Where do people go first when they need a product, service, or solution? not the Yellow Pages. not a township. At this point, not even to friends and family. They visit Google+. And the majority of them never leave the results page.
And because of this, SEO, or search engine optimization, is a multi-billion dollar industry. SEO is the process of adjusting a website to Google’s ranking factors. What are those Top SEO Ranking Factors 2024, then, and how can you make your website work around them? Find out more later.
What are SEO Ranking Factors?
SEO is the process of optimizing your website for organic search results (yes, you can aim for the first page). We refer to unpaid search results when talking about search by the term “organic. “This contrasts with PPC advertising’s paid results.
These are your SEO ranking factors, and an algorithm that considers various characteristics and SEO metrics determines your organic Google rankings.
We are aware of many of the over 200 Google ranking factors, but we do know a lot of them. We are also aware that, despite changing ranking factors and algorithms, Google’s goals are to extract expertise, authority, and trust (E A T).
E-A-T is not a ranking factor; rather, ranking factors serve as a method by which Google evaluates E-A-T.
The 10 top SEO ranking factors 2024 include:
- Relevant and Informative Content
- Keyword Placement On Web Pages
- Images Affects Website Ranking
- Niche Expertise and Authority
- Backlinks
- Page Speed
- Website Mobile Friendliness
- Core Web Vitals
- Website Link Structure
- Website Security
Types of SEO Ranking Factors
Let’s go over the various types of keywords before focusing on the top 10 Google ranking factors for how to optimize your website pages.
- On-Page SEO Ranking Factors – The quality of the page’s content and the keywords it is targeting are considered on-page SEO ranking factors.
- Off-Page SEO Ranking Factors – Backlinks are a major component of off-page SEO ranking factors, similar to endorsements from other pages on your website or other websites.
- Technical SEO Ranking Factors – Technical ranking factors assess the suitability of your website for crawling, indexing, and rendering of content quickly and securely for searchers.
- Local SEO Ranking Factors – All three of the above are taken into account in local ranking factors, with particular attention given to reviews, reputation, and listings.
There isn’t one ranking factor that will determine your SEO. It’s the combination of all your technical, on-page, and off-page efforts that work together to improve your Google ranking, increase traffic, and foster trust.
On-Page SEO Ranking Factors
The On-Page SEO term is used to describe the technical search engine ranking factors that apply to your website as a whole, while these next ranking factors are more page-specific.
Relevant and Informative Content
The quality of your content is the single most crucial factor in Google ranking. This is in line with the chart above’s consistent publication of high-quality content, user engagement, and niche expertise. What constitutes relevant, high-quality content, then?
It is reliable. The information is thorough, reliable, and free of spam comments and/or links.
It is understandable. That means written in conversational terms and not crammed with keywords like “Google will penalize you for this.” Use it interchangeably with related keywords and naturally incorporate it into your page.
It is new. Even the most popular articles lose relevance over time. Therefore, you should update outdated pages with new information and new keywords that are pertinent to today in addition to writing brand-new content. This is essential for upholding a high level of freshness.
It satisfies the keyword’s purpose. Make sure to search the keyword on Google itself to make sure you know what users are looking for when they perform that search in addition to using keyword research tools to find out what your ideal audience is searching online.
According to a recent poll conducted by Directive, 78% of marketers thought keyword research had a significant impact on driving new traffic. You can learn more about your target audience’s search queries and write content that addresses them directly during the research process.
Keyword Placement On Web Pages
It’s crucial to include keywords in specific places on your page once you’ve decided which ones to rank for. Among these are:
- Meta title: the title that appears on a SERP.
- H1 title: the page’s title.
- H2 headings: aim for at least two.
- Keep your URL brief and to the point.
- Naturally in the body and the first 100 words.
- In the body, as well as in the first 100 words,
The blurb below the title tag or meta title is known as the meta description. Make sure it effectively sums up your page and provides a reason for clicking for searchers. Although the meta description you provide is important, Google still needs to include it.
The title tags ‘keywords are by far the most crucial, followed by H2s and URLs.
Images Affects Website Ranking
This is crucial because, especially on mobile devices, regular search results are becoming more and more visual, as well as because of Google Image Search. How can your images be optimized for SEO?
This is the only way Google can “see” an image’s text alternative, and it is the only one that can be done with them. Include the keyword and be brief but succinct. Additionally, this makes your website accessible to visitors who are visually impaired and who use screen readers to browse the internet and will display if the image doesn’t load.
Use an image compression tool to compress and resize images if necessary. Saving as JPG rather than PNG is frequently beneficial. Additionally, larger than 1000px images are uncommon. The fewer requests your website makes to the server, the faster the page speed, even though a responsive website will automatically resize the images.
Use examples, charts, and illustrations that illustrate concepts instead of empty stock images and graphics in your blog posts. This increases the content’s quality and keeps users engaged longer.
Include the phrase “keyword “in both the file name and the alt text. Replace the spaces in the file name with dashes, as required, otherwise, your CMS will replace them with “+,” which results in an untrustworthy-looking image link.
Niche Expertise and Authority
Your niche’s expertise lies not just in the quality of your content, but also in the quantity of that content. For instance, WordStream has long been producing high-quality PPC content, which makes it a good sign that Google has come to trust us in this field. However, we have a low chance of getting a top-notch post about, say, robotic process automation.
