SEO metrics and data that matterAxel Landschoof

DATA THAT MATTERS

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Ranking Factor Study 2012

Meta Data

• Keywords 10.000

• Backlinks 7.948.407.598• Facebook Shares, Likes & Comments 5.397.199.386• Tweets 513.034.978• +1s 230.419.354• Pins 10.910.710

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CORRELATION ≠ CAUSAL EFFECT

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#1: Social has arrived in international markets

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Social networking site activity correlates very well with good rankings, just as it has in the U.S. for the past year. That doesn’t mean Facebook Shares, Tweets, etc. are definitively ranking factors, but it looks like, as a kind of user feedback, they are very important and they should take part in SEO strategy.

#1: Facebook

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#1: Google +1

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Links bleiben Gold.

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#2: Backlinks are still a key factor for SEO, but with caution

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Backlinks are still very important for rankings, but must vary between keyword links, no follow links, and “organic” links with stopwords (e.g. “as.” “the,”…) in them.

#2: Backlinks are still a key factor for SEO, but with caution

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#4: Keywords in domains stay a factor

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Although Google has often said that keyword domains today are not as important as in the past, we found many domains in top positions that have keywords in them.

#4: Keyword in domain Keyword is domain

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Although Google has often said that keyword domains today are not as important as in the past, we found many domains in top positions that have keywords in them.

But see what happend in US after EMD Update:

#5: Long URLs don‘t seem to rank well

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Recommendations for SEO in 2013

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• Social factors are getting more and more important: Start measuring social media signals and motivating users to make your company become more famous

• Backlinks are still a key factor for SEO

• Keywords in domains stay a factor, but could disappear soon

• Clean Onpage factors like short speaking URLs stay

SEO VISIBILITYA metric that shows visibility of a domain in organic search results

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Historical Change of SEO Visibility

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The SEO Visibility Formular

weight(x) = is the secret sauce giving each position a weight taking in account, if the keyword is navigational or informational and other factors

Why did SEO Visibility change?

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Compare to Competitor

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What about the main market?

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Project SEO Visibility

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See the impact of the domain name change and redesign

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Compare Organic and Paid Visibility

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Analyse changes

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Compare the domain to the top directories of the domain

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MORE DATA THAT MATTERS

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What Google thinks about the importance of Social signals

“Links are not going away, but social is an important signal. And it will become more and more important.”

Product Management Director for Google Search – Jack Menzel:

Social SignalsMatt Cutts in Google Hangout

Q: Do Google +1’s affect a website ranking?

A: “Not really a direct effect” […], BUT there are things like, we have an authorship proposal”

Marcus Tober, SEO Rankingfaktoren 2013

<Bullshitfoto>

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Bullsh**

Probieren geht über studieren

Quod erat demonstrandum…36

#1

No impact, no article got indexed

#2Immediately indexed after some +1s from real accounts

Immediately rankings for title-tag and some longtail queries

#2NOT indexed after some FB shares from real accounts

Not indexed, no rankings!

#2NOT indexed after some Tweets from real accounts

Not indexed, no rankings!

#2NOT indexed after some Pins from real accounts

Not indexed, no rankings!

#3 Added 50 more FB shares from real accounts

Article got indexed

Some rankings, similar to +1s behaviour

Still in progress

Takeaways• Implement +1 button on your site

• Measure +1 votes

• Set up Google+ page and share your content

WHAT‘S NEXT?

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Authorrank

300k Keywords @google.nl

~ 3.000 URL with Author

Is it possible that the author of a link will be a bigger factor than the URL?

Ranking signal of the future?

Loose of relevance for 1st PositionUser clicks the result he trusts An authors face generates trust

CTR already is relevant for rankings• 30% increase in CTR• Look or point to snippet• Try different colors

“Update from a CEO” by Larry Pagehttp://investor.google.com/corporate/2012/ceo-letter.htmlb

Author Rank a signal for 2013?

Google Autorenintegration

Spending “enough” time on a site with a certain author markup signals Google that he likes this author or article.

Going back to the SERPs you see more articles of this author

Author Rank a signal for 2013?

Google Autorenintegration

Probieren geht über studieren

Authorship is important, but today it‘ just Snippet Optimization

Searchmetrics Suite

•Over 110 countries•Over 200 searchengine language combinations•Local rankings•Onpage optimization•Web analytics integration•100 Millionen keywords (SEO, SEM)•150 Billion backlinks•3,3 Billionen social links (including pinterest)