TL;DR:
1. High-quality, high-value content.
2. Mobile optimization.
3. User experience.
4. Loading speed.
5. On-page optimization.
6. Internal links.
7. External links.
8. Locality.
So far, it all sounds simple and easy. Now let’s dive in and understand the 8 parameters that affect your website’s organic SEO a bit more in depth.
8 Parameters That Affect Your Website's Organic SEO
1. High-Quality, High-Value Content
If you do not have a blog or a content component on your website, you should read these lines carefully. Content is king. Yes, the king of organic SEO. But not only that. High-quality and valuable content is critical. Want to know how critical? Ask Google’s Panda and Fred algorithms, which crushed the organic rankings of websites containing content with no real value. The shortcuts and tricks practiced in the past no longer work. If your site does not have content pages containing real information and value, your site will receive a low optimization score.
Let’s drop the slogans for a moment and understand what high-quality content means. Think for a moment about your sales calls or the questions your target audience asks you before making a buying decision.
Most users will look for answers to these questions on your site. They will want to know more about you, your business, and the product or service you offer. They will want to know how to use it or how your solution will help them solve problems they face in their daily lives. A very small percentage of users who didn’t get answers to these questions will contact you directly. The majority will simply move on to another site, likely one of your competitors.
Wait, how do you verify that the content on your site is truly high quality?
Here are some parameters worth checking:
1. Time spent on site / on content pages. The higher it is (over a minute), the more you know you did something right.
2. Bounce rate. If you reach a rate below 20%, you are likely on the right track again.
Wait, how do you know what content should appear on your site?
In one word – focus. In four words – focus on search intent. Dive into Google Analytics and try to understand what your users were searching for. In GA4 you have the view_search_results event (site search) and the Path exploration report (user journeys) at your disposal. In addition, you can examine the Performance report in Google Search Console. Through this report, you can understand which search terms people click on when visiting your site.
If you are in the planning and specification phase of a new website, here is why you must not skip the keyword research stage: check what the main search terms related to your field are and what search questions your target audience uses when searching on Google. Here is an example: suppose your business is in the real estate sector and one of the services you offer is feasibility studies for urban renewal projects. The search query of your target audience might be, for example: What is the work process in an urban renewal project? Write a content page on your site explaining the process and how your company helps make it shorter and more effective.
It is, of course, preferable to group keywords by topic. Think about synonyms, long-tail keywords (those with low search volume), and keywords related to similar topics. Build the content pages on the site according to the results you found.
A word on refreshing content
One of the goals when creating content is to make it evergreen—that is, content that will always remain relevant. True, we said that the content on the site must match the questions of your target audience and their Google searches, but that doesn’t mean it’s a “set it and forget it” task. The content must be refreshed from time to time to stay relevant. This is true whether you sell a service or a product.
So what to do?
Once a quarter, conduct an audit to see what content needs refreshing on the site. Suppose, for example, that you have an e-commerce store: update the product page, refresh the images, description, FAQ section, and customer reviews area. The same applies if your business is service-based.
2. Mobile Optimization
You have probably heard the term “responsive website” many times. In case you didn’t know what it means, it refers to a website whose structure adapts to the device through which you are browsing (laptop, smartphone, tablet, or desktop). Here is another fact you might not know: 65% of users will visit your website via mobile. So why is it important for your website to be mobile-friendly, and how does it affect its organic SEO, you ask? Meet Google’s mobile-first index—or in simple words, the way Google indexes your site.
A complex process that began around 2017 and was completed in March 2021.
After it officially launched, Google explained that responsive web design helps its algorithm rank the content on your site. Additionally, if the mobile browsing experience on your site is good, you earn more ranking points. Therefore, if your site is not mobile-friendly or if you are in the process of building a new site, make sure you design it so the browsing experience is well-suited for mobile and your content is accessible and legible.
3. User Experience
In case you heard the abbreviation UX and didn’t understand what it is, we are here to explain. UX is short for User Experience.
According to recent studies, 52% of users will abandon a site if its content and layout are not appealing. But if we talk in financial terms, the same studies show that an investment of one dollar in quality UX design yields an ROI of 100 times in sales.
A word on architecture
When building a new house, one usually uses the services of an architect. Based on your requests, they build a blueprint for the contractor and interior designer that defines every part of the home’s space.
In exactly the same way, when building a website, you need to define and plan in advance how each page will look and where it will sit so that it’s easy for your visitors to navigate. Beyond the user experience, this process significantly impacts the site’s SEO. Proper construction of the website structure helps search engines crawl its pages more easily, and when it’s easy for them, the site’s optimization score goes up.
