Have you ever wondered whether there is an ultimate strategy that you can rely on to rank highly on Google’s search engine results page?
Well, the simple answer is: yes, there is. But the fact of the matter is that it’s not so easy. Let me try and explain why, before we can get to the strategy.
Google’s search engine ethos is mainly defined by the fact that they want search engine users to receive the most relevant results for searches submitted, in the fastest time possible. Websites that fulfill this need in the best possible way rank higher and are prioritized in search engine results.
This ethos is quintessentially captured through an algorithm that is used to determine which websites deserve to be ranked highest, according to the priority of relevance to a user’s search engine query.
Consequently, by ranking higher on Google’s search engine pages for particular search engine queries, a website is likely to thrive because it would experience more traffic and hence, more conversions.
Every webmaster’s ultimate vision is, therefore, to rank number one on a search engine page for a popular search engine query related to the content on their website, irrespective of whether the website is informational or e-commerce or business-related.
The key to ranking highly on the search engine hence, lies with developing a strategy to observe Google’s ethos (Read: algorithm) because understanding the factors that affect the algorithm determines how well your website will be ranked.
Everything that I have mentioned so far sounds very straightforward and almost automatic, but the truth is that if it were as easy as it sounds, everybody would be number one on Google’s SERP (search engine results page), right? …and we all know that this is impossible because not everyone can be number one!
The fact of the matter is that webmasters, and most Google employees, for that matter, don’t know what factors are used to determine how high a website ranks. What is, however, clear is that some 200 ranking factors are used in the algorithm, and Google gives some guidelines of where their priorities lie with these ranking factors.
Whereas Google is continually refining its algorithm, there have been five major algorithm changes that have affected how webmasters and users experience the search engine. These algorithm updates have been named as follows:
As a whole, the main direction and benefits of Google’s algorithm refinements so far have been:
This article shall discuss what you need to know about the different algorithms and algorithm updates that Google releases, how the algorithms affect websites, either positively or negatively, and more specifically how you should shape your SEO strategy to conform with right SEO practice, good web design and suitable web development practice, so as to get the best online visibility and give your audience the best user experience.
The Panda update was the first major update to the Google algorithm since its inception. Its primary impetus was to fine-tune the quality of relevant search results by prioritizing high-quality search results and pushing further back lower quality search results.
In essence, this update was a move by Google to produce better, high-quality results with relevant content that the search engine user desires.
This was done by filtering out or giving much less prominence to lower quality content or spam content that the search engine user didn’t want to spend time looking at and giving more priority to websites that users prefer to look at.
Through this update, SEO’s job was elevated to become more robust than only producing good content, putting in keywords, and adding backlinks, to thinking more about the experience that the website offered.
Google forced webmasters to shift their focus to creating a website and brand that people will love, trust, reward, and share with others. Essentially, strategic thinking about the user’s experience became more important when creating websites.
Since the Panda Update was launched back in March of 2011, there has been a refresh or fine-tuning of the algorithm every one to two months, totaling approximately 26 changes up until now.
What's more, the Panda Update also precipitated the idea that paying attention to what Google had to say about fine-tuning your website for better search engine ranking is very important. This is because there is a continuous evolution of what good SEO practice is defined to be. In short, good SEO practice today could very quickly become bad SEO practice or outdated practice tomorrow.
Below is a look at three main quality factors that the Panda Update introduced, including ways to avoid getting punished by the Panda update.
There is a lot of information online about duplicate content and how you should avoid doing it, but it is important also to highlight that it’s not necessarily duplicate content that gets you penalized by Google, but more the fact that spam-like content is frowned upon.
I would say that it is better to focus on producing unique, useful, and rich content that is helpful to the user.
With that said, two main issues need to be addressed when it comes to duplicate content on your website.
The first issue is for duplicate content that you have explicitly generated for your website.
To stem this issue, use a duplicate page finder to look for duplicate content on your web pages. If you find duplicate content on your website, you have two options:
The second issue is about duplicate content on your website from other sources, including guest posts and sponsored articles.
To stem this issue, ensure that before you accept guest content, you first run it through plagiarism or duplicate checker like smallseotools.com to rest assured that the content you wish to use on your website is mostly unique.
You should target content that is more than 80% unique. Content that has less than 70% unique content rating should be taken down immediately or improved upon.
Other issues that can cause penalties due to duplicate content include:
If you have unique, useful, and rich content on your website, but you still experience poor search engine ranking, you should turn your attention to the quality of inbound links.
Refer to the Google Penguin Update below for more information on this.
Your website's usability, design, and usefulness to the user are the main factors that determine the bounce rate of your website.
