And even if it does, it will consider them as relatively less valuable than pages that do have internal links. Great site architecture is also a big bonus for user experience. Indexability – Once Google has seen your page, it needs to be sure that you want it to show that page to its users.
Due to the amount of referring domains, Google understands your reliability and the authority in the chosen niche. In this section, I will explain the importance of links in SEO and try to explain the art of link building. Podcasts are on the rise and very popular, especially within specific niches.
However, there is so much content being generated; Google cannot catch all of it. For example, according to The Social Skinny, there are 510,000 comments, 293,000 status updates, and 136,000 photos added on Facebook every minute. But Google is crawling and indexing these sites and large amounts of their content. So we can safely assume that a healthy presence with ongoing engagement from a relevant audience helps SEO.
Quality content that brings value to users is what everyone is looking for — website owners, journalists, influencers, bloggers, Google, and even us as users. For it to work, your content HAS to be of great quality and bring value to their users — exactly the same conditions that we mentioned for Google earlier. In 2012, Google released a very strong algorithm update called Penguin that aimed at eliminating “link cheating” . Backlinks are incredibly important in Search Engine Optimization.
Like videos and images, Google shows them in the normal search results. Different types of content are appropriate for different stages in the funnel, different users. A good content strategy will contain a mix of the different formats I am about to describe. When you put together a solid and researched list, think very hard about the intent behind their searches and questions. Often, searches and questions are ambiguous, and the intent is not immediately obvious. You need to understand your audience and provide valuable content that serves the intent of their query.
Rich content – Include rich content such as audio, video, and illustrative images whenever feasible. Google is not capable of understanding the content of images or videos. So, when you do include these richer formats, accompany them with the appropriate meta tags to help Google and those with visual impairments understand what the image/video is about. You could also include a written version to make it easier for users who prefer written content.
Meta titles and meta descriptions- These areas of a page determine, in many cases, what Google shows its users in the search results. User interface – As we saw earlier in the raters section, Google wants to recommend sites that appeal to users both in the design and the comfort of use.
Your site layout needs to ensure that when the user lands on your page that they find it attractive, they understand at a glance what your page offers, and they grasp the navigational options that they have. You want them to interact with your content and then want to investigate further. Site architecture – You need to organize your site in a manner that makes it easy to understand sections and catégories and make it simple for Google to navigate through every single page on your site. If there are pages on your site that have no internal links pointing to them, Google will have trouble finding those pages.
It is vital to see each piece of content as part of an overall, coherent content strategy. As soon as you do that, you are thinking in terms of content marketing.
The noindex tag in the head section of your pages allows you to indicate to Google whether or not you want it to consider a specific page for its search results. Trust signals indicate to Google that your brand, your products, and your content are appreciated by your users/customers. Trust signals are things like product and service reviews, positive mentions in forums, comments on your blog posts, etc. In short, any positive activity by your users around your products, brand, or content. Page relevancy – Google looks at the content surrounding the link and evaluates how relevant that piece of content is to your content. Link relevancy – Google prefers links from relevant sites — usually in the same industry, or news sites or review sites that cover multiple industries in a credible manner. Link authority – Earning links from highly authoritative sites is more valuable than earning links on websites with a lower Authority Score.