How to rank high on Google
For those of you who might not be as familiar with the field of SEO, this part primarily consists of the fundamentals of SEO. If you want to rank, be sure to check these options.
1. Choose sensible keywords
You must first and foremost be aware of the keywords you want to rank for. Of course, you want to appear in search results for keywords used by your target clients. These are keywords, and to determine which of these are feasible for you to rank for, you'll require keyword research tools.
The following variables come into play while choosing the ideal keywords to aim for in order to rank on Google:
Volume: How many times a month the term is searched.
How difficult it is to rank for that keyword in terms of competition.
How simple it will be for you to rank for keywords depends on your domain authority. It will be simpler if your website has been around for some time and you have been producing high-quality material during that time.
Relevance: No point in ranking for a keyword that isn’t going to bring qualified traffic to your site.
✅ Pro tip
If you’re just starting out with your SEO strategy, your best bet is to start with low volume, low competition keywords so you can gain traction, and then build up over time. What constitutes “low” will depend on your industry, but keywords in the 90-400 range might be reasonable to start.
2. Verify the purpose of the keyword
Informational, commercial, transactional, and navigational keyword intent are the four main categories. Now, when it comes to SEO, informational intent keywords are your main concern. Nevertheless, you need to delve further into the specific information that the person searching for that term is looking for, even inside your informational intent keywords.
Check the keyword intent mangools.com
I was looking for a keyword to target with some screenshots I have of great websites and features, for instance. When I discovered that the keyword website ideas had a search volume of 2900, I thought it was ideal. Yet when I searched for it on Google, I discovered that the results were more likely to be for side hustlers looking for their next company idea or novice engineers looking for their next project.
It won't rank if I use screenshots of my website to target that keyword. Yet, if I search for "website design ideas," that's a different matter.
3. Implement on-page SEO
Here is a quick list for you:
Include your keyword organically in the body of your page as well as in the meta title, meta description, at least two H2s, image file names, image alt text, and the URL.
Add links from at least three additional pages on your website to the page you are linking to internally.
External linking: Add 1-3 links to reliable, pertinent pages on your page.
Maintain your meta description between 155 and 165 characters, and emphasize the benefits that readers will receive from clicking on your link.
How to rank higher on Google
Okay so that’s how to rank high on Google. But maybe you’ve done all those things already. Maybe you’re already ranking sort of high and want to rank higher. If that is you, keep reading.
4. Create extensive content about it.
How do you achieve a high Google ranking? long-form, in-depth information about the keyword you're aiming for. The best example of this is with blog entries, but landing pages can also benefit from this.
For instance, our landing page for the free Website Grader appears on page one for the keyword "website grader." It could appear to have little content at first sight. Yet, if you scroll down below the fold, you'll uncover a gold mine of text in the form of Questions.
✅ Pro tip
Note that I said in-depth long-form content. Google doesn’t like thin content, so skip the fluff and go right for the peanut butter.
5. Concentrate on long-tail, ambiguous keywords
Long-tail inquiry keywords are an added advantage because they offer chances to appear higher than the top results for broader, extremely high-volume keywords—through the People Also Ask section—and are typically the keywords that hit the sweet spot in terms of volume and competition.
For instance, "social media marketing" receives 32K searches every month (yow). The top two results are WordStream at number one and Sprout Social at number two. The PAA segment, however, sits smack dab in the midst of those two results. Any page that answers one of those queries after a reader expands it will now be ranked higher than Google's #2 result.
You just never know what long-tail keywords Google will pull up in PAA, giving your post an opportunity to rank higher than the #2 results for a high-volume keyword.
✅ Pro tip
Don’t target PAA questions for the purpose of ranking on Google through them. Instead, target long-tail question keywords for the primary purpose of ranking for that keyword, with the secondary goal to be some extra ranking through PAA.
Make your content skimmable (paragraph 6)
Google is increasingly emphasizing offering solutions rather than just a list of pages. So, "zero-click search," where a user can find the information they're looking for directly on the results page without having to click into any individual result. Being the source from which Google builds an answer is the next best thing—and your way to rank higher—but if you can't beat 'em (Google is like Goliath on 'roids'), join 'em. This isn't great for those of us who want to drive website traffic.
The best way to optimize for this is to make your content skimmable. This way, Google can extract snippets of your content to build answer-y results like with the Featured Snippet, Passage Ranking, and even meta descriptions. Here’s how:
Use your heading tags. Every website builder/CMS allows you to do this. Don’t just create headings by increasing text size and weight; make sure they are wrapped in <h2> and <h3> tags. For example, in our How to Brand Your Business blog post, we have a clear H2 heading that reads “How to brand your business” and then each of the steps are H3s.
Use specific headings.
Sadly, SEO can occasionally stifle your originality. A reader should be able to quickly find the answers they need by skimming your article's headlines. As you can see in the example below, Google created a meta description based on the H3s rather than the one we gave for the aforementioned post.
If we had used more witty or colorful wording, the piece might not have been as successful. Why do I say that? Check this chart:
Unclear heading ❌Clear heading ✅X marks the spotIdentify your target audienceUVP is the MVPCreate your value propositionSave the whalesDetermine your missionHumans only, pleaseDefine your brand personalityGet creatingCreate brand assets
The easier it is for a reader to extract the information, the easier it is for Google, too. So use lists, bullets, boldface, and headings…like, a lot.
7. State things clearly
No, not the offensive type. What I'm trying to say is that if you're targeting question-specific keywords, even if you have a multi-part response, make sure you have an unambiguous statement that both answers the question and restates it.
The SERP for the query "how long should a blog article be 2022" is shown below. The likelihood is that Hook Agency's line, "The best blog length for SEO in 2022 is 1,760-2,400 words," earned them the top spot because Wix, the second-place result, answers the query but does not repeat it.
And for “how-to” keywords, you can finish off the post with a conclusion that says, “So to recap, here’s how to [do X]: then provide a list of the strategies or tips from the post. Another option would be to have an overview section at the top of the post that gives the bird’s eye view before diving deeper into each item.
8. Add significant graphics
A page's ability to rank better is influenced by the presence of photos on the page. Thirdly, this gives your images a chance to rank in image results. First, it creates more interesting content that keeps visitors on the page longer. Second, regular search results are becoming more visual.
Stock photos and blank graphics, however, won't cut it for those blog pieces that you want to rank better.
Images that convey ideas, are valuable, and adhere to the keyword's goal are necessary.
For example, the SERP for “january marketing ideas” is not only very visual, but you can see that Google is giving preference to screenshots of January social media posts and event landing pages.
So when you’re creating content on a keyword, Google it and get a feel for not just how important visuals are, but also which visuals are showing so you can align with searchers’ expectations.
✅ Pro tip
And if, like in the example above, you can see that title card images are appearing, then make one!
Now if your blog template already creates a header image (like WordStream’s does), such that it would be redundant to put it at the top of your post, move it down to the end of the post. Or, see if your SEO plugin (we use Yoast) gives you the option to upload a social image. The image won’t appear in the blog post itself, but it will still be attached to that post and indexable in search results.
How to rank highest on Google
For ranking even higher, or for improving your rank for really hard keywords.
Do you want to learn SEO but don’t know where to start? Read our complete SEO guide for beginners and learn everything you need to know to proceed with search engine optimization on your own! As a bonus, you can take a short test and get a free SEO certificate!
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