Search engine optimization (SEO) can make the difference between success and failure for your company’s website. When someone does a search in Google, you want to make sure that your company is there first. Being higher on the search engine results page generally means more clicks, and more clicks means more potential leads for your business.
So, when your important rankings suddenly drop off, it can be mystifying — there one day, gone the next. On the other hand, climbing higher on the search results page can potentially change the fortunes of your business. Let’s look at some of the factors that affect your site’s SEO, and what causes your search engine rankings to move up and down.
How does Google decide that one website should be ranked higher than another? It all comes down to their search engine algorithm. The algorithm takes hundreds of factors into account, to try and give the user the best options in order from first to worst.
The tricky part of working within the algorithm is that nobody knows exactly how different search engine factors are weighted. To try and avoid manipulation, it’s a closely-guarded secret. In the end, Google wants its search engine users to get good quality results and have a good experience so that they keep coming back.
Even though we don’t know the exact inner-workings of the algorithm, 20+ years of search engine experience has given us some good intel. Many suggest that there are hundreds of search engine factors that determine your organic ranking.
However, since it’s usually impractical to focus on getting hundreds of miniscule factors right, most SEO practitioners direct their time and energy towards some of the factors which play the biggest role in determining your search engine rankings. Those include:
Chances are, there’s probably dozens of ways to potentially improve the SEO on your website and climb higher on the keywords that matter for your company. On the other hand, if you’re already dominating the search results, what might cause you to move down?
It could be any number of things. For one, Google is constantly updating and refreshing their algorithm: taking new factors into account, and placing more or less emphasis on certain factors. If your site is vulnerable to these changes, that can definitely affect your ranking for certain keywords.
Another big influence can be what other people are doing with their website. Competition is a huge factor, and you’ll find that the most lucrative keywords will tend to have the most competitive environment. If your competition improves, they can slide up and overtake you. That’s why monitoring your rankings over time is important.
If your rankings are tanking, you can count on us to help you out with our Ottawa SEO services. We see organic search engine optimization as a vital part of your overall digital marketing strategy and will take the time to understand your business and objectives before we dig in. Contact us to get started today!