Ayaz Nanji says, “Google is now better able to reward high-quality Web content that is relevant to a search query, and less dependent on traditional signals, such as keywords, according to a recent report from Searchmetrics. The report was based on an analysis of the the top 30 search results for 10,000 relevant keywords and 300,000 websites appearing on Google.com in 2015. The aim of the study, which has been carried out every year since 2012, was to identify the key factors that high-ranking Web pages have in common. Below are five key search engine optimization (SEO) lessons from the report.... [...]

Roy Hinkis says, “When Moz undertook this year’s Ranking Correlation Study (Ranking Factors), there was a desire to include data points never before studied. Fortunately, SimilarWeb had exactly what was needed. For the first time, Moz was able to measure ranking correlations with both traffic and engagement metrics. Using Moz’s ranking data on over 200,000 domains, combined with multiple SimilarWeb data points—including traffic, page views, bounce rate, time on site, and rank—the Search Ranking Factors study was able to measure how these metrics corresponded to higher rankings. These... [...]

Rand Fishkin says, “Howdy, Moz fans, and welcome to another edition of Whiteboard Friday. This week we’re going to chat about a problem that many of you have mentioned in comments, in tweets, in questions, and emails to me and to other folks here at Moz when we talk about content marketing and specifically content amplification like, “Okay, I made some great content. But how do I actually get people to share it? In particular, how do I get content into the hands of the influencers who might amplify it?” Look, this is very frustrating, right? If you’re a small brand,... [...]

Rand Fishkin says, “Today, it’s my pleasure to announce some exciting news. First, if you haven’t already seen it via his blog post, I’m thrilled to welcome Russ Jones, a longtime community member and great contributor to the SEO world, to Moz. He’ll be joining our team as a Principal Search Scientist, joining the likes of Dr. Pete, Jay Leary, and myself as a high-level individual contributor on research and development projects. If you’re not familiar with Mr. Jones’ work, let me embarrass my new coworker for a minute. Russ: Was Angular’s CTO after... [...]

Billy Hoffman says, “As we know well by now, the speed of a web page is very important from an SEO and user experience perspective. Faster pages have higher search engine ranks, and users will visit more pages and convert higher on a fast performing website. In short, the smart SEO professional needs to also think about optimizing for performance as well as content. As we discussed in our last article, WebPageTest is a great free tool you can use to optimize your website performance. One of the most useful outputs of the WebPageTest tool is a graphic known as the waterfall diagram. A waterfall... [...]

Kristi Hines says, “If you’re a local business owner, you’ve likely heard that you should submit your business to local business directories like Yelp, Merchant Circle, Yellow Pages, and similar networks in order to help boost your local search visibility on Google. It sounds easy at first: you think you’ll just go to a few websites, enter your contact information, and you’ll be set. Because all you really want to do is get some links to your website from these profiles. But the truth is, there are a lot of local business listings to obtain if you go the DIY route. There are... [...]

Brian Sutter says, “Small businesses have always lived and died by word of mouth. Even before the Internet, a business was in trouble if too many people said bad things about it. Fast-forward to today, when any customer can say almost anything about your business, and all the world can read it. One negative review can cripple a new business. Even an established company has to be careful not to rack up too much negative feedback. Turns out that online reviews are important. However, maybe you’re skeptical: Exactly how influential are customer reviews in the first place? you ask. Is anyone... [...]

Sam Edwards says, “As you’ve probably heard before, YouTube is the second largest search engine in the entire world. That means  aside from Google (which owns YouTube) no website is used more frequently each month than YouTube. In fact, the most recent statistics suggest Google attracts an estimated 1.1 billion unique monthly visitors. YouTube brings in approximately 1 billion. That’s more than Facebook, Yahoo!, Amazon, Wikipedia, Twitter, Bing, and other popular sites. And this equates to big bucks. According to data curated and published by ExpandedRamblings.com, YouTube produced... [...]

Farooq Bhatti says, “In the local search sphere, one of the most important aspects of an establishment is its unique identifier, commonly known as NAP, which stands for Name, Address and Phone.   A citation is simply an online mention of your business NAP. When search engines see consistent NAP citations across your website, review sites, social media profiles, and directory listings, then this acts as a positive ranking factor. However, if search engines find inconsistencies in the citations, in the interest of caution and their own reputation, they promote businesses with accurate and... [...]

Paul Shapiro says, “I recently asked a room of experienced marketers how they thought social media marketing could assist their SEO efforts. The answers were more or less what I had expected to hear: Social media helps foster relationships, which in turn helps build links and improves rankings. Social media aids in public relations, as a distribution channel and a means of generating easy online buzz. Social sharing provides a form of social proof, giving greater credibility and trustworthiness to your content. Brands can rank for their social networking profiles and receive greater visibility... [...]