
Google has gone local and the algorithm is getting smarter and faster day by day.
I kept a record of all the Google algorithm here (I recommend bookmarking this page if you really want to keep up the pace).
As per website ranking factors, there are 100’s of small and big factors which will be listed on this page with a plan of action that can be taken by you for your own website.
Table of Contents
Domain Name Factor
A domain name is the address through which people access a website, and it can influence a website’s search engine ranking. Here are some examples of how a domain name can influence a website’s ranking.
If you are just starting your website do not ignore your domain name selection matrix, I have written a complete article on it Learn how to choose the right domain name.
Make sure your major keyword is in your domain name which will give the highest signal to search engine about your website.
I agree that only a domain name with a good keyword may not always help, which I will explain later in this article, however, still, the right type of domain name with all the positive signal will give the website the boost you needed.
Here is some signal which a domain name gives out for website ranking factors.
Age of your domain name
They (Google) Search engines may regard an older domain name as more established and trustworthy, which can help improve the website’s ranking:
Age of registration: Search engines may give more weight to websites that have been registered for a longer period of time. This is because older domain names may be seen as more established and trustworthy.
Age of content: Websites that have been around for a longer period of time may have more content and a longer history of content updates, which can help improve the website’s ranking.
Age of backlinks: Websites that have been around for a longer period of time may have more backlinks from other websites. These backlinks can be an important factor in a website’s ranking because they indicate that the website is reputable and trustworthy.
History of domain: A domain name that has a long history of being used for spam or black hat SEO practices may be penalized by search engines and negatively affect a website’s ranking.
Branding: An older domain name may have a better chance of being a memorable and brandable name, which can help establish the website as a reputable and trustworthy source.
Keyword in a domain name
there was a time when if your domain name contains a relevant keyword, Then it was a sign of guarantee that your domain name will be on top at least for that domain name. But things are changed now, however, containing keyword will give you some positive flags. After all, they still bold keywords that appear in a domain name.
Having the first word as a keyword in the domain name
Your domain name having the first word as your keyword will give you another boost for the positive flag.
Domain expiry date
I will bet you were not aware of this factor as per google patent
Valuable (legitimate) domains are often paid for several years in advance, while doorway (illegitimate) domains rarely are used for more than a year. Therefore, the date when a domain expires in the future can be used as a factor in predicting the legitimacy of a domain
Subdomain
Search engine treat subdomain as totally different domain, so remembers we talked about the first word as your keyword (point 3) this mean if you are targeting keyword party in Mumbai and you have a domain name mumbaimasti.com then having party subdomain party.mumbaimasti.com will surely give you that little push.
Frequent Change in WHO-is data
In the event, there are lots of change in whois information from time to time then google may treat this as suspicious behaviour.
EMD (Exact Match Domain )
EMD This is good for a high-quality website.
If you are having an exact match domain name for your keyword with only 4-5 page of a spammy looking website, Then your EMD domain may not rank as you must have thought of.
Google is not born yesterday (know more about EMD)

Open WhoIs
well-keeping whois as private whois may help stop spammer but google also sees this as a suspicious factor and may give you a negative flag for private whois.
“…When I checked the whois on them, they all had “whois privacy protection service” on them. That’s relatively unusual. …Having whois privacy turned on isn’t automatically bad, but once you get several of these factors all together, you’re often talking about a very different type of webmaster than the fellow who just has a single site or so.”
Matt Cutts Tweet
Spammer in Whois
If one of your domain (owned by you in whois) is get listed as a spam domain there is a high chance that all domain linked to the same whois data get marked as the spam website.
Having specific TLD’s in a domain name
If you are targeting a specific region like India then having a domain name with .in TLD make sense to google or running an NGO with.
.NGO domain will surely give you another green flag.
We at Netspaceindia offer more than 999 TLD’s, I am sure you will get your right domain name with the right TLD.
Here get the list of TLD’s on our domain registration page.
On-Page Factor
Before you start making a website, the On-page factor helps you rank better on google.
Keyword Rich Tittle
The second most important factor after the content of your page. So do your research before selecting the title of your article or page.
Description Tag
People may say that meta description is dead but Don’t get confused with the meta tag’s meta description. Google officially said it give some importance to the meta description.
Content Lenth
They say content is the king, and they are right here.
The content of your article or page may give plus over shorter content, Here is the result of the random search. Notice the number of words of rank one article over another.

