP to ensure your content has been comprehended accurately by search engines. Use Scalenut’s SEO Hub to generate a complete set of semantically-related words for the target keywords. Use these terms in your content to optimize it further for search engines.
- Do thorough keyword research.
- Include your primary keyword in your URL.
- Place your primary keyword near the beginning of the meta title.
- Include your primary keyword in your meta description.
- Include your primary keyword within the very first 100 words of the content.
- The freshness of the content
Searchers want the most recent information from Google. To meet their needs, Google ranks and rewards dozens of content, offering fresh content. For instance, when you have published articles about strategies for investment, you must update this article regarding the most recent investment products. This can be a sure-shot way of pulling your SEO rank higher in the SERPs.
How to boost this factor
When you accumulate old content, it’s time and energy to relook at those articles and bring in more currency with all the latest data.
You prefer to conduct a quarterly audit to revisit and update old content pieces.
Produce a detailed editorial calendar that will allow you to manage this entire process better.
Backlinks
Backlinks or inbound links will be the links present on another website redirecting their visitors to your website when they click those links. Google considers backlinks a key ranking factor because backlinks are a vote of confidence from another website.
Every backlink you earn makes Google believe that your content is valuable, credible and packed with authenticated information. Concentrating on high-quality backlinks from reliable and popular websites is also essential.
How to boost this factor
The simplest way to obtain quality backlinks is through guest posting. Find websites from similar industries willing to publish your blog on the site.
Besides guest posting, you must also learn about Google’s Link Spam Update. This update is about identifying the links you get to your webpage. But Google has a couple of guidelines you need to follow for backlinks. This ensures websites refrain from involving themselves with spam backlinks to enhance their rank.
Internal linking
Think of internal links as backlinks but from within your website. Internal links help the visitors, along with the search engines, to seamlessly navigate through your website. Internal linking aims to help significant readers and search engines find the required information in as short a time as possible.
How to boost this factor
Add more internal links between relevant web pages.
As a rule of thumb, you should ensure that your internal links are user-centric and not overdone. This means the links must be created so an individual can navigate the relevant page. They will not be sent on a wild goose chase by interlinking your pages with every other page.
Domain and page authority
As the terms suggest, Page Authority (PA) is a metric that evaluates a specific page, while Domain Authority (DA) considers the whole domain and the corresponding subdomains for the authority. The authority scoring is based on the expertise you portray through the content.
Before you try increasing the DA and PA, you need to understand that both are functions of time. It will take continuous efforts and lots of time to boost your ranking.
- How to boost this factor
- Increase how many backlinks to your website
- Make your website mobile-friendly
Enhance your page speed by optimizing your images, reducing redirects, caching your web pages, etc.
Enhance your social signals by linking your website with social media accounts and promoting your content regularly on those platforms.
Local SEO & product reviews
This ranking factor is particularly applicable to those websites selling products and services on the internet. If you are one of them, Google recommends updating your content based on geography. Also, garner more product reviews to push your website higher in the SERPs.
- How to boost this factor
- Optimize your website for the Google My Business tool.
- Publish posts targeting the neighborhood population in Google My Business and other social media channels.
- Make your presence felt in various online directories.
- Collect more reviews for your websites and products by incentivizing the review process.
Image optimization
Google has begun giving importance to visual results alongside textual ones. Put. Content creators must try to find ways to convey their messages through images and videos. But that’s not enough. You’ll need to optimize the photos so your search engines can index and rank a picture properly in image search.
How to boost this factor
Add an alt text for every single image. It is the only path for Google to “read” an image. Have a short image description, and remember to incorporate the keyword.
Compress your images. Heavy-sized images take longer to load, impacting an individual experience. Google penalizes such web pages by lowering their ranks. Always compress your ideas and bring their size to only 70-100 KB.
Instead of stock photos, try using screenshots or illustrations that offer instant value to users.
Technical Google Ranking Factors
Independent of the above, you can find certain technical factors employed by Google to rank your website, as listed below —
Page speed
Your website must have a higher page speed than your competitors to be ranked higher in the SERPs. You can check your page speed using Google’s PageSpeed Insights Tool.
- How to optimize it – You can optimize your page speed by compressing the images, reducing the redirects, and caching your website.
- Google page experience signal: Core web vitals
It is an accumulation of signals that evaluate how your visitors perceive the experience of getting together with a website beyond its informational value. Core web vitals comprise one particular signal that measures
- Largest contentful paint: Just how long it takes a page to load from the perspective of a genuine user.
- Cumulative layout shift – How stable an entire page is because it loads
- First input delay – Just how long it requires something to occur on a page.
- How to optimize it – Few ways to boost Core web vitals are by reducing JavaScript executions, implementing lazy loading, and Improving server response time.
Mobile-first website
Your website is likely to be first ranked for performance on mobile in place of desktop. Make sure you build a website and create optimized content for mobile.
How to optimize it – Offer intuitive navigation and avoid disruptive pop-ups. More to the point, test the website on real devices under natural conditions.
Site security/ SSL certificate (HTTPS)
Security is another crucial aspect of a website that Google values. You need to ensure that your website comes with an SSL certification, not merely to keep your website data secure but in addition as it is just a key ranking factor.
How to optimize it – Install an SSL certificate and use HTTPS on your pages, links, and content. Keep updating your software and scan your website regularly.
Schema markup
Schema markup is a questionnaire of microdata that creates an enhanced description that appears in SERP. The improved description is also known as rich snippets. Schema markup is hidden and can only be read by search engines.
How to optimize it – Markup only what’s on the page and have a crucial go-between for every business concept. Avoid unwanted overlaps and connect things in the markup.
Conclusion
As you can see from the abovementioned factors, Google values visitor experience over everything else to rank a webpage. So, ensure that each little bit of content you create is applicable, informative, and engaging to the reader. Also, please ensure that you execute a thorough SERP analysis before starting every blog because it can help you offer a great experience to visitors.
