What Keeps Your Website from Ranking: a Short Guide to SEO in 2022

First of all we must keep in mind two important things:

• Google is constantly improving, changing its ranking algorithm 
• Google will never tell you the exact steps you must follow in order to get on top of Google

When it comes to ranking factors, in fact, there are hundreds of them to follow and implement. 

The main problem I see when it comes to getting to the top of Google is the approach Google uses when ranking websites.

Most experts say that Google checks how people behave when visiting your website.

If they stay long that means your content is relevant and it probably serves as a ranking signal to push your website to the top of search on Google.

Or if visitors leave comments on your website it means your content is engaging and relevant. It’s another good signal to rank your website.

If you have many backlinks from other websites relevant to your page content, it’s another sign to rank your website.

But the main problem with this approach is that your website should stay in the top ten for some time to see if it fits this criteria.

But how can it be decided if it fits or not if Google doesn’t allow your website to appear in the top 10?

Google thinks your website is not established and you are not an authority in your niche.

There are thousands of websites writing on the same topic and Google simply can’t rank them all to see if they fit or not.

All this means your content must really stand out so it can get ranked even in super competitive niches. 

Sometimes you may be targeting some topics for which it’s extremely hard to get ranked because the niche you chose is highly competitive and sensitive, such as medical or psychology or finance.

Google prefers ranking only authoritative websites when it comes to sensitive niches. Because new websites are not established and may be giving wrong advice to someone.

Even if you write the right things, Google doesn’t know you which is why you are climbing rankings very slowly.

Try to avoid sensitive niches because you can simply waste your time and efforts with no result.   

When you plan to write an article on some specific topic, always make sure it’s not TOO competitive because you will be wasting your time trying to get your content ranked under that term.

Before choosing a topic, do some research using Google to check the competition.

Under the search you will see related search terms that Google suggests for you to use as terms for alternative topics. By doing so you can find some great topics way less competitive for you and  can help get your new content ranked much easier.

A few months back it was important from SEO standpoint to create content for your website on different topics, such as review posts, tutorial posts, definitive guide posts, “how to” posts.

Now the game rules have changed and you need to focus less on “review” posts.

If you focus too much on “review” type posts, it can affect your search engine rankings.

You have to always check the competition and see what type of posts your competitors write that outrank your website.

Google changes ranking rules very often which becomes a big problem for many websites.

Sites that were getting a ton of traffic loose it completely in a day or so if they don’t follow new rules set by Google.

We have to remember that Google has a lot of money that they invest for improving their search engine ranking algorithm.

They hire hundreds of people to set the highest criteria possible for high quality content and they apply it to their ranking algorithm. In fact, their ranking system is very sophisticated but it’s far from being perfect.

Because in my 6 year practice in SEO I’ve seen websites that break all possible rules and still they rank very high in search engines.

This probably happens because Google breaks its rules intentionally. I think Google sometimes violates its own rules intentionally so that its ranking system does not seem simple in the form of following points from a to z and then you are guaranteed first places in the search.

There must be a certain amount of ambiguity in order for the system to be unpredictable, and this is what we see in the SEO field.

As evidence, there are examples of many SEO experts who have both successful sites and unsuccessful ones, although they apply the same approach proven over the years of practice.

Your content must be relevant when it comes to the search term around which you create your content.

The more relevant your content the more chances that your content will be ranked high in search engines. 

Backlinks are not so important now but it doesn’t mean you can completely ignore it. The best approach will be having high quality content along with quality backlinks.

This is the best approach in terms of SEO. If you have great content and have no backlinks, you still can get high rankings but it can take longer time.

But if you have a ton of backlinks from reputable and relevant websites to your website and have no high quality, relevant content on your own website, you won’t get any rankings at all. Links won’t help you at all.  

So, Google has a lot of data and knows which content is the most relevant and deserves to be in the top 10 search positions. This is based on the user experience.

Google analyzes a lot of data and knows which content gets clicked more often than others. 

But as I said above, it doesn’t mean this rule will be strictly followed all the time by Google. 

I won’t be talking about all the factors that impact rankings, such as inbound links, outbound links, images, content age,  social signals, structure of your website and content.

The main problem with Google rankings is that no matter what niche you choose, there will always be a lot of competition and there are already many established websites in that niche.

This means winning top search positions is extremely difficult and you really need to have a team or experts who can write an authoritative content for your website that will outrank other sites or you need to have a lot of experience in SEO to be able to create such a content. 

This means it’s absolutely possible to create such content and outrank other websites. But this task is very difficult.

You must be prepared to do a lot of research online to check other websites that are already ranked on the first page and see what and how they write.

You probably have to spend a week or maybe even two weeks before you can write something really valuable to have a hope to get your content ranked in the top search positions.

Remember that your content must be relevant, helpful, engaging, authoritative in order to get ranked.

Also, remember that when you create content relevant for a specific search term, you also will be ranked for all other related search terms as well, including search terms of your local area.

Using Google search, make sure to possibly cover many search terms related to the main topic of your article.

Try to answer as many questions as possible and cover the topic from different angles. 

You can also write some other posts and cover those questions in detail and then interlink all those related posts to each other. This can help you get your content ranked easier and faster for top search positions.   

Also, in order to get high rankings, you have to follow some critical SEO factors, such as

• SSL
• Site speed 
• Malware 
• Images
• Broken links
• Too many ads
• URL length
• Easy site navigation
• Mobile friendly website
• Duplicate content
• Bad grammar on site

You can find more information in this post.  

About the Author: Adam

My name is Adam. I'm the founder of Your Income Advisor. My goal is to help others succeed online, by exposing scams and reviewing top rated products. I can help you start your own business online