Google's 200 Ranking Factors: The Complete List - For 2016
PUBLISHED: MARCH 18, 2016 - ARTICLE: GOOGLE'S 200 RANKING FACTORS: THE COMPLETE LIST
More SEO Tips And Tricks From Easysite On The Best Way To Rank Your Website
On-Page SEO Tips
- Search Engine Optimisation And How To Get It Right
- Its Important To Choose The Right Website Builder
- Not Sure How SEO Works? Watch A Video And Get Some Helpful Search Engine Optimisation Tips
- How Does Google Find The Best Website For A Search Query?
- What Happens When You Search The Web?
- How To Set Up Each Page On Your Site And Rank High In Search Results
Off-Page SEO Tips
- What Is Off-Page SEO
- How To Drive Organic Search Traffic To Your Site
- Why Do You Need To Get Your Website Link On Other Sites
- What Are The Benefits Of Off-Page SEO To Website Owners
- Some Popular Ways Webmasters Build Links
Must Read
As you may or may not know Google uses about 200 factors to rank websites in their algorithm to work out what your page is about, and how to rank the page on their search results. The million dollar question is what are they? Find out here.
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Hi and welcome to our SEO article on Google's 200 ranking factors. My name is Mike and I am part of the Easysite team and going help you get to the top of those search results.
If you follow the below SEO tutorials when you make a website with Easysite your site will rank higher for its given keywords on Googles search results. This means lots more free visitors and more sales.
There are lots of different search engines on the web. But the best place to rank your site would be Google. About 70% of the people in the world use Google to find what they are looking for. Thats why its important to rank your site at the top of Google's search engine results.
Make Yourself A Cup Of Coffee And Find Out How To Rank Your Site On Google
As you may or may not know Google uses about 200 factors to rank websites in their algorithm to work out what your page is about, and how to rank the page on their search results. The million dollar question is what are they?
Today is your lucky day because here at Easysite its not only about using our site builder to build your website we also want you to understand SEO and how important it is to get it right. We care and want your site to rank high on Google.
Some are proven.
Some are controversial.
Others are a SEO educated guess.
But they are all below.
1. How Long To Register A Domain For:
When you register your domain try and register it for at least five years or even ten years. Most spam websites are normally registered for one year. By registering your domain for five or ten years you are telling Google you are here to stay.
Did you know when you create a website with Easysite we give you a free domain name, sign up here and get your free domain name.
2. Keyword Appears In Top Level Domain:
This used to play a vital part in ranking your website. But today does not give the boost it used to. Having your main keyword in the domain still acts as a relevancy signal. Visitors that see your link will also know what the site is about.
If possible try to register a domain with your main keyword phrase, and new pages on your site should also have the keyword for the page in the URL.
Example: The URL of this page is www.easysite.com/google-ranking-factors/
Notice our keyword in the URL (google ranking factors).
3. Keyword As First Word In Your Domain:
If you want to get that edge over competitors start your domain with your main keywords. This will help to tell Google that those words (your keywords) are important.
Example: webdesignbymike is better than mikeswebdesign the main keyword is web design.
4. Domain Age:
The difference between a domain that's three months old versus two year old or older. The older the domain name the more authority, backlinks and shares it will have and this will influence the ranking. So yes domain age counts for a few points in Google's eyes.
5. Keyword In Subdomain Name:
Keywords appearing in the subdomain can boost rankings. Utilizing a subdomain name can help grow your business. Organize your site for your website visitors, by doing it this way it will also have a impact for the better on your overall SEO strategy.
6. Domain History:
Are you bad or good? Google's search engine is constantly crawling your site, visiting all the pages and reviewing your content. The Google bots are checking inbound and outbound links and more. Your domain history reflects how your website has performed overtime.
A record of your website's rankings, history, link building practices, and even traffic are stored. If your website has been penalized in any shape or fashion, your domain history will reflect that. A website that has a history of violating guidelines or having different penalties on Google will have a very hard time getting back to the top of Google's search results.
Do not do anything to get your site penalized. Don't buy cheap backlinks. Don't copy content from other sites. Don't link to spammy sites. Make sure the majority of outbound links on your site have the nofollow tag.
7. Exact Match Domain:
A exact match domain is exactly that, its a domain that matches the search query precisely. Exact match domains may still have an advantage if the site is a quality site.
But if its a low-quality site, it's vulnerable to the exact match domains update.
8. Public vs. Private WhoIs:
So far Google has never recommended that you should hide your data. Making it private may seem you have something to hide. If a visitor researchers your business, private WhoIs data in your account could make people question the identity of who owns the website.
Most people won't want to know who owns the website. Google has never released a specific statement that private or public WhoIs data may be better than the other. Its best to always be honest with the Search Engines!
9. Penalized WhoIs Owner:
Any site owner that has a spam site must be wary. Once Google finds out that a person has a spam site the person will be a penalized WHOis owner. Google will then try to find out whether the person owns other websites by checking domain and hosting registrations.
This is a SEO ranking factor used by Google to stop spammers building more sites after being penalized. This will help to eliminate spam websites by that owner.
