Google Ranking Factors: These 11 Matter the Most




Posted by on Jun 12, 2025 in General




Search engines know that people want to find answers as fast as possible, so they prefer to show sites that will load quickly for users. This is even truer for mobile sites, as Google announced that its Speed Update would make load speed a ranking factor for mobile searches. Mobile-friendliness refers to how a website looks and performs when someone views it on a mobile device. Mobile-friendly sites provide a good user experience by using a responsive design that adjusts the content so that it looks good on every screen size.

Informational Search Intent

  • Content can vary β€” it could be a webpage, an image, a video, a PDF, etc. β€” but regardless of the format, content is discovered by links.
  • Use keyword research tools to identify relevant entities and related queries around your main topics.
  • Ensure your business is listed in local directories and that your citations are consistent across the web.
  • Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) play a pivotal role in how users find information online.

Our free plugin comes with features like the SEO and readability analyses, which give you feedback on your content right away. Our Premium plugin gives you access to some more features like AI-powered features, a redirect tool, and the possibility to add BHS Links multiple keywords per page. There is also a Yoast SEO app for Shopify that comes with a lot of the same features, but is more focused on SEO for online stores. Before you get to content creation, it’s important to get your technical SEO in order. If you know your way around redirects, optimizing page speed, crawlability, security and structured data, make those your first priority. If not, let your site builder help you out or hire someone with a background in technical SEO.

seo ranking factors

Domain authority score is a compound metric used for measuring a domain’s overall external SEO performance. The algorithm includes many data points to measure the final score but all of the metrics are about the external links pointing to your website and their quality. To build your expertise, authority, and trustworthiness and stand out in the eyes of both your visitors and search engines, you will need some social proof. Especially if you are creating content around YMYL (Your Money or Your Life) topics such as legal, medical, and finance; it’s critically important to show your expertise. Search engines work by crawling, indexing, and ranking the Internet’s content. Then, indexing analyzes and stores the content in the search engine’s index.

seo ranking factors

User Experience Signals (Technical SEO)

seo ranking factors

Since voice searches are more detailed, long-tail keywords become incredibly important. These are longer and more specific phrases that visitors are likely to use. Incorporating long-tail keywords helps you target specific queries and increases your chances of appearing in voice search results.

seo ranking factors

Doing link building in the right way can be tricky so take a look at all of the factors below or just use a service like LinksThatRank or any of these other guest posting services to help. Their algorithm actively measures how long people spend on your site, whether you answered their search query and even how many pages they visited. Core web vitals are how they measure the user experience your website provides. Google recently introduced mobile first indexing and have a mobile friendly testing tool and a mobile pagespeed testing tool. The number of pages a site has is not a ranking signal on it’s own.

seo ranking factors

Picture this – when you conduct a search on Google, let’s say for the β€œbest coffee shop near me,” a few specific results stand out. Firstly, you’ll notice a group of three businesses displayed prominently at the top, complete with their contact details and pinpointed locations on a mini Google Maps window. This is what we call the β€˜Local Pack.’ It’s like a fast track pass for local businesses to get noticed instantly by users who are searching for services or products in their vicinity.

seo ranking factors

Historically, third-party review sites have also affected local rankings – and have a strong influence on conversions from customers. After a successful upload, you have to make sure that the video gets a certain degree of popularity to get many views. You can promote that by linking to the new video in other videos, adding external links, commenting on related videos or actively seeking viewers on social media.