How exactly Google does their ranking is a mystery.  But with a little bit of experience, keeping an eye on what works and what doesn’t, there are a number of influencing factors you can extrapolate from trial and error.  Google has confirmed they use about 200 ranking factors, so Search Engine Journal and Backlinko have put together an infographic about the potential factors you should consider.

This infographic is a great way to learn and integrate some of the concepts into your own game plan for your site.  It is divided into sections for easy planning.  Here is a summary:

1 – Domain Factors

1. Domain Age – they do use it, but doesn’t appear to be that important
2. Keywords in Domain Name – if it appears first, or in the name at all, or is an exact match,  it appears to give a bit of an edge
3. Length of Registration – The longer into the future it’s registered, the better
4. Whois Factors – Privacy may be a warning signal to Google
5. Country Extension – Helps locally, but may hinder globally (.ca, .cn, .pt)

2 – Page-Level Factors

1. Keywords – If the target keyword appears in title tag, description tag, header (H1) tag, and is frequently used (but not too much) those are all relevant factors.
2. Content – Longer content, that is not duplicate content, that is updated and refreshed often, are all positive ranking factors.  Correct spelling and grammar are a plus (but aren’t they always?).
3. Links – Outbound link quality, the number of links sends trust and authority signals to Google.  Too many broken links on a page may be a sign of a neglected or abandoned site.
4. Images and Multimedia – Relevant file names, alt text, descriptions and captions all send relevancy signals about your site.
5. Page URL – The shorter, better themed, keyword rich page URL’s appear to be more favored.

3 – Site Level Factors

1. Content – Original, with unique value and insights provide relevancy indicators.
2. Trust – Also called Trustrank or Domain Trust, is measured by how many links away your site is from highly trusted sites.  Linked Google Analytics and Webmaster Tools are helpful for indexing.
3. Updates – The more often pages are updated and added, along with a relevant sitemap, help Google index your page and keep it relevant.
4. Usability – Breadcrumb navigation, mobile optimization, and user reviews are becoming more prominent factors over time.

4 – Back Link Factors

1. Domains – The age, authority of the domain linking to your site (older the better), the number of referring domains (the higher the better), the domain extensions (.EDU or .GOV for example), the diversity of linking domains (more natural and diverse the better) are all important to your site’s rank.
2. Pages – The page rank (higher = better), link anchor text (relevancy), the location on the page (embedded in content is best), the type of page (hub or resource pages are better), and resource sites (DMOZ or Wikipedia) all carry relevant signals about your site.
3. Content – User generated, high quality content with relevant text around the link are factors that impact positively or negatively on your site.

5 – User Interaction

1. Organic – Page that get more click through for particular keywords, or that get lots of comments may be a signal of user interaction and quality.
2. Traffic – High bounce rates may be an indicator of quality, while sites with lots of repeat direct traffic may get a SERP boost.

6 – Special Algorithm Rules

1. Google Plus – Google shows more relevant higher results for authors and sites you’ve added to your Google Plus Circles (follow this link to set up your Google Plus Page for Business)
2. Users – Browsing history, search history, and geo-specific IP factors all impact results on the end users results page.

7 – Social Signals

1. Twitter – Number of tweets (higher the better), and authority of twitter user accounts have a greater affect on rank. (click this link to set up your Twitter Business Page)
2. Facebook – Like twitter, the number of shares and popularity of sharing pages may pass more weight. (Here is a step-by-step guide on how to set up your Facebook Page for Business)
3. Pinterest – not sure how pins impact quite yet, but you should have a Pinterest Page.
4. Google Plus – Verified authorship, and authority of Google Plus page, and a lot of +1’s coming from accounts with many followers are all good things.

8 – Brand Signals

1. Brand – Name and anchor text, along with brand specific searches are good indicators of trust.  A site with Facebook page (and likes), Twitter profile (and followers), Official LinkedIn Company Page with employees listed on LinkedIn and linked, are all good.
2. News – Really big brands get mentioned on Google News sites all the time.

9 – On-Site Webspam Factors

1. Optimization – Site and page over-optimization are negative factors.  Recently Google stated that it’s better to not have meta tags than to have duplicate tags on multiple pages.  Over keyword stuffing of tags is negative too.
2. Content – Computer generated content is frowned upon, and could lead to de-indexing.  Low quality content (and content farms) are less visible in search after the Panda penalty.
3. Affiliates – You’re inviting additional scrutiny with affiliate links and attempting to hide those links.
4. IP – If your server’s IP address is flagged as spam, it may hurt all the sites on that server.

10 – Off Page Webspam Factors

1. Links – Unnatural influx of links is a sure-fire sign of phony link building schemes.  Links from the same IP, and linking domain relevancy may negate the positive affects of those links.  You can potentially remedy the situation using the disavow tool, and if your site is really negatively impacted, ask for a reconsideration request.
2. Manual Penalties – Google has human reviewers, and has been known to hand out manual penalties.

Here’s the infographic:

I hope this summary has been helpful!

Happy Marketing!

Dave Burnett

Click Here to Connect with Dave on Google+: www.google.com/+DaveBurnett

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