10. Country TLD Extension:
What are Country TLDs?
http://www.webdesigncompany.co.uk - (United Kingdom) http://www.webdesigncompany.us - (USA)
Using a country TLD extension is a strong way to tell Google you would like the site to rank in that country, and it will help the site rank better in the country. So if you want your site to rank well in your country and not world wide use a country TLD extension.
11. Keyword In Title Tag:
The title tag is a webpage's second most important piece of content (besides the actual content of the page) and therefore sends a strong on-page SEO signal.
12. Title Tag Starts With Keyword:
Its good SEO practice to have your main keyword for the page first in your title tag rather than at the end of the tag. Google sees the words that are first as more important.
13. Keyword In Description Tag:
Again try to include your main keyword at the beginning of the keyword tag, and make sure its a good description of what the page is about.
14. Keyword Appears In H1 Tag:
There are six heading tags. H1 to H6 the most important heading tag is the H1 tag. Placing important words that you want to rank for in the heading tags will let Google know what the page is about.
Each heading tag should have unique keyword phrases to avoid over optimization of that keyword phrase on that page.
15. Keyword Is Most Frequently Used Phrase On Page:
When your keyword or keyword phrase appears more than other words, acts as a relevancy signal. This tells Google those words are important to the web page and helps you rank for those words.
16. Content Length:
Content is King. The serpIQ analyzed the top 10 search results for over 20,000 keywords and noticed a pattern. The average content length for a web page that ranks in the top 10 results for any keyword on Google has at least 2,000 words. It looks like the higher up you go on Google search results, the more content each web page has.
Create good well written content on each page and plenty of it. Never copy from other sites. If its interesting for your readers its interesting to Google and will rank well. Visitors will also share the page creating natural backlinks to the page.
Don't think you can write a load of rubbish content and as long as its over 2000 words expect your rankings or conversions to go up. If you write good unique content you will get the tweets, links, conversions, and higher rankings.
17. Keyword Density:
Keyword density still plays a roll on your page. Google still uses keyword density to help determine the topic of a webpage. Use long tail and short tail keyword phrases in the content. Be careful not to over optimize the page to much is just as bad as to little.
18. Latent Semantic Indexing Keywords In Content (LSI):
Latent semantic indexing keywords or (LSI keywords) help search extract the meaning from words with more than one meaning. Example: File can be a cardboard folder or metal rasping tool?
19. LSI Keywords In Title And Description Tags:
Just like your webpage content LSI keywords in meta tags will also help Google discern between synonyms.
20. Page Loading Speed:
Page speed matters. Its a fact pages that load super fast rank higher than slow loading pages. Make sure your home page and landing pages load fast. Check your website page speed.
21. Duplicate Content:
Duplicate content is content that appears on your website or the Internet in more than one place. Duplicate content on your website can negatively influence a site, and effect your rankings on Google. Use www.siteliner.com to check your site for duplicate content.
22. Rel=Canonical:
When used correctly will help Google from considering pages duplicate content. More on how to use canonical URLs.
23. Page Load Speed - Chrome:
Chrome user data may also be used by Google to get a better handle on a page's loading time.
24. Image Optimization:
Images on your page can help tell search engines what the page is about by naming the image with a relative keyword, and using the image alt text, title, description and caption. You should also optimize images before uploading to your site.
This will make the image file size smaller and help to load the page faster. Don't have to many large images on the page. Use the image resize tool to resize your image and tiny png to reduce your image file size with out effecting the image quality. Its easy to add pictures to your site when you make a website using Easysite.
24. How Recent Is Your Page Or Post:
Having the date that you updated the page, as Google now shows the date if you have it on your page. Read more on Googles official Blog about Caffeine.
Search results for Easysite. Notice the date displayed when the page was updated.
26. Content Updates:
Its important to update stale content. Rather remove a large selection of content that's not relevant any more and replace it with fresh new content. Keeping your site up to date is important. Think of all the new sites that are created daily if their content is more relevant than your old content chances are their page will replace your in search results.
Posting content and updating content is easy when you create a website using Easysite.
27. Historical Page Or Posts Updates:
The more times a page is updated also play a role in freshness. Daily, weekly, yearly? It does not matter how many times you update the page or post just make sure when the page gets stale you update it.
28. Keyword At The Beginning Of Your Content:
Try to have the main keyword or keyword phrase start your page content. If you cannot then try fit your main keywords in the first 50 words of a page's content. This will also tell Google those words are important and sends a significant relevancy signal to Google.
29. Keyword In H2, H3 Tags:
Adding your keyword to either the H2 or H3 heading could also help your ranking for that keyword. Words added to the heading tags are treated as important words by Google.
30. Keyword Word Order:
Having a exact match of the word the searcher is looking for in your content will help you rank better than the same keyword phrase in a different order.
For example: Lets say we were searching for "create a website". A page optimized for the phrase "create a website" would rank higher in search results than a page optimized for "how to create a website".
Its always best to know how many people search for the keyword, so that when you rank for the keyword people will be using that keyword on search engines, and you will get lots of visitors because you have done your keyword research.
