Look closely and you’ll find when it comes to ranking high in SERPs, quality makes all the difference.

It’s still true that the first page in the search engine results pages (SERPs) gets the most traffic and the most clicks. Many times, if searchers don’t find what they need fast, instead of looking through dozens of pages, they’ll input new keywords and search again. The good news is that ranking high is doable. Take a proactive approach to getting your business to place in a top SERP position. Leaving it to chance is like putting money on the table and then walking away.

Frequently Update Your Website with Relevant Content

Relevant content, updated often, tells your audience you’re serious. From a ranking standpoint, search engines notice the frequent activity. This increases your brand awareness and placement as an authoritative presence.

Display original, high quality content as often as you can. Long-form blog posts and articles outrank shorter pieces. A 600- to 2,000-word range is optimal to keep visitors engaged on your website longer. Google pays attention and may improve your SERP ranking. Two more benefits to keeping fresh quality content on your website are (1) current and potential customers appreciate the information, and (2) they may share it with others.

Improve Keyword Relevancy

Select a primary keyword that describes your niche industry. Be careful not to overstuff. Opt for organic, natural-sounding keywords and phrases. These tend to rank higher than forced keywords.

Find Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI) keywords. LSI keywords are words and phrases that have the same meaning. Gather ideas by conducting an internet search on your primary keyword or phrase. Take note of the results shown in the drop-down list. Use the ones that are pertinent to your particular type of business.

Remove Intrusive Interstitials

Interstitials are pop-up ads that cover up at least a portion of readable content on a page. These ads may also all of a sudden show when a visitor scrolls. Some ads take up the entire area above the fold leaving the original content the searcher was looking for below the fold. Most, but not all interstitials are intrusive. The exceptions are login dialogs, age verification queries, and other private pop-ups.

If an interstitial appears in mobile search results, Google penalizes that website by giving it a lower rank. The bottom line: It’s best to skip the shortcuts and optimize your website the correct way.

Complete Metadata Information

Fill out the Title, Description, and Keyword metadata fields for each webpage. The Title metadata appears in the browser window. The Description metadata describes a particular webpage so visitors understand what it’s about. The Keyword metadata is crucial for the webpage to appear in SERPs. Try to limit your total amount of keyword phrases to eight. More than that may look spammy and search engines might not index your website.

Organize, Categorize, and Promote Important Pages

Structure your site in a logical way. Define and highlight your most significant pages. Identify the pages that generate the largest amount of traffic and profits. Promote those the most. Place some inbound links inside a body of content on your home page for extra ranking boost!

At the end of 2016, there were more than one billion websites. Some consistently rank high. Your’s can too. The steps above are great starting points, but there’s so much more to it. We, at MAXBURST, can help. We’ve improved website rankings for businesses nationwide and we’re ready to do the same for your business. Fill out our Project Request a Quote Form or reach us at 888-MAXWEB (888-962-9932) today. Get on the exciting path to improving your company’s website’s rankings now!

Meet The Author

Colleen Loos