Ranking to the top of the search engine results page(SERP) is the climax of any online market. A study of In-front Webworks states that 95 percent of web traffic goes to the search results in the first page of SERP of Google, while the rest of the pages combined only receive the remaining 5 percent.
Many website owners -newbies and veterans- are puzzled by the mystery of unlocking the secrets of how to increase Google ranking and performance. Everyone wants to take a shortcut top that top spot, but the truth is there is no such thing especially because Search Engine Optimization is a long competition. What makes that so is the fact that Google is consistent when it comes to changing their algorithms. Moz accounts that there are 500 to 600 changes per year. That being said, we can conclude that if you fall far behind, it would take a vast amount of time for you to be at a stable pace again.
Because there’s nothing that would teleport your website to the highest positions in Google’s results page, we have laid out a series of steps that would take you there.
Guidelines For Getting High In Google SERP
Establish a sound website structure
If your website structure and information architecture are built poorly, it can damage even the best SEO campaigns. Bad website foundation is always bad news. You won’t ever get your goal to get to the top rankings if your site is difficult for users to navigate and for Google to crawl. Make it as usable as you can in any platform or device.
Understand Google’s ranking algorithms
As already said, Google constantly changes its algorithm. In case you ask, most of these changes are not announced or described publicly. We said most because Google does make major update notifications on some occasions. However, this is exact: to the general public, the exact inside operations of the algorithm are anonymous. Most of the information we get is from observations from industry experts. It’s no wonder why 40 percent of online marketers say that the changing of Google search algorithms as their greatest hurdle in the progress of their SEO.
Though, we understand why this is kept in secrecy. If every online marketer knew exactly how to rank in the first spot, Google wouldn’t succeed in ranking only the best results for the searchers.
All we know is this: Google favors websites with mobile-friendly versions and integrating with local search results like Google Maps. Google also targets spammers and sites that buy unnatural links to increase their rankings. Lastly, it aims to understand the context and intention behind a user’s query instead of just looking at the very words they typed in the search bar.
Optimize for mobile and local
As mentioned earlier, Google rolled out the mobile-first index. This means that your website needs to pass the Mobile-Friendly Test.
Passing that test will mean a lot for your business, 60% (stats are still growing) of searches take place on a mobile device. This test gives a quick and simple way to help you determine if your site is mobile-friendly or on its way for a penalty. Just enter your URL and click “RUN TEST.” You will get a “yes or no” result with a record of the page loading issues it found. This way you can fix and optimize to make sure that your mobile site running well.
Mobile search and local search are connected by Google. Google is on an ongoing task to cater to hyper-local search, attaching consumers and brands as easily and promptly as possible. That’s the reason why you need to always update your Google My Business profile.
Optimize for voice search
What’s with this buzz about voice search? Well to make it simple, voice input is four times faster than typing, therefore giving you access to faster results. There are clear issues about accessibility. People have difficulty typing on some gadgets. People also don’t like confusing menus. Conclusively, no matter how mobile-optimized a site is, or how big our phones are getting, searching on a mobile device will take time. The key to optimizing for voice search is to produce content for more straightforward questions or searches. Unlike the words we usually use when typing into Google, you should apply keywords that are spoken in a far more natural language in sentence forms.
Optimize On-page SEO
In this part, you can get help from Google. They have created a Search Engine Optimization Starter Guide intended for anyone interested in developing online content through Google search. The best thing you can do in this is to show Google what your pages are about, produce unique, brief and descriptive titles, and create clickable meta descriptions.
In summary
As we’ve presented, Google continues to close the door on spammy techniques and schemes. That is why anyone serious about digital marketing can’t take any short cuts and just run the long race. The mentioned guides above may require time, but we are confident enough to say that it will help your website rank up in Google.