31. Outbound Link Quality:
Linking to high authority sites from your page with the same topic is another way to tell Google what the page is about. It will also send trust signals to Google. Try have a few out bound links on some of your pages. Remember make sure the link opens in a new page, and has the nofollow attribute.
Copy code below
<a href="http://www.yourlinkhere" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Keyword here</a>
32. Outbound Link Topic:
When linking to another site, search engines may use the content of the other site as a relevancy signal.
For example: If you had a page about web design that linked to a page that was all about designing buildings you would be telling Google your page is about designing buildings. Make sure you only link to high authority sites with the same topic as the page you are linking from.
33. Grammar and Spelling:
Make sure your site has no spelling errors and proper grammar if you want your site to rank high on Googles search results.
Check your site for spelling errors using the free online spell check tool.
34. Unique Content:
Make sure each page has content that's unique, in other words its your original work. NEVER copy from other sites. If you find content on the web its already indexed. If its already indexed Google indexed it because its original. If you copy that content your page has little or no chance of ranking.
Do not even hire people to write for you as they may use scraped content. Take your time with your content and write it in your own words for some great results.
35. Helpful Supplementary Content:
Helpful supplementary content is an indicator of a page's quality.
36. How Many Outbound Links Should You Have:
Be careful of dofollow out bound links. They will leak PageRank and Page Authority. Google could also think you are making money from selling links on your site if you have to many dofollow links and your site could get penalized.
37. Multimedia:
Images (remember to name images with keywords), videos, podcasts and other multimedia elements should all be about the topic of the page. This will help Google to determine where the page goes on search results.
38. Internal Links Pointing To Page:
When you link to a page on your site from another page on your site you telling Google that you recommend that page and its important. This is why webmasters will always include a link back to the websites home page using different keyword anchor text. This will help boost the home page on search results for those anchor text keywords.
You can also link to pages that are relative to the page you are on. This will help Google bots and visitors find more relative content on your site.
Example: We could link back to our home page with a link like this create a website using Easysite.com.
39. Quality Of Internal Links Pointing To Page:
The more authority a page has when it comes to internal linking the stronger the effect.
40. Broken Links:
Broken links can damage your site. If you don't remove them its a sign of a neglected or abandoned site. Check for broken links at least once a month, when you find a broken link replace it or remove it.
Here is a how you can find all the broken links on your site www.brokenlinkcheck.com.
41. Reading Level:
Google has software to estimate the reading level of webpages. Some SEO experts say that a site with a basic reading level will do better, because anyone on the web that can read the language its written in will be able to read it.
42. Affiliate Links:
A few affiliate links should not hurt your site. How ever if you have loads of affiliate links it could effect your rankings. Google could think you are a "thin affiliate site".
43. HTML Errors/W3C Validation:
If you write your own coding make sure its free of errors. Errors in your HTML could effect the performance of your website.
If you use a website builder like Easysite to make a website you will not have any HTML errors or coding errors. Build your own website with Easysite today. You can even try create your own website free for 30 days.
44. Page Host's Domain Authority
All things being equal a page on an authoritative domain will rank higher on Google than a page on a domain with less authority.
45. Page's PageRank:
Page rank is not used or updated any more by Google. But webmasters still like to try and get inbound links from high pagerank websites.
46. URL Length:
The shorter the better.
47. URL Path:
The closer the pages are to your home page the better. Try have every page on your site no more than three clicks from your home page.
48. Human Editors At Google:
Some say Google has filed a patent for a system that allows human editors to influence the SERPs, but this has never been confirmed.
49. Page Category:
The category the webpage is on sends a relevancy signal. A webpage that's part of a related category should get a good boost compared to a webpage that's under an unrelated category.
50. Blog Tags:
Tags are a specific relevancy signal.
51. Keyword In URL:
Having your main keyword or keyword phrase in the URL sends another strong signal to Google that those are important words.
52. URL String:
The categories in the URL string are read by Google and may help to provide a signal to what a webpage is about.
53. References And Sources:
Citing references and sources, like research papers do, may be a sign of quality.
54. Bullets And Numbered Lists:
Using bullets breaks up your content. It brings attention to certain words. It could even tell Google those words are important so remember to add keywords in content that's in bullets.
55. Priority Of Page In Sitemap:
The priority a page is given via the sitemap.xml file could influence ranking. Make sure the your home page is the highest priority 1.0 and landing pages set to 0.8 or 0.7 less important pages 0.5 and pages like your contact page 0.3 should be fine.
56. Too Many Outbound Links:
The more outbound links you have the more likely visitors will move to another site. You do need outbound links but don't over do it.
57. Quantity Of Other Keywords Page Ranks For:
You may be lucky and your page may rank for other keywords. Google may like how you have planned your SEO and picked up other keyword phrases it thinks your page should rank for.
58. Page Age:
Content is King and older pages may rank higher than newer pages. Remember always update old stale content with fresh new content rather than leaving the old content on a page then creating a new page to add the content on. Regularly updated pages may outperform a newer page.
59. User Friendly Layout:
Make sure your theme is clean and user friendly. The main content should be easy to see and read.
