Since 2012, Searchmetrics has published our annual “Ranking Factors Study”. What does this report mean to you, and why should you take any notice of it? Often, misunderstandings arise regarding the interpretation of data and its causal relationships, so here is an explanation of the background and our approach to interpretation of the data.

seo ranking factors

These are all ways that people can increase their E-A-T for higher SEO rankings. And much of it boils down to using best practices to manage your online reputation. The goal of this change was to ensure that users weren’t just getting the highest quality content but also getting the right information from that content.

These best practices include compressing images (which improves page experience) and adding image alt text (which helps search engines and users understand the visual). SEO marketing for small businesses can be daunting, but it’s also one of the most effective ways to grow. Whether you’re running a local shop or an online service, these top 10 ranking factors will help you stay ahead. A few high-authority, relevant backlinks are worth more than dozens of low-quality ones. If a user clicks on your page but leaves quickly, search engines notice.

  • To compile our list of the top SEO ranking factors, we looked at a variety of sources–-including our own in-house experts and other popular lists.
  • Those ranking factors form the basis for successful SEO strategies.
  • This plugin has a similar tool, TruSEO On-Page Analysis, but it provides feedback directly in the WordPress editor.
  • Websites that appear on the first page of search results are far more likely to be clicked on, with the top positions gaining the majority of user attention.

Ideas, concepts, products, and information are all constantly evolving, and users’ changing expectations are aligned with that. An integral part of content are the keywords and words on the page. There are theories circulating that keywords are now obsolete and not needed anymore to rank.

Keyword difficulty measures how challenging it is to rank for a specific term. A high keyword difficulty indicates many sites are targeting that keyword, making it harder for you to rank favorably. Prioritize keywords that balance high search volume with lower competition.

seo ranking factors

Data privacy

seo ranking factors

When you visit a site, check the MozBar and see what the site’s Page Authority and Domain Authority BHS Links are. If you see a high Spam Score, chances are high that the site is bad news and you should not try and get a backlink from the site. Try also to use your city’s name in approximately two spots on your website pages, and be sure to use relevant keywords in your site’s Title and Description metadata/tags. Please remember that Google isn’t the only review site that matters.

seo ranking factors

So if your site is hard to use, uses intrusive popups and ads, and has a bunch of broken links… people aren’t going to link to it. UX can indirectly help with SEO because people are more likely to share and link to user-friendly site. Instead, I optimized my page (and title) around ONE important keyword. It’s no secret that you want to use your keyword a handful of times on your page.

The goal is to attract organic traffic by making content friendly for users and search engines. In contrast, links unrelated to your content or niche don’t offer value. Also, irrelevant or spammy backlinks will harm your rankings and organic traffic. Aside from web-based search results, multimedia is an essential tool for appearing in Google’s image- or video-based search results, which don’t have SGE enabled. Again, this provides SEOs another avenue for capturing organic traffic from AI-generated search results. In 2025, SEO will continue to evolve, but the fundamentals remain the same.

Marketing with AI: Agency Growth Kit

seo ranking factors

If you’d like to see what specific front-end web performance problems you have, Zoompf’s free web performance report is a great place to start. Focusing Solely on Desktop Optimization A related mistake is focusing all your SEO efforts on the desktop version of your website. While a well-optimized desktop site is important, overlooking mobile optimization can hurt your SEO ranking factors significantly. With Google’s mobile-first indexing, websites are ranked primarily based on how they perform on mobile. It’s critical to provide an equally strong experience for mobile users to satisfy search engine ranking factors.

With paid or free AI image generation tools, it’s possible to generate helpful graphics or visuals (ChatGPT can even create charts!). SGE while browsing also highlights what Google knows about your website, which ties into another high-impact AI Overviews ranking factor, databases — specifically Google Knowledge Graph. Make sure your website loads fast, doesn’t shift around while it loads, and responds quickly when users interact. If your SEO agency hasn’t optimized these, you’ll likely lose out in rankings.