How To Get a Higher Google Ranking in 2021 (10 Easy Steps Guide)

Subhash
by Subhash
Updated On: October 16, 2023
How to Rank High on Google in 2021

Want to know how to rank faster and higher on Google in 2021? Use this step-by-step guide on how to get a higher ranking in Google and improve your organic rankings on SERPs.

How to Rank High on Google in 2021

Want to climb the Google ladder? That’s the aim of virtually anyone who creates a website to grow an audience and want Google rank.

However, it’s a competitive method to reach the first page of search results for a term you need to rank for; it’s possible to do this by applying the right SEO techniques.

It’s difficult to understand what is working & why some websites move up or down on the Google position rank.

One of the most popular questions that modern SEOs have remains: how to rank high on Google? And “how to rank on page 1 of Google” is the common one.

Well, the solution itself isn’t that straightforward; we can comprehend this question through two major heuristics.

The first remains a simple mental framework for improving your rankings on Google; moreover, the second signifies the proven steps of best practices to accomplish this.

So, let’s dive into the million-dollar question & share our thorough – moreover somewhat lengthy – analysis of how to rank more efficiently in Google.

But First: The Mental Framework for Enhancing the Ranking of Your Website

Think of SEO as a big machine including hundreds of gauges, dials & other little switches.

Your job being an SEO remains to optimally transform those dials to exactly the right point that you begin to creep up to rank high in Google.

It’s essential to understand that ethical SEO needs one to think like the scientists. It’s about testing the various hypotheses & measuring results, moreover then repeating them in your method.

While doing B2B SaaS SEO, it is remarkably true, which possesses relatively more variables and unknowns than other organic marketing forms.

However, to do that efficiently, you require measuring your growth. The power of a SERP tracker such as Moz, Ahrefs, or SEMRush can benefit you to make better decisions.

We at outranking.io like to consider a rank tracker as a thermometer.

Knowing precisely how you’re moving up & down in the SERPs, you’ll understand what is working & what isn’t. Just instead of inspecting the temperature, you’re inspecting rankings.

Use the rank tracker as the weather station to monitor & measure the rank of your SEO work.

There are various ranking factors to evaluate if you desire to rank high on Google, although few of them are more powerful than others.

Here in this blog, I will outline all the essential steps you require to take if you desire to get a top ranking position on the Google SERPs.

Steps to rank higher in Google

There are several reasons you need to seek a good Google ranking; let’s discuss how to rank higher in Google.

Here are the 10 steps to follow:

Step 1: Check the quality of the content

Step 2: Improve the link profile

Step 3: Get the on-page SEO right

Step 4: Add internal links to the most significant pages

Step 5: Perform a technical SEO Audit

Step 6: Improve the page loading time

Step 7: Make sure that the website is mobile-friendly

Step 8: Make the website HTTPS

Step 9: Tell Google about the website

Step 10: Get benefit of the Social Media Buzz

Let’s understand these steps in detail to climb the SERPs ladder.

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Step 1: Check the quality of the content for higher rankings

First & foremost, you require checking the quality of the content.

You should have unique as well as original content published on your site. It remains a must and one of the essential factors for your website’s progress.

Copying & republishing content from another site will not accomplish this since content originality is essential for Google rankings.

When doing content analysis, keep the following factors in mind:

Does it meet the user’s intent?

Each content you publish on your site also requires a specific goal. It is no other than meeting the user’s intent.

Whenever the users type a query into the Google search box, they expect that the website that is in the first position will give them an accurate answer or solution to their query.

Is your content a suitable petitioner for this? How does your content compare with sites that are ranking higher in Google search results for the same search phrases?

Be honest when performing your evaluation; otherwise, you won’t be capable of enhancing your content and rankings.

Can search engines recognize it?

Besides ensuring that you have written content for your users, you must also ensure that search engines can recognize it.

It means that you necessitate learning how to create SEO-friendly content.