60. Parked Domains:
If you have a parked domain use it or risk loosing the domain authority on it. Get your site up and running as quick as possible.
61. Useful Content:
Higher quality content not necessarily more useful content.
More helpful tips to gain insight into the factors that may help or hurt a website's visibility in search engines.
62. Make Sure Your Content Provides Value:
If your site lacks content of no value beware. Especially if you are trying to make money using affiliate links. If your content does not provide any value your rankings will not improve.
63. Contact Page:
Its important to have a contact page. You should have all your contact details on the page. The contact us page should also be easy to find and the link included in your main menu with the anchor text contact us.
64. Domain Trust/TrustRank:
Site trust measured by how many links away your site is from highly trusted seed sites is a massively important ranking factor.
65. Website Architecture:
Make sure your site is designed well. Google bots and visitors need to find pages a silo structure is a good way to organize your site. Learn how to create a silo structured website.
66. Updating Your Site:
You need to add content to your site regularly. Good fresh unique content will boost your rankings. Also update any old information with new information when available.
67. Number Of Webpages:
The number of pages a site has can help Google separate the weak sites from the strong sites. Weak sites with few pages will rank lower than sites with a large amount of pages.
68. Presence Of Sitemap:
Having a sitemap helps Google find all your webpages. Your sitemap link should be on the bottom of each page. Some visitors may also use your sitemap to find more pages on your site.
69. Site Uptime:
Any sort of downtime can damage your rankings. We know that and when you use Easysite to create a website you won't have to worry about downtime.
70. Server Location:
Server location can also effect your ranking. If you create a website in the USA then Easysite should be your first choice. Our servers live in the USA and using Easysite to make a website will help your rank better in the USA.
71. SSL Certificate:
Google has confirmed that they index SSL certificates and that they use HTTPS as a ranking signal.
72. Terms Of Service And Privacy Pages:
Having a terms of service and privacy page helps tell Google that your site is a trustworthy member of the World Wide Web.
73. Duplicate Meta Information On-Site:
Do not have duplicate meta tags, each meta tag should have its own unique content.
74. Breadcrumb Navigation:
Helps users and Google bots to know where they are on a webpage.
75. Mobile Optimized:
This is a must. Your site must be responsive in todays world. Responsive means that no matter what device you website is viewed on it will look great. Having a responsive website will help your site rank higher. Google displays "Mobile friendly" tags to sites that display well on mobile devices.
When you build a website using Easysite.com it will be responsive and look great on any device your visitor uses.
Find out more about responsive website design from Easysite.
76. YouTube:
Google loves it when you add a YouTube video on your site so where possible make a YouTube video for your page.
77. Site Usability:
A site that's hard to navigate will soon loose visitors and rankings. Make sure your site is easy to navigate and user friendly.
78. Google Analytics And Google Webmaster Tools:
Some webmasters believe having these two programs installed on your site can improve your page's indexing. But both programs can give you a accurate account of how your site is doing and a lot of helpful info that can be used to improve your rankings.
79. User Reviews/Site Reputation:
Watch out if your site gets bad reviews on sites like RipOffReport.com and Yelp.com. A few bad reviews could effect your rankings. If you know of a customer that has a problem try your best to sort the problem out. Maybe then you get a good review and that could help boost your rankings.
Backlink factors
80. Backlinks From Older Domains:
Backlinks from domains that have been around for a few years will have good authority and be more powerful than backlinks from a domain that's only a few months old.
81. Linking To Root Domains:
The number of referring domains linking to your site is one of the most important ranking factors in Google's algorithm. You need a variety of domains, it must seem natural to Google.
82. Links From Separate C-Class IPs:
Links from separate class-c IP addresses suggest a wider breadth of sites linking to you.
83. Linking Pages:
The total number of linking pages even if some are on the same domain is a ranking factor.
84. Alt Tag (for Image Links):
When you use a image and link it to another website the image alt tag acts as the anchor text. If you link to another page on your site make sure the image alt tag contains a keyword or keyword phrase to help tell Google what the image is about. You can also name the image with a keyword phrase.
85. Links From .edu Or .gov Domains:
Links from .edu and .gov domains are powerful and can only boost your rankings.
86. Authority Of Inbound Links:
The more authority of a inbound link the better. You need less links if higher authority inbound links link to your site. Having high authority inbound links to the home page and other pages of your site will boost your site to the top of those search results.
87. Authority Of Linking Domain:
If the home page URL is PR3 and you get a links from a page on the site that's on a PR2 page, it might be less than another site that the home page is PR8 and you get a link from a page on that site from a PR2 page.
Both links back to your site are PR2 but the better link to have would be from the website that has the PR8 home page.
88. Links From Competitors:
If you can get a link from a competitor that's ranking in the same SERP it would be more valuable than a equivalent page rank link that's not the same SERP.
89. Social Shares Of Referring Page:
The amount of social shares on the page that has your backlink on may influence the link's value. The more social shares the stronger the link value.
90. Links From Bad Sites:
Links from bad sites may hurt your site and effect your rankings.
91. Guest Posts:
Guest posts is another way you can get inbound links. Make sure that the site you are guest posting on allows dofollow links in the post. Some only offer nofollow links.