Use the hub and spoke approach, also known as the pillar page and cluster content, to expand your area of expertise. With this approach, you build a hub/pillar page dedicated to a particular topic, typically with a broad, high-volume keyword. Your various H2s cover various child keywords within that topic, and this serves as the main source for that topic.
Then you have your spokes, or cluster content, which are the additional pages that cover each of the topics covered in the pillar page (child keywords).
This approach also benefits your website structure, which we’ll discuss later, by demonstrating your expertise in this area. All of your links are tightly organized around the same topic because the cluster pages link to and from the pillar content as well as each other.
Off-Page SEO Ranking Factors
Off-Page factors like backlinks, influencers, social media signals, and others, affect search ranking. But, there is one key element of Off-Page SEO i.e. backlinks.
Backlinks
We have backlinks, which is most definitely not the last thing. A backlink is a page that links to your website from another website. A page with numerous backlinks indicates to Google that the specific page is offering exceptional value and is coming from a trustworthy website. However, a single link from a high-quality domain is much more effective than multiple links from several low-authority websites.
How do you obtain backlinks, then? Four link-building techniques are presented here.
If your content is high-quality, original, and delivers value to your audience, it will automatically generate backlinks. Avoid repetitive material, such as thought-leadership material and original, data-driven pieces.
You’ll also want to build backlinks by finding relevant content and pitching your pieces to the author for a link because it takes years to do so.
Guest blogging is another technique for generating backlinks. Offer to write a post for that website rather than just asking for a link. In your author bio or post, you can include a backlink to your website.
Technical SEO Ranking Factors
Technical SEO is typically a joint venture between marketing and development teams because it involves knowledge of website structure and content management systems. Although this may seem complicated, SEO is not very important once your website is in top working order. What are the technical methods for boosting your ranking:
Page Speed
Users want a pain-free browsing experience, so page speed is a crucial ranking factor. Your bounce rate and ranking will decline if your pages take too long to load. Google PageSpeed Insights or GTmetrix can help you determine yours. You can use website speed optimization techniques for SEO to improve your website speed.
Website Mobile Friendliness
Google promised to use mobile-first indexing on all new websites back in 2019. This results in a ranking decision based on a website’s mobile version as opposed to its desktop version. Then, in 2020, it announced plans to apply to all websites, and as of 2021, all websites are now subject to mobile-first indexing.
In other words, even if your website’s desktop version is flawless, mobile-friendly search engine optimization could hurt your site’s ranking significantly. Most content management systems allow for mobile/smaller screen previews and adjustments. Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test is another option.
You should still always preview and test your web pages on mobile devices in addition to these tests because some things are just too difficult for code to understand.
Core Web Vitals
Ranking factors don’t frequently change, despite SEO trends’ ebb and flow. However, Google did include Core Web Vitals as a new ranking factor in the page experience update in 2021. Core Web Vitals assess a person’s online activity, which determines how and when they interact with your page. Among them are:
- LCP (Largest Contentful Paint): how long a page’s visible elements take to load.
- FID (First Input Delay): How long does it take for a page to register after you click or tap it first?
- CLS (Cumulative Layout Shift): whether there are disruptive popups or unanticipated movements.
- With code minification, image compression, and other improvements, you can enhance your Core Web Vitals.
Website Link Structure
Search engines crawl and index various pages of your website, as previously mentioned. Any hyperlink that directs to another page of your same website is considered an internal link. The more points of access you can create to any given page, and the easier it is for search engines (and users) to find what they’re looking for, the more organized and tightly-knit internal linking structure you have.
Any given page on your website should be accessible in three clicks or less, in your opinion.
When creating a new page or piece of content, you must be aware of the pages you are linking to to do this.
It makes the content accessible to search engines, making it easier to read and index. User experience-related topic clusters are also beneficial. Readers will understand that they don’t need to visit multiple websites to find what they’re looking for, which makes your content easier to navigate.
Your website probably already goes through regular maintenance to check for issues like bugs or server issues. Every couple of months, conducting a technical SEO audit of your website to look for issues like 404 errors, redirect loops, and broken links is a good idea for SEO purposes.
Website Security
Ever wonder what HTTPS (as opposed to just old HTTP) means? It does, after all, mean secure. You must obtain an SSL (secure sockets layer) certificate to make your website an https site rather than an http site. The cost of getting an SSL varies depending on both your hosting setup and the level of security you require.
Conclusion on SEO Ranking Factors
You can increase your visibility with a strong presence in both paid and organic search engine results. No matter what type of business you operate, having visibility on search engines is essential if you want to win customers, increase brand awareness, and increase trust.
Remember that there is no such thing as a magic bullet when it comes to real SEO. The most crucial thing to keep in mind is the time required to navigate the search results pages. Tomorrow, your website won’t magically appear in the top three if you optimize it for several ranking factors.
Your website must remain as relevant and up-to-date as possible during the optimization process. You’ll start seeing organic growth as long as your website is functional and designed with your intended audience in mind.
Follow our simple 10-step SEO audit for more opportunities to optimize for Google’s ranking factors, or use our free Website Grader tool to do it for you. Or, to find out how we can assist you with your SEO, check out our full range of digital marketing options.