SEO-friendly content helps search engines understand the context of your content precisely.

And don’t forget that the search engine crawlers signify computer programs, not humans; moreover, the only way to explain what a piece of content is through the signals that you present them through content SEO.

Do you have sufficient relevant content on your site?

In addition to possessing quality content, you also necessitate a LOT of content. As the competition is intense in every niche, you might think of, and you must stand out from the crowd.

With some latest changes in its ranking algorithm, Google has explained that it prefers relevancy & authority in the sites that rank on top positions.

It signifies that it’s not enough to just create a single piece of content regarding a specific subject. However, you must show that your site has much relevant & related content regarding a topic.

Algorithms no longer seem for the specific keywords within the content. However, they analyze the site and try to know how relevant it is to what the users are searching for.

That’s why it is necessary to optimize the site structure and make sure that it highlights all necessary parts and your site’s content to both users and search engines.

Relevancy in combination with high-quality content & great off-page SEO builds authority.

Remember that if you have to pick between quantity & quality, always go with the quality because search engines always prefer websites with quality content.

Age of domain: We tend to ignore this, but a new domain will not quickly get a higher ranking. It takes a lot more extra work to catch the attention of a specific search giant and build Google trust. It does not indicate that it’s impossible to accomplish something good by a new domain; it just indicates that it will take some more time.

Is the content long enough?

The length of content is one of the most important ranking factors. Although Google states that they don’t utilize the number of words in a specific ranking algorithm, they declare that the content should be thorough and insightful.

Many pieces of research have shown that long-form content does better in search moreover gets more extra social media shares.

There are no magical numbers as to how many words to make your blog posts; however, as a rule of thumb, the articles with 1500 words or more have more chances of gaining higher ranks in the Google SERPS.

What you need to do is to provide users exactly what they require. Don’t provide them extra information that they don’t require to understand; however, they provide a detailed solution for their query.

It is a very good habit to check the target keywords in Google and analyze the length (& type) of content in the first position.

It will provide you a very great idea of how detailed your content requires it to be.

Step 2: Improve the business link profile to rank on Google

For acquiring the attention of Google, it is essential to have the mentions (links) from other sites on the web pointing to your site.

If the backlinks are evolving from big & trusted websites, they have more value than can positively influence the Google rankings of your site.

Link building techniques or off-page SEO techniques signify a huge topic; however, what is necessary to understand now signifies that incoming links are similar to ‘votes of trust’ from other sites. Moreover, this is something that Google SERPs consider while deciding which web pages will acquire a higher ranking.

Step 3: Get your on-page SEO right for Google rank

Besides getting high-quality incoming links, you also require to make sure that your ‘on-page SEO’ is accurate.

On-Page SEO remains a set of practices to make your site SEO friendly.

 An SEO-friendly website is a lot easier for Google to ‘understand’ & the more information it can ‘understand’ from the website, & has greater chances of obtaining a higher ranking.

Step 4: Add internal links to the most significant site pages

Internal linking implies adding the link to any web page that leads to another web page on the same website.

Internal links are an extremely compelling way to show Google what the page is about; this is good for the user as they can find new pages on the same website, and it’s also an inspiration for Google for crawling more content from the same site.

A good internal link uses the anchor text that describes the linking page.

Step 5: Perform a technical SEO audit to get Google rank

Technical SEO remains extremely important in the entire SEO process. If there are any issues in the technical part of SEO, then the ranking of the website can be negatively affected, even if you have done everything else perfectly.

You should perform a technical SEO audit at least every six months to ensure that Google can access and index your site without any dilemmas.

The most important points to review while doing a technical SEO audit includes:

  • The index coverage report within the Google Search console
  • Proper usage of canonical URLs
  • the robots.txt file
  • The right use of structured data mark-up (website & individual pages)
  • Broken links as well as 404 pages
  • HTML & XML Sitemaps

Step 6: Improve the page loading time to rank site in Google

Although it is a segment of technical SEO, it should emphasize that a fast-loading site can get higher Google rankings than a slow-loading site – an important aspect of having a search engine friendly URL.

