How Google Thinks About SEO: 3 Winning SEO Tips

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How Google Thinks About Seo - 3 Winning Seo Tips

For some, ranking higher on Google is a dead-end that never seems to work out. For others, they want to get any of the latest SEO tricks they can lay their hands on – any tricks to get them to the top of Google’s search results. Hence, when Google publishes another post on how Google thinks about SEO, it’s a must-read.

Even Google has to follow its own rules. Google owns 7,000 websites and makes over 200 changes per day, which could potentially affect its website’s SEO, and its websites are treated the same way as any other site. 

Of course, there are multiple other ways to boost website traffic. From display media to social posts, PPC, and other paid media, the list is ongoing. When properly implemented, though, a winning SEO strategy provides cost-effective organic growth.
With many businesses experiencing similar results, this is a route you want to explore as a website owner.

Just as every modern business owner can’t stop thinking about SEO, Google’s constant focus on SEO is revealed in its regular SEO updates as it aims to improve search credibility.

It is for this reason that Google continually updates its SEO guidelines. How Google thinks about SEO can be found in these guidelines, its SEO updates, and its approach to SEO for its websites. Here are 3 important SEO tips we can learn from Google. 

1. Start Small

A website is only as good as its smallest details. Many webmasters fail at SEO by going after big SEO results, rather than small, incremental changes. Google itself has found success in its ranking efforts by pursuing small incremental changes such as those found in the web fundamentals guide for developers.

According to Google, its Google My Business, for example, recorded a 2X increase in its organic traffic by implementing canonicals to show search engines which URLs to index. Start with implementing canonicals to avoid duplicate pages, so you should learn how to implement canonicals.


Tip: Not sure where to begin? Use Google’s URL inspection tool to assess your site and identify underlying issues for improvement. 

Google Inspection Tool

2. Embrace Change

Google is continuously evolving its search features to improve content relevancy. They want users to only see the most relevant search result for their search terms. They also continuously adapt search results to keep up with changing user behavior. For instance, in response to a 50% increase in website traffic from mobile, Google has introduced new developments such as Progressive Web Apps (PWAs) and Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP).

These constant changes can get overwhelming. Do you embrace these changes as they come or fight them? Google has found that these tweaks improve the user experience and also improve the rankings of websites that adopt them.

For instance, by implementing structured data, adding AMP, and fixing Google Search Console errors on the ‘Think with Google’ site, Google was able to improve its impressions by 200%. Providing quality content also lead it to rank appropriately through featured snippets, leading to a significant 1,000 extra impressions daily. 

Google Structure Data Markup

Tip: To learn how to add structured data to your web pages, visit Google’s new Structured Data Codelab and then run your web pages through its Structured Data Testing Tool.

3. Consolidate Duplicates

Do you have multiple microsites for different sections of your audience base? Some webmasters aim to reach different, but mostly similar, customer profiles or geographic locations using multiple websites. 

These websites are designed to contain very similar content tweaked to match the slightly different buyer personas on target. While this may seem a suitable approach, it leaves you with some disadvantages. For one thing, it is confusing for users of your website. It is also very confusing for search engines. So, rather than create multiple microsites, creating one great site that targets all of your buyer personas is the best way to boost your organic growth.

According to Google, for instance, it recently conducted a site audit for many near-duplicate websites it has developed to match different marketing campaigns or goals. Following the audit, it decided to overhaul its Google Retail website by consolidating its content and cleaning up six old microsites. This increased effort to grow one great website led to a boost in organic traffic by 64%.

Tip: Work on improving your entire website ecosystem while also working on your on-page performance.

Can you Apply Google’s SEO Strategy to your website?

Google is continuously looking to improve the search rankings of all of the websites in its web ecosystem. Like you, it doesn’t always get its SEO strategy right. But it has found success by continually adapting to changes in the SEO world, focusing on the smaller details, and focusing its efforts on building one great site instead of many small sites.

You too can improve your website’s SEO performance using these tips. Focusing your SEO strategy around these three areas can help you build a winning strategy that drives powerful results and embrace change.

Kesar Long

About the author

Founder, Chief Strategist, and head of web development and advertising at Orbit Local–is a certified Google Ads Expert and HubSpot Solutions Partner with over a decade of digital marketing experience. He's earned a BS in Computing Information Science from the University of North Florida and an MBA at the Florida Institute of Technology.

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