If you have a website, you’ve likely heard of SEO, or Search Engine Optimisation. Your SEO ranking dictates how much web traffic you get from Google.
The thing with your SEO ranking however is, you want to be ranked for the right keywords that attract the right audience. Suppose you are experiencing a lack of quality web visitors. In that case, you may want to improve your Google website ranking and SEO ranking, as these work together to help more of the right kind of Google users find your business.
More important is that 75% of Google users won’t click past the first page of Google Search Results. On the first page alone, the first five organic results account for 67.60% of all the clicks. So you really want to be high up there!
If you’re not sure why your website isn’t ranking on Google, keep on reading to find a few possible reasons why – plus how to fix it!
Designing SEO friendly websites
When it comes to designing your website to improve your SEO ranking, there are a few things to learn from existing SEO friendly websites that can help your Google ranking down the line.
A few key things to consider when building SEO for a new website include:
- On-Page optimisation: This involves keyword research, title and header tags, image alt tags and your meta description. More in-depth on-page optimisation activities include creating an optimised URL structure, internal link structures, site navigation, information architecture, and so much more.
You may focus on on-page optimisation for most of your time when looking to improve your SEO ranking on an existing website, as there are many unique elements involved.
See also Content in Web Design: Why It’s Important.
- Off-Page optimisation: This differs from the above on-page optimisation and features a more in-depth marketing strategy to improve your SEO ranking. Activities for off-page optimisation include a competitor SEO analysis, using keyword-rich anchor text in inbound links and earning inbound links from authoritative domains.
Other important things to consider when building SEO friendly websites include:
- Having a fast loading speed for all web pages
- Optimising your images and other content for search engines
- Using a solid structure on each web page.
We know it sounds a bit tricky, but all of these elements work together to help your website receive more organic traffic from quality visitors. And better organic traffic should mean more leads, and revenue, for your business.
Remember that the whole point of having a good SEO ranking is to keep visitors coming to your website regularly and organically, no matter how specific or competitive your business or industry is.
Help! Why is my website not ranking?
If you’ve ever asked the question, ‘Why is my website not ranking?’ then you’re not alone.
Here are a few reasons why it may not be ranking:
- Your website is new. Google may not have had enough time to crawl or index your new website or webpage. Make sure Google can crawl your website to stand any chance of improving your Google rankings.
- You have duplicate pages. You could be wasting valuable SEO juice on duplicate content that you have forgotten about, which would cause both pages to rank averagely instead of having one great SEO ranking. Check for any duplicates and remove them.
- You haven’t signed up for Google My Business. This free service is easy to use and can help Google refer more people to your business. Google rankings often prioritize users of Google My Business above those without accounts.
- Your content marketing strategy is lacking. Perhaps you publish a blog post only every now and then. To actively grow your business, you need a stricter content marketing strategy and schedule. Add due dates to your content to help you stay on track. Remember that every piece of content is another opportunity to rank for a new keyword.
- Your website isn’t mobile-friendly. Today, it’s unacceptable to offer a website that doesn’t cater for screens of all sizes. Did you know that Google has moved to mobile-first indexing when deciding on a Google ranking? A lack of mobile-friendliness or poor user experience could be hurting your SEO ranking, even if you’re doing everything else right.
- Your content isn’t broken up properly. By this, we mean using the appropriate header tags to help break up your articles and blogs. Headers make the text easier to skim and can help improve your SEO ranking.
- Your site contains broken links. Broken links will hurt your SEO ranking, and it doesn’t look good when a visitor wants to find information that is missing. Luckily, free dead link checkers are available, which you can use to monitor your links’ status actively.
- Your contact information is outdated. All of your contact information should be clear and up-to-date, and in plain view on your website. If you don’t do this, people may start to report your website for having false or old information, which can crush your SEO ranking.
- You need a more robust social media sharing strategy. You may not think that there’s a direct correlation between your Google ranking and your social media posts, but your SEO ranking can improve if people are sharing links to your website from social media. It may take a lot of work, but having a lot of engagement (mainly shares) can pay off for your website.
- Your blog titles aren’t drawing attention. Bear in mind that you only have 65 characters to write your headline. Keep it short and to the point, but make it enjoyable. Most people scan the first few words of a headline before deciding whether to click or not.
- You aren’t looking for networking opportunities. While contacting other websites or organizations for outreach may seem counterintuitive, it may help generate good press and, therefore, good traffic to your website. For example, if a thought leader interviews you in your space, this will likely help improve your SEO ranking. It doesn’t hurt to reach out to someone you respect in your field – they may surprise you!
- You aren’t using enough keywords. Keywords play a significant role in improving your Google website ranking. You need to include relevant words that people use to search for your content. But you have to be sparing in your use of keywords or risk being penalized for keyword stuffing. The goal is to make your keywords fit naturally into your sentences, and you can use them in header tags and image captions.
There are many other things you can do to improve your Google website ranking, so it’s advisable to review your website regularly to ensure you aren’t missing anything obvious when it comes to your SEO ranking.
It’s always worth working on your SEO rankings
The challenge of building SEO friendly websites involves many complex elements that work together to give you a strong SEO ranking. It’s essential to give your business the best chance at achieving a top Google website ranking, so you need to put considerable effort into this goal.
Luckily, it’s not impossible to achieve your goal of improving your Google ranking. If you need help with your website’s SEO, reach out to us at BigToe Creatives for some advice from our web experts – we’d love to help!