To be more specific, if users get to your website and leave your website without any interaction because they can’t find what they are looking for, or because your website is too complex to navigate through, then your bounce rate becomes high.
A bounce rate that is higher than 60% is too high and implies that you need to put in some work on your website to make it more user-friendly. To find out your website bounce rate, sign up for a Google Analytics account, and make use of informative guides on Google Analytics.
With that said, sometimes, your website's bounce rate can vary abnormally. For instance, if you happen to have redesigned your website to make it better for your audience, the bounce rate is likely to vary as your audience gets accustomed to the new layout of the website’s user interface.
There are several different solutions that you can use to reduce your website's bounce rate.
If your website retention is very low, meaning that visitors don’t come back to your website frequently enough, then Google assumes that your website is not very relevant or that you don’t frequently refresh the content on your website.
Some of the different ways to get visitors to come back to your website include:
To better plan your website, three important factors need to be addressed. These include:
The Penguin Update’s primary motivation has been to limit and discourage the unethical use of links (both inbound and outward links).
The unethical use of links involves trying to gain favor with Google by tricking the search engine that the website is an authority website or that the website has rich content.
Through this algorithm update, issues not favorably looked upon, including the use of:
When developing your website’s SEO strategy, keep in mind the following considerations:
The Hummingbird update has been one of Google’s most significant search engine algorithm updates so far. In September 2013, Google made substantial changes not only to the algorithm but also to indexing methods as well.
The main motivation behind the Hummingbird update is for Google to understand user queries better and therefore be able to return better and more useful results.
In essence, the search query intent by the user became more important than the mere use of the keyword itself. Therefore, content that best answers the intent of a user’s query is more likely to rank higher and more favorably than content, which includes the same keywords used by the user.
Source: Pre-Hummingbird and post-Hummingbird search techniques
In essence, your hummingbird strategy should focus on using tools like Google’s Keyword Planner, that will help you find relevant keywords used by users and then use the keywords in a conversational style within your website's relevant content.
Also, it is very important to focus on producing content with your reader's needs in mind, so that your audience can get hooked and engaged by the interesting content that addresses their needs, concerns, curiosities and general queries.
The Pigeon algorithm update was launched in July 2014, and its primary goal is to provide useful, relevant, and fast query results to web users looking for local search results.
The update has so far only been launched in the USA, Canada, UK, and Australia and not in the rest of the world, although this may take effect soon.
Based on this algorithm update, your strategy should incorporate the following ideas:
Source: Search radius has been refined
In February 2015, consistent with Google’s intention to make the user experience through the search engine a more pleasant one, the focus through this update was to give priority to websites that were optimized for mobile devices.
This focus on mobile devices comes from the fact that more and more people do searches through mobile devices than through the desktop computer.
In the USA, for example, 94% of searches conducted are on smartphones, with 77% of mobile searches surprisingly happening at home or work, places where you would easily find a desktop computer.
Website creators, anticipating massive changes that this algorithm update would bring, dubbed the launch update Mobilegeddon. Mobilegeddon happened on April 21, 2015, and with it came the changes as promised.
Source: Mobile SEO is appropriately done versus a normal webpage on a mobile device
Some of the considerations that you will need to keep in mind with this algorithm update are as follows:
If you are not sure about the impact of ‘Mobilegeddon’ on your website, there are several things that you can do.
The influence of the Google algorithm updates can be quite impactful to webmasters and to businesses that rely solely on their website for online revenue.
For many website owners, proper SEO Training and following Google’s guidelines, can make the difference between a thriving online business and get lost in oblivion, never to be seen or heard from again.
If you want to have the least negative impact on your website and your business, mainly if you rely on Google searches, having a web strategy that aligns your website goals and your online business's vision to that of Google’s ethos, is critical.
Furthermore, being nimble enough to make quick changes that adhere to Google algorithm changes may be vital for you. Google usually forewarns all stakeholders about upcoming algorithm updates that it is about to implement, which means keeping an ear to the ground, with regards to what Google has to say, is important for all webmasters.
Alternatively, and maybe more importantly, if you feel that you are over-reliant on Google Searches, then it is time that you find different ways to diversify your marketing strategy, or else you may quite easily meet your doom in the online world.
Employing different strategies, including good PR and marketing for your online business, may be an important move to make for your online business or your website.
Ironically, the more you begin to use robust strategies including PR and marketing strategies to promote your business, the better your Google rank is likely to become because you will be focusing on brand recognition and on being an authority to be reckoned with, which is what Google is directing its search engine results towards.
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Maryanne Gaitho holds a degree in Sociology and writes on a wide range of topics Some of the topics she has written about include big data, project management, online Marketing and Salesforce.
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