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Search Engine Algorithm update is no longer breaking news to online business owners. In fact, many were affected and struggling to get back on their feet after being dreadfully penalized. A lot of internet marketers may have even lost their businesses in just a wink of an eye due to the recent penguin and panda update. Evidently, the marketing tactics that were working so effectively in the past are no longer applicable today. Hence, a lot of SEO pros re-evaluated their approach and modified their methods to keep up a good ranking on the search engine results. Moz is one among the many groups of SEO pros who ardently put effort in keeping track of search engine ranking factors. They incessantly conduct study every two years to ensure that they are updated and aware of these important factors. Just recently, they have presented the result of this year’s search engine ranking factors. According to the data they have gathered, the 2013 search engine ranking factors shows high correlations to the following: • Page Authority Among the metrics in search engine rankings, Page Authority came up with the highest correlation factor. There are many factors that affect Page Authority including but not limited to MozTrust, MozRank and Link counts. • Social Signals Social signals such as Google Plus, Facebook shares and Twitter are among the top three social sites with high correlated factors in ranking. Google plus takes the number one place while Facebook shares beats twitter in the second position. • Anchor Text Although it was apparent that Google dug deeply into the anchor text by identifying over-optimized anchor text in the previous Google algorithm update, the anchor text factor remains highly correlated to ranking. The survey given to top SEO pros came up with one common conclusion – distribution of optimum combination of branded and non-branded words, known as organic anchor text is by far more efficient than collecting a huge number of links. • Schema.org and Structured Data Usage The top three search engines such as Google, Yahoo and Bing in collaboration with Schema.org were able to provide a collection of schemas to webmasters, like html tags that are used to markup web pages. Included in Moz’s study is finding out whether structured markup plays an important role to ranking. Unfortunately, the result turned out negative. Hence, Schema.org and structured data usage is at the moment not used in ranking signals. • Keywords Moz’s study and survey turned out that the use of keywords in the title and on the pages persist to prove its effectiveness in the ranking factor in Google’s search engine results. More so, the importance of keyword usage is also fundamental in the HTML body, H1 tags and meta description. Summing up the result of the recent study based on all the data collected from top SEO in this industry, Moz was able to pinpoint the following conclusions: 1. That links (approximately 40%) play an integral part in the algorithm. 2. That proper keyword usage on the page remains an important factor. 3. That social signals are surprisingly attracting high correlations in contrast to what a lot of SEOs believed. Not to ignore the possibilities in the future, of course, SEOs believes and are expecting a turn away from the customary ranking factors particularly anchor text and exact match domains. They are looking at a total shift in the ranking factors which are geared more towards the site’s value to users, authorship, structured data and social signals to mention a few of the possible important factors to look forward to. Article Source: The Moz Blog About the Author: Manuel Gil del Real is the owner of MGR Consulting Group, an Interactive Marketing Agency providing marketing solutions to companies worldwide. He’s also an auto racing enthusiast and a blog author who enjoys sharing his thoughts and ideas on Internet Marketing, entrepreneurial advice, lifestyle and travel experiences among many others. You can read more interesting articles on various topics from his MGR Blog.
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search engine, ranking factors, google algorithm, anchor text, keywords, social signals, google plus, facebook, twitter, page authority,
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