If you are going to offer guest posts on your site be careful. If you offer a dofollow link in the guest post Google may think you are selling links and penalize your site.
92. Links On Homepage Domain:
Links on a sites homepage show Google that that site is very important and holds a lot of value.
93. Nofollow Links:
Its good SEO practice to have a few nofollow inbound and nofollow outbound links on your site. Having a nofollow link keeps all the link juice of the page on the page.
94. Diversity Of Link Types:
Links should be from all sorts of sites. Having an unnaturally large percentage of your links come from a single source will not be natural and Google will penalize you.
95. "Sponsored Links" Or Other Words Around Link:
Words like "sponsors", "link partners" and "sponsored links" may decrease a link's value.
96. Contextual Links:
Links that are in the article content are considered more powerful than links on a page with no content.
97. Excessive 301 Redirects To Page:
Links coming from 301 redirects dilute some or even all PR.
98. Backlink Anchor Text:
Backlink anchor text helps tell Google what the keywords for the page is. You need a selection of different keyword phrases in your anchor text that link back to your site.
99. Internal Link Anchor Text:
Another way to tell Google about your keywords is in your internal links. Placing keywords in the anchor text of the internal link will send signals to Google that those words are important. Find out more on SEO and inner link structure.
100. Link Title Attribution:
Another place to include important words is in the link title. That's the words that you see when you hover over a link. Including keywords and keyword phrases would be a good idea.
101. Country TLD Of Referring Domain:
Want to rank in a certain country? Then you need to get links from those country-specific top level domain extensions.
Example: We want to rank high in the US so getting a backlink from a .us domain extensions like www.2createawebsite.us would help us rank in the US.
102. Link Location In Content:
Its probably better to place a link in the beginning of content as some webmasters think it carries more weight than at the end of the content.
103. Link Location On Page:
Its a known fact. Links in a webpage content are more powerful than links in the footer or sidebar area.
104. Linking Domain Relevancy:
Its important to get inbound links from similar niche sites as your site. This is more powerful than a link from a completely unrelated site. When you are planning your off-page SEO strategy focuses on obtaining relevant links.
105. Page Level Relevancy:
A link from a webpage that's closely tied to page's content is that much more powerful than a link from an unrelated page.
106. Text Around Link Sentiment:
Google probably knows if a link on your site is a recommendation or part of a negative review. If its a positive review it carries more weight.
107. Keyword In Title:
Get that little extra kick for your keywords by including keywords in your title of the link on your page.
108. Positive Link Velocity:
What is positive link velocity? Link velocity is the rate at which a site is gaining inbound links on a day to day basis. If your site has positive link velocity it should be boosted in the SERPs.
109. Negative Link Velocity:
Negative link velocity will have the opposite effect and reduce your rankings.
110. Links from "Hub" Pages:
Its possible that getting links from webpages that are considered hubs or top resources on certain topics get special treatment.
111. Link From Authority Sites:
Having inbound links pointing to your site from authority sites will pass more link juice than sites of a low authority.
112. Wikipedia Inbound Links:
Webmasters are saying that getting inbound links from Wikipedia could benefit your site by giving your site a little extra trust authority on search engines, even if these links are nofollow.
113. Co-Occurrences:
The words that are all around your backlinks will help Google know what the webpage is about. Those words should relate to the topic of the page the backlink is pointing to, this would be good SEO practice.
114. Age Of Backlink:
Google says, older backlinks have more ranking power than newly indexed backlinks.
115. Links From Real Sites vs. Splogs:
Due to the rapid increase of blog networks, Google probably gives more weight to links coming from what it thinks are real sites than from fake blogs. They likely use brand and user-interaction signals to distinguish between the two.
116. Natural Link Profile:
Sites that have a natural link profile will rank high on Google. Google is always changing and updating, if your links look natural to Google your site will be fine. Unnatural links may result in loss of rankings.
117. Reciprocal Links:
What is reciprocal links? A reciprocal link is when site A links to site B and site B links back to site A. This used to be a good way to get backlinks as you would just exchange links with a site of the same category as your site. Now its a bad idea. Avoid doing reciprocal links.
118. User Generated Content Links:
Google is very clever and can identify links generated from user generated content vs content created by the site owner. So make sure your content is your own work.
119. Links From 301:
What is a 301? The 301 status code means that a page has permanently moved to a new location. Links from 301 redirects may lose a little bit of juice compared to a direct link.
120. Schema.org Microformats:
Pages that support microformats may rank higher than pages without it. This could be a direct boost or because that pages with microformatting have a higher SERP CTR.
121. Backlink From DMOZ:
Webmasters always try to get listed on Dmoz as they believe that once listed you get a little more trust from Google.
122. TrustRank Of Linking Site:
The trustworthiness of the site linking to you determines how much "TrustRank" gets passed onto you.
123. Number Of Outbound Links On Page:
Having hundreds of backlinks pointing to different sites on a page means each one of those hundreds of backlinks dilutes the next one.
To benefit from backlinks its best to only have one or two backlinks in the article, and your backlink should be one of those two.
