Time to Boost Your Google Rankings!
Here are 5 Ways to Boost Your Google Rankings
I get asked almost every day about boosting their rankings in Google. Every time it’s followed buy how can I do it with the least amount of work.
If you are one of these people, great news, SEO is game that takes work and takes time to get Google to like you. There is no quick fix and if someone is promising you a quick fix prepare to lose your money.
I am going to share with you the 5 most proven ways to boost your Google Rankings. Yes, Virginia, this is going to take some work.
How Long Does It Take to Improve Google Rankings?
There is not a concrete answer to this. Sometimes it takes 3 days to show improvement sometimes it takes 30 days.
I know everyone has a short attention span and that is not what you want to hear. Sometimes the truth needs to sting a bit.
There are so many factors to put into the equation there is never a concrete answer. How is your competition doing, whats your budget, website SEO score, keyword research, the color of shoes you wear. No, your shoes don’t matter but your laces do.
If it’s not working Improve It
If you have a page that is not performing the way it should fix whats broken. You can find those easily in your Google tools. What are those you ask? Webmaster Tools and Analytics. If you still have a puzzled look on your face you are already doing things wrong and you need to contact us now.
Be it blog posts or pages you need to keep improving your content so the Google crawl will rank you correctly. It crawls you on a schedule and you can fix it before the next crawl that I can promise.
Lets get started to Improve Your Google Rankings
This is where you will need to roll up your sleeves and get ready for some work. Just like a brick and mortar store your online presence is going to take work.
1. Start with your Web Site
A poor website will sink the ship before anything else happens.
The navigation should be easy for users and Google to navigate. That is a huge SEO ranking factor.
Your site will need to be able to switch from a mobile to a desktop template with ease. Having a separate link to mobile sites will hammer your ranking in Google.
SEO Audit Your Site
There are over 300 factors that the Google algorithm looks at to rank your site. This is very critical to get right quickly.
Here is a link that will allow you to see your score and the factors you falter on. seositecheckup.com is great at this and you can export the report out as PDF so you can get everything fixed.
Duplicate Content Is a Web Site Killer
Duplicate content is a big fat NO NO. If you have two sites with the same content then you need to end one of them. You will have to set up a redirect in your .htaccsess file to clearly fix this.
2. Mobile is First
Google is not playing when it’s saying Mobile First indexing is the key to ranking. Your website and content need to be written to perform well on any mobile device.
Performance is parmount
If your users are scrolling alot to find the info their looking for, your not doing content right.
Images are a killer if you have not optimized them for Mobile. Nobody will stay on a site that takes images forever to download.
Page speed on Mobile devices are the most important factor to ranking with Google.
3. Speed Optimization
Your site speed for desktop and mobile are so important. This has to monitered constantly.
Use the Google PageSpeed tool to check your site. Bookmark this site you will need it.
Your site needs to be under 3 seconds. End of story.
Image File Size
You can use WordPress to format your pictures to load fast. You by all that is holy on this third rock from the sun need an image on your site bigger than 900 pixels. THIS IS NOT A DISCUSSION PIECE OF THE POST! STOP IT!!!!
You also do not need 18 pictures on a page. If your a graphic designer says different then you really need to rethink things. Seriously.
Scripts and the Bells and whistles
If you are trying to use every plug-in in WordPress depository then that will also slow your site down.
4. Links in and to your Web Site
Internal links, aka links that go to different parts of your website. External links to and back to your website, from social networks, yelp, other websites. All count for ranking factors. How?
Well, internal linking helps users, counts for user experience and for Google to map your site.
External links, links from your website to another website that rank better or the same boosts your standing. If you guest blog to link back to your site.
Social links to your site from Facebook posts, Twitter and such. All help your ranking when people click over.
Making sure these links work and are still live is key, broken links will sink these ranking factors quickly.
5. Page and Post Optimization
Google has a starter guide to help you understand how Google crawls your pages and posts. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Starter Guide details the steps of getting your content up in Google search and ranking high.
Making sure your pages and posts are optimized for Google search is just as important as making sure your web site is running smooth.
Tell Google What Your Pages Are About
Use Schema format. Google loves Schema format.
Schema types include recipes, businesses, products, authors, and more.
Create Unique, Brief & Descriptive Titles
A unique title that is natural and true to the content that follows it. Plus those titles will draw users to your site which help with your click-through rate.
Meta Descriptions
Make your post and page Meta Descriptions irresistible to the users, use your keywords in these as well. It plays a role in ranking but mostly it’s used the boost your CTR.
Final Notes
Google is constantly upgrading the way it works. They never announce their moves so keeping up with traffic reports and these 5 steps you will not suffer a Google Penalty. Which is very hard to recover from.
These steps take work and I hear you don’t have time. I get it, but it is crucial you follow these steps to get more traffic to your site. Which in turn makes you money. Yep, I said money.