In this digital age, how do you think your prospects will find you: they go and search online. Say, for example, if they want to find an agency providing Local SEO services, they go online search for best “Arabic SEO services”. If you are spotted on the first page of Google, there is a higher chance that you will be converting that prospect into a client. How do you get yourself on the first page of google?
Well paid ads are the best way to gain instant exposure, nothing can get better credibility than getting them in the top of the search engines organically. No matter what business you own, being there at the top of the search engine is important for the long run if you want to attract the prospects and drive revenue.
What is SEO?
Defined by Ahrefs, SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is the practice of optimizing content to be discovered through a search engine’s organic search results.
What are the ranking factors?
Ranking factors are certain aspects of your website that determines how well your page will perform in the organic search. Well, there are more than 200+ factors that will have an impact on your search rankings. Not all are equally important, but some are very important enough to have an impact on your organic performance. In this blog, we are going to discuss those important factors.
How does google algorithm have an Impact on this?
The reality is that no one could control the search engine algorithm. What you can focus on and what you should do is about optimising your website with various ranking factors. In this post, let’s look at some of the very important factors that you should take into account while optimising your website.
Before we deep dive into details; these factors can change as google updates its algorithm very frequently to provide a better user experience. So it is important to stay up to date on the latest Google algorithm changes to ensure that you are up to date with the best SEO practises.
The Important 9 SEO Factors
- Security
In most of the updates, Google has stressed the importance of site security. Over the years now, it is one of the most important factors that can have an impact on your ranking. Always use HTTPS encryption, which gives an SSL certificate to your website, ensuring a secure connection between you and your end to end-users. Search engines always prefer to drive users to trusted websites.
- Crawlabity
Search engines cant rank your website if they can’t find it. Search engines must crawl your website to determine what the website is all about, review the content and determine how it should rank. There are certain steps you need to follow to allow search engines to crawl your website
- Submit the sitemap
- Use Google search console to find out the number of pages Google has crawled
- Use robots.txt to tell search engines which pages they should consider and the pages they should ignore.
- Core Web Vitals
User experience is what matters most for google. Every factor that has a direct relation to user experience plays an important role in the ranking factor. In that case, page load speed is an important factor taken into account. Starting in May 2021, Google is rolling out the Core Web Vitals update which is said to have a significant impact on your SERP visibility. Read our blog to know more about what is core web vitals and their metrics.
Audience want answers and they want it quickly, search engines know that and they prefer to rank sites that load quickly to provide a better user experience. This is not only applicable to the desktop but the mobile version too since most of the searches are now happening in the mobile version. Use Google page speed insights to determine the speed at which your website loads.
- High-Quality Content
SEO is irrelevant without content. Quality content forms the crux of SEO as it is one of the most important factors which has an impact on ranking. To get the attention of the search engines you need to be consistent on posting content. Ensure that each page has a minimum of 300 words. Update all the existing thin content.
Google always prioritizes the users and they want to give the users the best search results. An in-depth, well-structured content always leads the race. Break down the content into shorter paragraphs, sub-headings, bullet points that make it easier for the users to consume the content and make it easy for Google to scan the content.
- Content Optimization
Optimising the content is equally important as producing quality content. Optimising content doesn’t mean keyword stuffing. Optimize the page for one or two most important keywords that are relevant to the content on the page. Never optimise for the same keyword for more than one page. Avoid keyword cannibalization.
Read our blog on the On-page SEO checklist to make sure you are aligned with the best on-page SEO practices.
- Structured Data or Schema Mark-Up
Schema mark up is the data at the back end of your website. Implementing schema mark up tells search engines on how to classify and interpret pages and their intent. It can also contribute to the factor that your content can be featured in the rank zero or featured snippets which can improve the CTR.
- Backlinks
Backlinks are one of the most important factors that will have an impact on your ranking. When you drive traffic back to your website from high authority websites it gradually increases your website DA. The higher the domain authority the more authoritative will be your website. So to improve your ranking it is important not to neglect this important off-page SEO tactic.
Plan your link building strategies through guest posting, directory submissions, digital PR and other link building techniques. But keep in mind when it comes to link building “Quality matters the most”.
- User Engagement
What is the whole point of creating content if users are not engaging with the same? Google uses the advanced AI tool Rankbrain to determine user engagement. Click through rate and dwell time are two metrics that determine how engaging the content is. Use internal links throughout the content to keep the users engaged that will increase their time spent on the website.
- Keywords
Create content around a cluster of keywords that can drive quality traffic to your website. Do proper keyword research and mapping before getting started with content creation. When doing keyword research and mapping keep three things in mind
- Target long-tail keywords: With Alexa and Siri gaining popularity users are more likely to search for long phrases and questions. Structure the content with long-tail keywords in addition to the primary keyword to target the content.
- Focus on search intent: Matching the search intent boosts ranking for your page that matches the search intent.
To Conclude
SEO consists of several different acts but is not just a one-time thing or something you can buy off the shelf and expect it to work right away. Looking ahead, the Future Of Digital always remains bright. Who doesn’t want to invest in the bright future? SEO is always an investment for your business in the long term.
Got questions? Reach out to us.
