SEO Ranking Factors

During the 2019 spring semester, this blog will be dedicated to my class Content Development & Search Engine Optimization (MKTG 348).

To begin the semester, we have been asked to read the article 4 Most Important Ranking Factors, According to SEO Industry Studies. This article, written by Aleh Barysevich, talks about SEO and Google rankings. For those who are not familiar with this concept, Google ranks websites that appear after a search depending on how useful or accurate the site is in relation to the search. In other words, the placement of a website occupies in the Google search results page is directly related to Google's ranking of the page.

For example, if I type into my Google search bar "How to make banana bread?" these are the search results I get:

However, if I search for "easy banana bread recipe," my search results are completely different.

Although both Google searches are about the same concept, making banana bread, the search results vary due to the rankings Google has assigned each website in relation to the search. There are several factors that Google takes into consideration when ranking websites, and according to the article written by Barysevich, the 4 most important ones are content, backlinks, mobile-first user experience, and other technical factors.

Content
As the title implies, Google ranks websites for a search result according to whether or not the search matches the content of the page. Notice how when I searched for a banana bread recipe, my search results did not include anything about lemon-pound cakes.

Backlinks
According to ShoutMe Loud, backlinks are incoming links to a webpage. Me linking ShoutMe Loud's article about backlinks is an example of a backlink to ShoutMe Loud. Backlinks help your site be considered more relevant by Google. Note that high-quality backlinks need to come from a number of diverse and authoritative domains.

Mobile-First User Experience
Whether your site has been optimized for a mobile device or not affects the ranking Google gives your page. I searched for how to make banana bread on my mobile device and my search results was the following:

As you can see, the top 3 sites are the same on my desktop computer and on my mobile device. However, the ranking is slightly different: the second and third websites are switched when searching on my phone. This is because, according to Google, the Live Well Bake Well Often is better optimized for a mobile device than The Kitchn. 

Other Technical Factors

The other technical factors listed are encryption, H1 and H2 headings, anchor text, and interstitials. Note that websites that have not switched to HTTPS are now marked as unsafe in Google Chrome and an ad or CTA that covers the main content or whisks users to a new page upon clicking might suffer a penalty (SearchEngine Journal).

It is important to remember that Google rankings chance every day, so maintaining and upkeeping your site constantly will ensure a better ranking than the one in those sites that are left alone/are not updated for a long period of time.