124. Forum Profile Links:
Taking the time and looking for forums and then trying to get your link in the profile has become a waste of time. Those links are of little value because of industrial-level spamming.
125. Word Count Of Linking Content:
If you can get a inbound link in an article that has 1500 words or more, it would be more valuable than having a link in a 100 word snippet.
126. Quality Of Linking Content:
Inbound links from spun content, copied content, and poorly written content will not pass as much value as a well written article.
127. Sitewide Links:
Matt Cutts has confirmed that sitewide links count as a single link. Sitewide links are links that are present on every page of a site. These links are often placed in the footer or sidebar of a website.
User interaction really helps your site to get to the top of those search results
128. Organic Click Through Rate For A Keyword:
Some of your pages that get clicked more in CTR may get a SERP boost for that particular keyword.
129. Organic Click Through Rate For All Keywords:
A webpage's organic click through rate for all keywords it ranks for may be human-based, user interaction signal.
130. Bounce Rate:
Google may use the bounce rate to see how popular your site is for the search term searched for. If your bounce rate is high it could be that your site is not what the user was looking for. This may effect your ranking position and you could start moving down in those search results.
131. Direct Traffic:
Google uses data to see how many direct visitors your site gets. If your site gets lots of direct traffic its probably a good quality site and you could score a few extra points.
132. Repeat Traffic:
Websites that get repeat visitors may get a Google ranking boost. If the same visitors return time after time your site must be of high quality and visitors must like the content.
133. Blocked Sites:
Not used by Google anymore.
134. Chrome Bookmarks:
Google collects Chrome bookmarks user data. If your site is bookmarked by thousands of users you may get a little boost on those Google search results.
135. Google Toolbar Data:
Google could use data from the Google toolbar to help it with ranking factors.
136. Number Of Comments:
Google could use the number of comments and the wording in the comment a page gets to help it rank a page.
137. Time On Site:
Google keeps notes on how long visitors spend on a page when they coming from Google search. The longer visitors spend on a page the better as Google will think the page is quality and the visitors is interested in what's on the page.
Special Algorithm Rules
138. Query Deserves Freshness:
Certain pages that are new will get a boost for certain searches.
139. Search Query Deserves Diversity:
Google may add diversity to a SERP for ambiguous keywords.
140. User Browsing History:
When you are signed up to Google and visit the same site more thank once. The more people visiting the site while signed in will boost the ranking of the site.
141. User Search History:
Search chain influence search results for later searches. Example, if you search for "reviews" then search for "cars", Google is more likely to show car review sites higher in the SERPs.
142. Geo Targeting:
Having a local sever for your hosting and a specific country domain name extension will give your site preference over other sites that don't have the country extension and local server.
143. Safe Search:
Adult sites will not be found when visitors use safe search.
144. GooglePlus Circles:
Google shows higher results for authors and sites that have been added to your Google Plus Circles.
145. Digital Millennium Copyright Act Complaints:
Google "downranks" pages with digital millennium copyright complaints.
146. Domain Diversity:
The so-called "Bigfoot Update" supposedly added more domains to each SERP page.
147. Internal Link Anchor Text:
Google sometimes displays different results for shopping-related keywords, like flight searches.
148. Local Searches:
Sometimes Google places GooglePlus local results above the normal organic results.
149. Google News Box:
Certain keywords trigger a Google News box.
150. Big Brand Preference:
Google putting more weight on brands in rankings
151. Shopping Results:
Google sometimes displays Google Shopping results in organic SERPs:
152. Image Results:
Google displays images from our site on Google images. Clicking on a image brings the visitor to our site.
153. Easter Egg Results:
Google has a new feature where you can search for bubble level and use the bubble level directly on Google's mobile search results
154. Single Site Results For Brands:
Google now lets more of your pages come on a single search result. In other words if some one typed in a search query on Google you could have five results on the first page all from different pages on the same website.
Social Signals
155. Number of Tweets:
The number of tweets and re-tweets a page has influences Google. If a page has thousands of tweets its a good indication that the content is great. Google takes this into account. Please Tweet this page >>>
156. Authority Of Twitter Users Accounts:
The older the Twitter account the better. The more twitter followers the stronger the message to Google when you post a link. Having some one like Kim Kardashian tweet your link with +forty million followers will send a message to Google, that's because she has tons of authority on her Twitter account because of all her followers.
157. Number Of Facebook Likes:
Google probably considers the number of Facebook likes a page receives as a weak ranking signal. The more Facebook likes means visitors like what they are reading and the content must be good.
If the content is good it deserves to rank higher on Googles search.
158. Facebook Shares:
The more Facebook shares your page gets the better indication to Google that the content is great. Also each share is like another backlink to your page that's been shared. Its nofollow but could also boost your rankings.
159. Authority Of Facebook User Accounts:
Just like Twitter, Facebook shares and likes coming from popular Facebook pages may help to pass more weight.
160. Pinterest Pins:
Google probably considers Pinterest Pins a social signal as its another very popular social media account.
161. Votes On Social Sharing Sites:
There are lots more social accounts like Reddit , Stumbleupon and Digg that Google will use to help find the best webpage for the search term typed into its search results.
