Frequently Asked Questions
There are many different SEO strategies available to the SEO specialist. Sometimes the tendency is to skip over some of the basics to deal with more technical areas. We all know that the goal of an SEO campaign is to optimize a site so that it ranks in the top slots in search engine results. And although there are many tools available for us to use, the basics are still the foundation for building a successful website optimization campaign. Here are five of some of the most frequently asked questions on areas that are essential to SEO best practices.
Question 1 – What are the main factors that influence SEO rankings?
Web crawlers are looking for certain things as they crawl the web and index sites. Quality is one of the important ranking factors; quality of content and backlinks are very important. Anchor text which is used in backlinks, social sharing metrics and domain authority all carry weight when the site or page is being ranked in SERPs. Also important is the bounce rate as well as the average time visitors spend on the page.
Question 2- How long does it take to get a site to rank in search engines?
There is no way to set a certain time frame for when a site will rank in any of the search engines. There are many factors that come into play. One of them is how many other competitors there are trying to vie for those coveted spots. If your site is launched in a niche that has very little competition then it may obtain a high rank in a short amount of time. However, if it is a topic that is highly competitive it may take it longer to get into those positions. The main thing to remember with an SEO campaign is to keep doing the right things and be patient because they do work.
Question 3 – What is Google PageRank and how important is it?
PageRank is how high your site ranks according to Google. It is a numeric value that your site is given based on how important and relevant Google thinks it is. In Google’s older algorithm if your site had a higher score (on ten point scale) it indicated the site was important and “trusted” by search engines. There are presently hundreds of factors which are considered when determining how a site ranks in the SERPs. It is important to have a high PageRank, but it is not the most important of all the factors which determine if an SEO campaign was successful.
Question 4 – How often are Google search results updated?
It used to be that it might take as long as a month for web pages to finally get indexed. The results of searches would shift about every month or so and it was nick named the “Google Dance.” But now indexing does not take nearly as long. Search results are changing almost constantly. Most pages get indexed almost immediately. Even a brand new site can be indexed in just a few days depending on how many Google pings it gets.
Question 5- How do I know if my SEO campaign is successful?
There are several tools to use if you want to tell if an SEO campaign is successful and some of them are pretty complicated. It is important to stay consistent and having a little bit of patience helps too. While there are many metrics that can factor in, there are two quick ways to tell if SEO strategies are working. The first thing you should notice is increased traffic to the site. That is certainly one of the simplest ways to tell if you are moving in the right direction or not. The second indicator is the search engine rankings. This is of course what helps drive traffic to the site. When your SEO campaign are functioning optimally then you should see the site begin to move up in the rankings.
Your SEO Questions
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