Google is pretty freaking picky these days about what it ranks well.
It’s no longer possible to create a 5-page
website with 150-word articles and rank on the first page
unless you’re in such an obscure niche that you have nearly
zero competition.
These days, Google wants to see:
* Content that is relevant to the site’s overall theme
* Longer content, at least 1,000 words, and longer is better
* Content with images and videos included
* A low bounce rate
These are the top ranking factors when it comes directly to
content. There are others, of course, such as back links and
social signals, but when it comes to content, these are the
most important.
Most content should be relevant to the site’s overall theme.
If your site is about pets, you shouldn’t post articles about
gardening unless it somehow relates to pets (such as a list
of vegetables in a garden that could make your dog sick).
Content should be at least 1,000 words, on average. In fact,
according to an analysis performed by SEMRush, the average
content on page one of Google was 1,890 words.
As you can tell from these results, the days of short articles
easily ranking on page one are over. It’s all about length.
But there are exceptions to this, which we will discuss later.
Additionally, content should contain other forms of media.
It’s not enough to post long articles. Those articles should
also contain pictures and videos, when appropriate.
Studies have found that content with at least one image ranked
better than content with no images.
Bounce rate relates to the number of people who visit your
page and leave without viewing any other content on your site.
If a large number of people leave your site without viewing any
other content, it’s an indicator that your content is not up to
par, and Google does look at this as a ranking factor.
For this reason, it is critical that all of your content be
the best it can be. It must be interesting, it must be useful,
and it must encourage people to view more of the content
on your website.