So, give 100% of your attention to creating valuable content.
If required you can also take the help of a professional writer for your content writing work.
Page Load Speed
In my previous two articles, I have written specifically about Website Load Time and What Are Core Web Vitals, And Why Should You Care About Them?
Google have a specific tool for testing your website load time called PageSpeed Insights and others which I have mentioned in detail in the above articles.
in fact, some industry experts believe the loading speed of your website is also monitored by Google Chrome.
Page Age
Google love the fresh content, but an older page with fresh content may outperform the new page due to high page value.
Image Optimization
Most modern websites have Images and these on-page images send search engines important relevancy signals through their file name, alt text, title, description and caption.
(Tip: Compress images for faster loading time)To put everything in summary for on page factor, This report from SearchMatric is the best reference

The frequency of content update
Google love recently updated content, that’s the reason it shows the date of a page’s last update for certain pages:

Keyword order
An exact match of a searcher’s keyword in a page’s content will generally rank better than the same keyword phrase in a different order.
Outbound Links and Theme
Many experts believe giving references to a high-quality website (Like media / Wikipedia / Government Website) may increase your quality score.
But before you start linking random Wikipedia website make sure you are keeping themes in mind.
By saying theme, I mean the theme of your article (not WordPress theme).
So if you are writing about how to buy a dress? and you give a link to the movie website then the search engine may think that you are writing about dress in the movie.
Say no to too many outbound links
When you link a website you are leaking your page rank, So think before you link to a website too many outbound links is also not good for your page rank.
Ok, I got it … You want technical details ….Hmmm here is the formula
Just kidding (BTW: The formula is correct) but if you really want to study how page rank work here is the link for you.
On page Multimedia
Google love what people love and people love Multimedia, So when you add youtube video or images which people will love to visualise then google love it too.
Inter-Page Linking
Like the outbound link, the Search engine loves referring to internal links with high page rank.
A big no to 404 and 500 (Broken or page error):
Google hate 404 page not found an error or any 500 error they are no good for your ranking factors.
Affiliate Link
Having an affiliate link is not bad but too many affiliate link from your domain may not be a good sign for your website ranking.
URL Location
Pages closer to your Homepage may rank higher then pages linked deep inside your website.
URL Lenth
URL of your website should be under the limit. I.e: www.linktomypage.com/yourpage will rank better than www.linktomypage.com/somthinghere/somthingthere/mypage
Categories
Google consider categories as important factors, This tells google what is the page about.
Listing and bullet points
remember <li> and <ol> tags? Well, search engine gives weight to bullets and nested points. (Note: How this article is written on points)
Multi-Keyword ranking
If the same page is ranking high in google for some other keyword, this may give a sign for good ranking for your targeted keyword.
Web-Site Repo
The overall website reputation is also a key factor for website ranking factor.
Contact Us Page
Website proper contact information like address, email and phone address is considered genuine. In fact, if your contact us page contains same information with WHOIS data then considers it a bonus.
Site Freshness
How often you update your website is an important factor.
Bigger is better
A website with lots of pages may rank better than those with only a few.
SiteMap
Sitemap help google crawl your website faster, So it is good for your website.
SSL certificate
Google now officially says that a website with an SSL certificate will be given a high ranking value compare to a non-SSL website.
Terms and Privacy Page
These two pages tell Google that you care about your website visitors.
Server Location
Search engine preferred showing local content to a local user.
Site Uptime
Too much of downtime is not good for your website ranking, So make sure you have a reliable web hosting provider.
Site userfriendly
Site usability is an important factor, Non-user friendly website can hurt your ranking.
Using Google Analytics & Google Webmaster:
Some expert believes, using these two google tool may give you a good boost as google will have more insight of your website like bounce rate. Which make sense to me.
Shashi kant Pandidhar
Leave a Comment
Get the latest news and deals
Sign up for email updates covering blogs, offers, and lots more.
Subscribe: Trusted By 1M+ Readers
Get the weekly Tech Update straight to your inbox.