What Is SEO? Learn the Basics of Search Engine Optimization

Friday, June 13, 2025

Mastering on-page SEO is essential for improving your website’s visibility, driving targeted traffic, and ultimately boosting your online success. Since switching to mobile-first indexing in 2018, Google has prioritized sites optimized for mobile traffic, even for desktop search. Meta descriptions are another HTML element that provides a brief overview of your page’s content in search engine results pages. You can also leverage the Auto-Optimize feature, which will include the keywords naturally in your content. In the Content Editor you can see which keywords to include in your content and how often.

A guide to Google Search ranking systems

You will need a working knowledge of all these Google ranking factors if you want to succeed in your SEO journey. To know when your website is losing links, use SEOptimer’s Backlink Research tool. It automatically checks your whole backlinks profile and sends email alerts when one of your links status changes. Don’t link to unrelated websites and sites that have been deindexed or penalized by Google. Your external backlinks are recommendations to your users and have to be of very high quality. There are millions of websites competing with you for higher rankings and more organic traffic.

seo ranking factors

Better data & analytics = higher rankings.

Your name, address, and phone number must be accurate and consistent everywhere it appears online. Even small differences — like using “St.” on your website but “Street” on your Google Business Profile — can create confusion with search engines and hurt your rankings. Technical SEO ensures that search engines can easily crawl and index your website.

Google’s algorithms BHS Links are increasingly focused on delivering the most relevant and high-quality content to users. The more helpful, informative, and engaging your content is, the better it will perform in search rankings. Incorporating an FAQ section on your website is an effective way to improve user experience.

seo ranking factors

I lead strategic marketing and business development initiatives, helping businesses overcome plateaus and achieve significant growth. My journey has led me to collaborate with leading businesses and apply my knowledge to revolutionize industries. You can hide some parts of your mobile website to increase usability for mobile users. Using your main keyword in the description will most likely help you improve the click-through rate. You may use multiple URLs to the same page, or add URL parameters for searches and categories, etc. If you don’t tell Google the original page you want to rank by using canonical tags, your pages will compete with each other and this affects your SEO negatively.

seo ranking factors

Google checks the Core Web Vitals of a website to determine its user experience based on user interactions with the website. All things remaining the same, Google prefers to rank sites that can be easily accessed from all kinds of devices. Mobile-friendly sites are rewarded with higher rankings and sites that don’t render well on mobile devices are punished.

  • We’re a full-service digital marketing agency with years of experience creating local SEO strategies for our clients.
  • With the right tools at your disposal, you’ll be better equipped to enhance your site’s performance and reach your target audience.
  • One of the best ways your website can establish it is through links from other reputable websites.
  • AI content must therefore be helpful, relevant, and aligned with user intent so that your rankings stay in good shape.

No matter which method you use, however, the content on your site must be the same on both desktop and mobile devices. Each version must have the same title tags and meta descriptions, too. Average engagement time reflects how long visitors were actively engaged with the content on your site. Google Business Manager, formerly Google My Business, is how you manage your Google Business Profile. Signing up for it is completely free and is something every local business owner should use.

seo ranking factors

seo ranking factors

We’ll look more at linking practices to improve SEO ranking in tip #8. Though Google has penalized exact-match domains (those where the target keyword is in the URL), that penalty is generally for spammy sites with thin content. Did you know that nearly 60% of the sites with a top ten Google search ranking are three or more years old?

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