Google's Main Ranking Factors

We all know from experience that we rarely get past the first page of Google search results. Partly because we want to find the answer to our question quickly, and partly because we trust the results on subsequent pages less. Google displays the “best results” on the first page, but what does the search engine use to make that choice? Let’s look at the ranking factors that can improve your site’s position in search results.
Top Google Ranking Factors in 2022

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1. What is Search Engine Results Page (SERP)?
Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) are what we get in response to a Google query.

Depending on their search content writing service query, users can get organic search results, paid Google Ads or Google Shopping results, a Featured Snippet block, Knowledge Graphs blocks, or video links, as in the image below.



In total, Google has more than a dozen different SERP features, and it is important to understand how the search engine displays results for a particular query.

For example, your company is engaged in apartment renovation and you want your service website to be displayed on the first page. We look at the results for the query "apartment renovation" and see that you will have to compete with a snippet that displays the location of competitor companies.



There is another interesting point: it turns out that you can appear on the first page of Google search results, but not receive traffic to your site. The reason is, again, in snippets.

We enter the query “when did dinosaurs live” and get the following picture:






All the information you need can be obtained directly from the snippet. Moreover, you can even find out when dinosaurs became extinct. And you don’t even need to go to any website to do this.

Statistics for early 2023 show that zero-click searches are on the rise. But it's not all bad, ranking first in search results still matters and brings in a lot more traffic:

64.82% of Google searches ended without clicks.
33.59% of clicks in 2023 came from organic search results (the ones we hunt for when setting up SEO).
Paid search ads accounted for only 1.59% of clicks.
On average, the #1 organic Google result received 38.16% of all organic clicks, while the #10 result received only 3.10% of clicks.
As you can see, being on the first place in Google results will get you 10 times more traffic than those who are on the 10th place. SEO still matters, while paid advertising in search has obviously become boring for users.

2. Why is it important to analyze positions in the TOP (SERP)?
This is about analyzing the strategies of sites with high search rankings. Understand what they are doing right - you will find new optimization strategies to improve the positions of your resource.

Here are some reasons to take search engine ranking analysis seriously. This process will help you:

identify new keywords and backlink sources;
find original ideas for content;
identify missing keywords that will help you rank better;
analyze highly ranked sites and determine your competitive advantages;
find ways to optimize content to get into snippets;
improve the structure of the content (use of tags, markup, bulleted lists, etc.).
Search results analysis is a necessary part of any SEO strategy, and it is best to start with understanding the factors that determine whether a resource gets into the TOP of the search.

3. Google's Main Ranking Factors
Google is believed to use over 200 factors to determine where and how to display pages in search results. Ranking factors are constantly changing as the search engine evolves, adjusting its algorithm to provide the most accurate and relevant results.

In this article we will look at the most important factors that matter today.

3.1. Reference factors
Backlinks are one of the most important elements of successful SEO. Links from authoritative websites show Google that the resource is trusted by other sites, which helps it rank higher in search results. This philosophy was the basis for Google's creation in the 1990s, and links still matter.

3.1.1. Link anchors
Anchor text is the keywords used in the link text. The more descriptive and concise it is, the better the link will look. Google's crawler determines the context based on the words in the anchor text.

When using anchors, you should avoid over-optimization. If all anchors in backlinks contain your company name or exact keywords, Google may suspect that such links are bought, and penalties may follow.

Experts from the Moz project recommend sticking to a 7:3 ratio, i.e. out of 10 backlinks, 7 should contain general text (“this website”, “read here”, etc.) and only 3 should include the brand name or keywords relevant to your project.

3.1.2. Site Authority
Google prefers that links to a site come from authoritative domains. Recall that domain authority (DA) is a search engine ranking indicator developed by Moz, the essment scale varies from 1 to 100. In simple terms, the more other resources link to a site, the more authority it has (for example, wikipedia.com).

By getting backlinks from reliable sources (with high DA), you can increase the authority of your own resource, and for Google such links will have more weight than others.

3.1.3. Link m growth rate
When building your backlinks, remember that a sudden spike in backlinks to your website will make Google think you've bought them or exchanged links, which could result in penalties.

According to Google, " backlinks should appear naturally as you build up content on your site ." In practice, this is difficult to implement, since organic backlinks appear extremely slowly. If you have a new resource, you should not suddenly increase the number of backlinks. It is also important to maintain a smooth growth of the link m , without sudden jumps or declines.



3.1.4. Thematicity of donor and acceptor
Links from domains in a similar niche will help you rank better. On the other hand, Google penalizes sites with a large number of links from irrelevant domains - this behavior is perceived by the search engine as backlink manipulation.

There's even such a thing as Topical Authority. If you sell food, it's perfectly normal to get backlinks from recipe sites, but not, say, software sites or electronics review sites.

Another point: SEOs used to be able to use links from press releases or articles to build their backlink profile. However, due to abuse, Google now sees a large number of such backlinks as an attempt to manipulate rankings. The same is true for links from forums, so you should not overuse them either.