162. Number of Google+1's:
It looks like Google+ has little or no effect on rankings that's according to Matt Cutts.
163. Authority Of Google+ User Accounts:
It's logical that Google would weigh +1's coming from authoritative accounts more than from accounts that don't have many followers.
164. Known Authorship:
In February 2013, Google CEO Eric Schmidt famously claimed.
Within search results, information tied to verified online profiles will be ranked higher than content without such verification, which will result in most users naturally clicking on the top (verified) results.
Google+ has been shut down for some time now. But Google probably uses some form of authorship to determine influential content producers online and gives that content a boost in rankings.
165. Social Signal Relevancy:
When you share a link on social networks in content, Google will use the words in the content that surround the link to help determine what the link is about. Those words, and the anchor text in the link could be used to help Google decide where the page belongs on its search results.
This means its important to have relevant content around the link and the anchor text should be a keyword phrase you are trying to rank for.
166. Site Level Social Signals:
Traffic from social signals is only going to boost your site and Google likes to see it. It can be a real asset even if the links from social sites have the nofollow link. Why? you ask. Having lots of intereaction on social media accounts lets Google know your site is being talked about.
If its being talked about its because people are liking what they are reading and its good content. That means it belongs on the first page of those search results.
Brand Signals
167. Brand Name Anchor Text:
Having branded anchor text is a simple, but strong way to get your brand noticed by Google.
168. Branded Searches:
If you have a brand you want people to find it on Google. Big brands are everywhere and probably at the top of search results. Its very hard for the little guy to compete. They have a team of experts and get backlinks by the ton from people linking to the brand site.
169. Facebook Page - Shares And Likes:
Brands generally have a Facebook social media accounts with millions of followers. When they post something it usually gets hundreds of likes and shares boosting the link that's been shared on Google.
170. Twitter Profile:
Brands will also have a Twitter profile with thousands or may be millions of followers. The more followers the brand has proves to Google the more popular the brand is.
171. Official Linkedin Company Page:
All the top brands will also have a company Linkedin page. Another great way to convince Google you mean business is to get your own Linkedin page and get followers.
172. Employees Listed At Linkedin:
Linkedin profiles of people that work for your company is a brand signal.
173. Legitimacy of Social Media Accounts:
Having a social media account with 20.000 followers and then only posting 2 or 3 posts a month will be seen a lot different than another 20.000-follower strong account that posts hundreds of posts a month.
Boost your social media accounts by posting daily it works.
174. News Sites Mention Brands:
It happens daily. Big brands are mentioned on Google News sites all the time.
175. Co-Citations:
Sometimes there is no link when a brand gets mentioned. Its possible that just having the brand mentioned in the news article sends Google a message that the brand is popular.
176. Number Of RSS Subscribers:
Considering Google owns Feedburner RSS service, it makes sense that they would look at RSS Subscriber data as a popularity/brand signal.
177. Brick And Mortar Location With Google+ Local Listing:
A Business that's real would have a office and lots of staff. Google could try to find out the physical location-data of the business. Is the business on Google maps. How many staff are in the business. These factors and others are used to see if the business is a big brand.
178. Does The Website, Business Pay Tax:
Its possible that Google could try to find out if the website, business is paying tax.
On site webspam factors
179. Panda Penalty:
BAD CONTENT - Could get you the Panda Penalty.
THIN - Pages on your site with a few sentences on the page is know as thin content. Google loves content and plenty of it. If your site has only a few lines of text on a page then do something about it. Add more content. Have a minimum of 500+ words on a page more if its a landing page.
SPUN - Spinning content is a big no no. Taking content and using software that spins it will get your site into trouble. Don't do it.
DUPLICATE - Coping content from other sites should never be done. That content has already be published and indexed by Google. If you copy that content Google will know this is duplicate content and punish your site.
IRRELEVANT - If your page ranks for a certain keyword and the content is not relevant users will hit the back button. If this happens to many times your page will drop in the search results.
Example: You could have a page all about roast chicken to eat, but because the title of the page says chicken recipe Google has it under chicken recipes, and there is no chicken recipe on the page.
Visitors finding the page after searching for chicken recipes and can not find a recipe on the page. They will hit the back button.
180. Links To Bad Neighborhoods:
Bad links will hurt your site. Linking to adult content, loan sites and spammy sites will effect your sites rankings and hurt your search results.
181. Redirects:
One of the most common mistakes made by site owners is the incorrect use of redirects. Sneaky redirects can get a site not just penalized, but de-indexed if caught.
182. Popups Or Distracting Ads:
Popups not only effect your page load time (because they use a script), they are also very annoying. Ads all over the page are distracting. If you use popups and lots of adds be careful. The official Google Rater Guidelines Document says that popups and distracting ads is a sign of a low-quality site.
183. Site Over-Optimization:
Be careful of over optimization when writing your content. Title, description, heading tags and main content keyword stuffing is a recipe for failure. Write for humans not Google!
184. Page Over-Optimization:
Many webmasters have reported that unlike Panda Penguin has targeted individual pages, and even then just for certain keywords.
