If you want your SEO campaign to succeed, you often need to keep it oriented to Google. It is dominating the search engine industry. If Google accepts your website well by giving it a good rank, then it is likely other search engines will do the same as well. So, it is important to know what Google seeks from a website and it is usually quite straightforward. However, you should know that Google’s algorithm for determining SERP is complex and it is consisted of hundreds of ranking factors, not just backlinks that are directed to your website. It means that you should play in Google’s ballpark and follow its rules. Experienced webmasters should already have a good idea of what these factors are, because Google doesn’t give us a list. However, official statements from Google and indications could allow us to create a credible list, although it’s probably still far from complete.
It appears that websites that gain a lot of trust and respect in the industry or niche is often placed high in the rank. Google knows that these websites are able to provide quality answers consistently for common problems in specific industry. It becomes a solid reference for many people. People have been asking so much about the ranking factors used by Google. They know that having a reputable website in industry is often the most critical thing, but they only seek to gain shortcuts, instead of making a website that is genuinely the system. You should know that focusing on the ranking factors would only encourage you to game the system. When you start to emphasize on it, there’s a good possibility that you use methods that are placed in the grey or dark SEO categories.
Instead of focusing too much on ranking factors, you should emphasize more on making your website highly respected in the industry. Naturally, this will cause you to work hard on providing excellent, hard-to-find content, intuitive site navigation and appealing design. After you have gained decent trust in the industry, then you could focus a bit more on the known ranking factors. Your aim is to make sure that you don’t unintentionally violate any SEO rule. But it is something that’s unlikely that you will do, because you genuinely want to bring quality results for clients. As an example, your content may use unusually high percentage of desired keywords, so you need to control that and try to keep things within limit.
The most important impact of being trusted in the industry is that you will get free backlinks. People will genuinely want to make a link that is directed to your website. It means that you get backlinks from actual professionals in the industry, because your website contains many pieces of information that can’t be found anywhere else. Google knows that your website is being used as genuine of references due to hard-to-find information that you have. This is a powerful enough factor that propels you high in the rank.
