Factors in Ranking
In class we talked about a number of strategies for how search engines rank their results to find the best options to present to the user, among these PageRank and Updating Hubs and Authorities. Although a few of the different strategies are well understood, we are not exactly sure of how any Search Engine in particular makes its rankings as there are a number of different factors that go into it, and it differs from company to company. This article explores a couple of possible factors that contribute to how rankings work at Google and though it is not a comprehensive guide to all the possible things that go into it, it gives a good summary of a few of the most important ones.
The first thing it mentions is that the relevance of the content to the search still remains one of the most important factors. The author of the article notes that this is often overlooked because it is assumed that we’ve moved to more complex measures. The second factor he describes is Inbound Links. PageRank is a technology that falls in this category because it gives higher important to those pages that are linked more often by others. Though PageRank itself is being used with less importance, Google still takes the scores given into account when determining page ranking. The next point he makes is about the importance of content quality in these determinations. Because search engines want their user to have a good experience with the service, pages with a clear structure that lacks content errors will receive higher ratings than those with issues such as typos, or too much/ too little content. The next factor he discusses is technical issues. If there are a lot of tech issues, a page may be omitted or much further down in rankings than it would have been without those same errors. The next factor that seems to have a role in determining ranking is user engagement, which is defined slightly ambiguously but deals with the degree of user interaction with the page. The final factor that he describes to be important in googles process is RankBrain. This system allows for results that are not in the exact phrasing of the search, but use other information to fine results that are related to the content of the search. This has effect on searches that are more specific but less on those that are broad.
Although the exact formula that Google, or any search engine, is not open to the public it is interesting to see what some of the more important aspects of the rankings are.
http://www.cio.com/article/3104104/search/top-6-seo-ranking-factors-of-2016.html