An overview of SearchMetrics 2014 Ranking Factors for the Melbourne SEO Meetup Community

1. www.meetup.com/Melbourne-SEO/ www.searchmetrics.com/us2014
SEO Ranking Factors
An overview of SearchMetrics 2014 Ranking
Factors for the Melbourne SEO Meetup
Community
Peter Mead twitter.com/petermeadit Search Specialist at wearedando.com

2. Must-Read SEO Survival Guide 2014
Searchmetrics have produced comprehensive
study on Google Ranking Factors.
For complete the analysis within the guide...
Download the study here: www.searchmetrics.
com/us2014

4. What is a Ranking Factor
● How is a Ranking factor analyzed?
● What about correlation?
● Analyzed top 30 search results for 10,000
keywords – approx 300,000 URLs
● Using the Spearman correlation, the rank-correlation
coefficient is calculated
http://www.searchmetrics.com/en/what-is-a-ranking-factor/

5. Algorithms and Ranking Factors
● Search engines evaluate topics and
relevance using Algorithms
● SERPs pages use these evaluations
● The criteria used for this are known as
Ranking Factors
● Blackhat Keyword Stuffing, Cloaking etc.

6. SERPs Ranking Position and Order
Also Influenced by:
Personalisation
User Behaviour
Logged into Google
Using Chrome
Geolocation
Cookies storing personal info

7. Interpret the Analysis
● Correlation
○ Differences between certain properties of URLs
ranking from position 1 to 30, to show what
differentiates URLs according to their ranking.
● Average Values
○ Describes the existence or extent of certain features
per position on average for what the top sites have
in common.

8. 2014 Ranking Factors Infographic
Infographic: http://www.searchmetrics.com/en/knowledge-base/ranking-factors/infographic/

9. Most important Ranking Factors
Five main areas:
● Content
● Technology
● Backlinks
● Social Signals
● User Signals

11. Content Ranking Factors
● Needs to be high quality
● Professionally written - Readability Flesch
● Highly relevant
● Long form
● Media enrichment
● Relevant topical terms - Hummingbird
● Internal linking

13. Technical Ranking Factors
● Site architecture
● Internal linking structure
● Fast loading times
● Meta tags
● H1 and H2
● Keywords in domain further devalued

15. Backlink Ranking Factors
● Penguin: Quality is most important
● Number of links is important
● Blended mix of backlinks
● Natural anchor texts
● Branded anchor texts
● Deep linking

17. Social Ranking Factors
● Top platforms: Facebook, G+, Twitter,
Pinterest
● Google emphasised not a ranking factor
● Social cues indicate fresh content
● Social affects traffic
● Branding is a big deal

18. Branding and Rankings
● Branding factor for SERPS
● Brands specifically rank higher
● Top positions for Brands and Wikipedia
● Niche brands - go for longtail
● Branded anchor text

20. User Signals Factors
● Click-Trough Rate
● Time on Site
● Bounce rate
Desktop vs Mobile:
● Mobile optimised sites, faster download
times helps.

21. Find out more
Download www.searchmetrics.com/us2014
If you have questions about the study email
sales@searchmetrics.com
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Connect with me @petermeadit