Things Google’s Algorithm Loves
After telling you what Google does not want to see, you may be curious as to what will please the algorithm. Here are a few things that Google DOES want to see from your site:
- Updates/Fresh Content
Do you keep your website up to date with the latest style trends and features for your business? Or are you still using the old HTML website from the 90’s? Some of you may think that the old saying “If it ain’t broke don’t fix it” might come into play here, it doesn’t. Because Google is focused on giving the user the best experience, it will give better rankings to those who bring fresh designs, content and knowledge to their industry.
- Content
This doesn’t just include having fresh content. The Googlebot loves content the same way kids love candy. It can’t get enough. As such, it will give precedence to sites that have a lot of content on them. Why? The reason: Google once again cares about the user and wants to provide the best results to them. That means that you need to appear as an expert in your field in the eyes of the Googlebot. The best way to do this is to show what you know with content. This is a fine line however, as you need to make the site not just blocks of text. Google may put you in front of a user for that, but the user will quickly leave the site unless you have images and other forms of media to keep their attention. This is the digital age; no one wants to read one giant block of text.
- Relative URLs
Don’t know what a URL is? Think of it as the address to which your page lives. Google likes to it when these URLs have words in them that relate to the content that is on the page. Much like Amazon likes to know who they are sending a package to, not just the address of the household. If you want your interior pages to rank, make sure there are some relative keywords in the URL to help tell the Googlebot what it will find on that page. Be smart though; don’t try to keyword stuff in the URL or on those pages. Google gets smarter with every update and they will get you penalized.
- Speed (Not the Drug)
Have you ever looked at the top of a search you have just queried on Google? It will tell you how many results it got (usually millions) and the amount of time it took (usually less than half a second). Google is dedicated to getting their users the best results as quickly as possible, which means it rewards webmasters and website owners who also try to make their sites as fast as possible.
- Good Quality Links
A good way to tell Google that you are an authority in your industry is to have a well trusted and highly established site credit you for your knowledge in the form of a link. Trusted sites like those of powerful news companies are much more trusted than any old wordpress blog that was built last week. The more trusted the site that links to you is, the more beneficial the link will be to you.
- The Age of your Domain
Having a long-standing domain is like having a company that has been in business for 10 years already. Google is much more likely to trust that site over a new site that was just created yesterday. Your rankings will definitely have the edge over your competitors if your site is older and more established. Follow the other rules to ensure you stay on top!
Use your best judgment for how much of everything your site may or may not need. As far as speed goes, try not to sacrifice good content to improve your speed. Although, that giant slider that adds half a second to overall load time, should be either shrank or removed.