Remember an important rule: it should take website visitors no more than 3-4 clicks to find any page on your site.
A word on security
One of the parameters affecting the user experience on your site is the visitors’ sense of security. They want to know that the site they are currently on is secure and that no one can steal the information they are about to leave (their personal details such as email address and phone number, or their credit card details).
How does this affect organic SEO, you ask?
Back in 2017, Google announced that its Chrome browser (used by 45% of the world) would alert users about insecure sites—sites whose address does not begin with https or do not have SSL security standards implemented. Although it hasn’t been proven to have a dramatic direct impact on ranking, no one wants to lose traffic from Chrome users due to this alarming warning. In addition, if you run search ads on Google and your site does not start with https and lacks SSL standards, you are likely to receive a low Quality Score for your ads.
4. Loading Speed
Until 2018, loading speed ranking was only relevant for desktop browsing. Since then, page loading speed has become a ranking factor for mobile as well. Simply put, the slower your website loads, the more visits and revenue you will lose, and you will also pay a price in terms of the organic ranking of the site in search engines. For Amazon, for example, just one additional second in page load time could cost it $1.6 billion in sales each year.
There are available tools for testing the average loading speed of websites, such as GTMetrix. Most of the fixes required are relatively easy to implement if done by someone who knows what they’re doing, but it is best to leave this task to a professional company.
5. On-Page Optimization
The work you do “behind the scenes” of your website greatly affects the optimization score of each page and naturally also impacts the user experience on the site. This optimization, which has existed for many years and is the easiest to implement, can help your existing content be discovered faster by search engines and users.
Here are 2 examples:
Metadata tags
Meta tags are HTML tags designed to provide information about the data on your site. They include the title and descriptions of each of its pages. Google retrieves these titles and descriptions and displays them in organic search results.
XML Sitemap
A map of your website that helps search engines navigate your site and learn about its content.
6. Internal Link Structure
An internal linking structure helps visitors and search engines navigate and find pages on the site much better.
So why is it good, really?
Looking at it from a strategic perspective, it simply helps route traffic within your site from the moment visitors land on it. You can create references for further reading in other content sections of the site, thereby increasing time on site and providing more value to users. Suppose, for example, you built a page for an online booking system you developed. On this page, beyond explaining the system and its benefits, you can also include a link to a page featuring a demo of the system, and from there direct users to leave their details for more information or sign up for a trial period.
7. External Links (Backlinks)
One of the most influential parameters for your website’s organic SEO. In this process, links embedded within relevant and similar websites to your own are acquired, thereby increasing their relevance. For example, suppose your business is in the financial sector: you can acquire a link that directs to your website from one of the major financial websites or a link from a leading blog in your field.
8. Locality - or Local Search
More relevant for businesses with a physical location, but also for those without. As far as Google is concerned, local SEO is divided into three ranking factors:
1. Relevance – How closely the business matches the search query. For example, you are in Tel Aviv and looking for a place to eat pizza nearby. Google will detect your location and recommend a pizzeria that is close to you.
How can you influence this parameter?
Register your business in common search directories (144, Yellow Pages, Easy) and of course open a profile on Google My Business. Enter the business address, phone number, opening and closing hours, provide a menu, and talk about the services you provide on-site.
2. Distance – The physical distance between your business and the user searching. The closer your business is to the searcher, the more likely its location will appear higher in Google’s local map results.
3. Prominence – Prominence is related to how well-known your business is in Google’s eyes. In simpler terms: links and references to your business from around the web, articles and posts recommending it, and of course, the number of positive reviews you have received.
4. Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness (or in short: E-A-T) – The rating given by Google to your business based on the feedback and reviews provided by users. This is not only about direct reviews on the nature of the service you provide to your customers, but also about the match between the search they performed and the value they received from landing on your website. For example, returning to the Tel Aviv pizzeria example, suppose the user searched for a kosher pizzeria near them, but your business is not kosher and nothing is mentioned about it on your website—the rating you receive will be low.
Summary
To promote your business, you need to pay attention to many details. But if you make sure to improve the 8 parameters mentioned in the article: provide high-quality content with lots of value for the user, ensure a great user experience, improve your website’s speed to make it really fast, perform on-page optimization, maintain internal links and plenty of external links—you will be able to advance organically, get more website traffic from Google, and consequently increase your inquiries and leads.
About the Author
Alon Schneiderman, CEO and owner of Web3D.
Web3D was founded in 1997 and is one of the leading and most veteran companies in the Israeli market in providing creative, dynamic, and complex solutions in the fields of Internet and software, digital marketing and strategy, branding and graphic design, and multimedia products (business presentations, promotional videos, animations, and 3D simulations).