Speed remains a known ranking factor as well as extremely essential for usability.

You necessitate having a website that loads faster because Google will like it more and positively affects the bounce rate.

Step 7: Make sure that the website is mobile-friendly

More & more people are utilizing their mobiles to search Google and many pieces of research, showing the importance of the mobile search for businesses and website owners.

When it proceeds to rankings, possessing a mobile-friendly site remains a must as Google is now ‘punishing’ sites that don’t offer a good mobile experience to mobile users.

Step 8: Make the website HTTPS to improve Google rank

From the year 2014, HTTPS is a much known ranking factor. As stated by Google, it’s a lightweight signal; however, one of the easiest things you can do is get a comparative advantage over your competitor site that does not possess SSL enabled on their site.

In addition, from July 2018, the Google Chrome browser indicates Non-HTTPS websites as not secured and can drive customers and visitors away.

Step 9: Tell Google about the website.

To build some kind of communication by webmasters, Google formulated the Google webmaster tool.

The webmaster tools, with other things, remain an exceptional approach to provide information to Google regarding your website and find out what Google understands about it.

You can configure many Webmaster tools such as target country, preferred URL, sitemap, etc. Likewise, several diagnostic tools you can utilize, such as ‘fetch as Google’ & ‘robots tester,’ ultimately benefit you rank higher on Google.

Step 10: Get the benefit of the Social Media Buzz for higher rankings.

The part social media has to perform in Google rankings remains a popular point amongst digital marketing managers and SEO Experts.

There are several opinions about the impact social has on rankings; however, what is certain signifies that one successful social media marketing campaign possesses a lot of benefits to offer to any website that proceeds beyond rankings & it is something you require to use as well benefit from.

Why do you need to rank high on Google?

Good rankings signify hard to get when you do. It’s only after a lot of patience plus hard work. By knowing the advantages of having the web page in the first position on Google, you can get the motivation and courage to work until you reach the target.

Below are some better reasons to rank high on Google. Explore all now!

#1 – Higher rankings indicate more traffic –The first benefit is the traffic accumulations. The higher your website ranking is, the more extra organic traffic you acquire from Google.

Remember that statistically, the first five positions in SERP get the bulk of search traffic, which is more than 60%.

#2 – It is a very great signal of trust –One of the reasons Google grew as the World’s most popular search engine remains because users trust it. They trust Google because they understand that they will get what they are searching for whenever they search for anything on Google.

Google is utilizing more than 255 signals and more than 18 years of research & development on its ranking algorithms; also, they became very great in choosing quality websites to display in the search results.

If users find your website within the first pages of Google, they understand that it’s a great website since Google trusts it and presents it in their results.

#3 – You will acquire more social media shares & comments –Any website on the first page of Google acquires more social shares and comments because it gets more extra traffic because of the ‘trust’ basis that I have mentioned above.

#4 – Higher rankings on other search engines –Google implies not the only available search engine, but it’s the one including the most traffic.

Although the other search engines possess SEO rules similar to Google, and good ranking positions will certainly follow in the other search engines once you acquire a good ranking on Google.

10x your content production

Empowering writers, not replacing them.

Final thoughts

Google is steadily looking to get quality websites to add to its index to present the best possible results to its users.

As a happy Google user will arrive for more searches, this is their aim.

Your aim as a webmaster should be to create a site that presents real value to your users and makes sure that Google can easily understand what your website is providing its users.

Moreover, these SEO tools and WordPress plugins can surely add an extra advantage to help you in getting higher ranking in Google.

Also, you need to prove to Google that your website deserves to rank in the top positions by getting the links (votes) from other trusted websites on the internet.

Ultimately, be patient – high Google rankings take time to accomplish, but nothing can deter you from getting the ranking positions you require if you continue working in the right way.