185. Ads Above The Fold:
The Page Layout Algorithm penalizes websites with lots of ads and little content above the fold.
186. Hiding Affiliate Links:
Trying to hide affiliate links (especially with cloaking) can bring on a Google penalty.
187. Affiliate Sites:
Having lots of affiliate links on your site could set off alarm signals for Google. Google does not like affiliate sites. Be careful when it comes to trying to make money using affiliate links.
Instead of having a affiliate link on every page of your site create a page about the product and have your affiliate link on that page. Next put a link on all your pages to that page. Now you only have one affiliate link on your site instead of one on every page.
188. Auto Generated Content:
If Google thinks your site's pumping out computer-generated content, it could result de-indexing or a penalty. Here's what Matt Cutts says on auto-generated content.
189. Trying To Cheat PageRank:
Out-bound links must seem to be natural to Google. Having all out-bound links nofollow from your site is not a good idea. Have a mixed selection of nofollow and dofollow.
Also having to many in-bound links nofollow might seem to Google that you are trying to beat the system. Some webmasters like to have pages that are not important like the contact us page nofollow.
They don't want any link juice going to pages they do not wish to rank. This could be seen by Google as a way to try cheat the PageRank system.
The PageRank system is no longer used by Google anymore.
190. Banned IP Address:
All your website files are stored on your hosting account and if your IP address on your server is marked as spam, all your sites on that sever could be hurt.
191. Meta Tag Keyword Stuffing:
Its good SEO practice to include your main keyword phrase for the page in your meta tags. But never stuff that meta tag full of keywords. Use your keyword phrase as close to the beginning of the tag as you can followed by other words that are not keywords.
Off page webspam factors
192. Lots Of Inbound Links All Of A Sudden:
You purchase backlinks from a company and they add all the links at once. This would be un-natural, as if all of a sudden your site got 1000 backlinks in a month when it had only got 100 backlinks for the last 3 months this would be a sure sign of phony links.
Link building must be constant and natural. If Google sees anything un-natural it will assume you are buying backlinks and that's a sure way of getting your site in to trouble.
193. Google Penguin Penalty:
The Penguin penalty is to catch sites that are buying links or obtaining them through link networks. If your site was hit or if you buy links your site could still be hit by it. If your site gets hit by the Google Penguin penalty you will find it hard to find on Googles search results for any of your given keywords.
194. Links From Low Quality Websites:
If you want to rank your site for those keywords you need in-bound links. Those in-bound links or backlinks need to come from a wide selection of different websites. If your site only has backlinks from low quality websites like blog comments, forum profile links etc your site won't stand much of a chance.
Links from high authority sites that are the same topic as your site are what you need. You need the link to be surrounded with ate least 500 to 800 words and the anchor text a keyword phrase you are trying to rank the page for. Remember always vary the anchor text or you will over optimize that keyword phrase.
195. Domain Relevancy That You Are Linking To:
Sites that have links pointing to them from content that does not relate to the content on the page they are linking to are more likely to get hit by Penguin.
In other words take Easysite for example. Easysite is about creating websites, how to make a website, website builders, hosting, domains, etc. We would want sites of the same topic to link to us. We do not want a site that's all about fishing for example to link to us. The fishing site if linked to Easysite would be relaying a message to Google that Easysite has something to do with fishing, and be bad for our rankings.
Having lots of links from unrelated sites pointing to your site is not only bad for your SEO it could make your site more susceptible to Google Penguin.
196. Unnatural Links Warning From Google:
Make sure you have signed up to Google Webmaster Tools and submitted your site. Google Webmaster Tools gives you lots of information on how your site is performing. It can also warn you if your site has unnatural links, then you will be able to do something about the unnatural links.
197. Inbound Links From The Same Server IP:
If your site gets a large amount of backlinks all on the same server IP it may be a give away to Google that you have just bought links. If you hire a backlink guy and he has a lot of sites all on the same server IP and you get backlinks from all those sites Google will know, and suspect it may be a sign of blog network link building.
Never try to trick Google. The best way to get natural backlinks from different IP servers is to have lots of good quality content. Visitors will then share your content and your link building will be natural.
198. Selling Links:
It may seem like a good idea to sell links if your site is doing well. Webmasters may offer you money to place their link on your site. Be warned if Google catches you or even thinks you are selling links it will hurt your rankings in Googles search.
Do not sell links or advertise on your site that you are selling links.
199. Google Sandbox:
If you have a new site, hopefully you used Easysite to create your new website then don't let your site fall into the Google Sandbox.
This is when a new website that's just been created gets a sudden influx of backlinks. Google will then temporarily limit the search visibility for a few months. Remember link building must seem natural to Google.
200. Google Dance:
The Google Dance can shake up your rankings temporarily. This may be a way for Google to see if a site is trying to manipulate its rankings.
Thanks:
Thank you for taking the time to read our article on Google's 200 ranking factors, if you found it interesting and helpful please share it on your social media accounts. And remember here at Easysite its not just about creating a website its creating a website that works and gets thousnds of visitors.
If you require any help to build your website talk to us first. We will help you get online and help you with your SEO.