From the SMX Advanced Conference in Seattle, Washington, June 22-23, 2016. SESSION: The Periodic Table of SEO Ranking Factors: 2016 Edition. PRESENTATION: Deconstructing the Gospel of Rankings - Given by Leslie To, @itsleslieto - 3Q Digital, Director of SEO. #SMX #11A

1. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
Four Factors in Focus
Deconstructing
the Gospel of
Rankings

2. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
And Me
• About me:
• Director of SEO
• Responsible for SEO strategy on all clients
• About 3Q Digital:
• Over $400 million in annual managed spend
on Google
• Search, SEO, mobile, paid social, display,
creative and analytics

3. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
• Why Test Old-Guard Ranking Factors
• Old-Guard Factors: Titles, Descriptions & Content
• Understanding RankBrain
Agenda

4. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
• Why Test Old-Guard Ranking Factors
• Old-Guard Factors: Titles, Descriptions & Content
• Understanding RankBrain
Agenda

5. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
“Change is the only constant.”
- Heraclitus

6. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
A Quick Review of The Ever-Changing Landscape
2 0 1 1 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016
(not provided)
KG
KG
Expands
2.0
2.0
2.0

7. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
Ecosystem of Ranking Factors
Ranking
Factors
Media
Domain
History
SSL
UX
Bolded
Terms
SERP
Behavior Page
Speed
Link
Equity
Duplicate
Content
Internal
Outbound
KW
Targeting
Search
CTR
Title
RankBrain
H
tags
Meta
Desc.
Domain
Age
Body
Content
EMD Content
Length
LSI
Canonicals
Recency
Inbound
Helpfulness
Crawl
Errors
Readability
HTML
errors
Domain
Authority
Architecture
Mobile
Friendliness

8. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
Many project plans still heavily emphasize meta data & body copy
optimizations even though there are so many other levers to be
pulled at any one time.
I Got 99 Problems and Ranking Factors are Just One of
Them

9. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
Many project plans still heavily emphasize meta data & body copy
optimizations even though there are so many other levers to be
pulled at any one time.
I Got 99 Problems and Ranking Factors are Just One of
Them

10. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
How much does exact match keyword targeting matter in title
tags?
CTR is related to meta descriptions and has been thought to impact
rankings. Does it really?
Is there a diminishing return on content investment?
Three Lines of Inquiry

11. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
How much does exact match keyword targeting matter in title
tags?
CTR is related to meta descriptions which has been thought to
impact rankings. Does it really?
Is there a diminishing return on content investment?
Three Lines of Inquiry

12. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
Exact Match Titles vs Phrase Match Titles
1
3
5
7
9
11
13
15
2/28/2016
3/1/2016
3/3/2016
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3/11/2016
3/13/2016
3/15/2016
3/17/2016
3/19/2016
3/21/2016
3/23/2016
3/25/2016
3/27/2016
3/29/2016
3/31/2016
4/2/2016
4/4/2016
4/6/2016
4/8/2016
4/10/2016
4/12/2016
4/14/2016
4/16/2016
4/18/2016
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4/22/2016
4/24/2016
4/26/2016
4/28/2016
4/30/2016
5/2/2016
5/4/2016
5/6/2016
5/8/2016
5/10/2016
5/12/2016
5/14/2016
5/16/2016
5/18/2016
5/20/2016
5/22/2016
5/24/2016
5/26/2016
5/28/2016
Exact Phrase Control

13. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
Exact Match Titles vs Phrase Match Titles
1
3
5
7
9
11
13
15
2/28/2016
3/1/2016
3/3/2016
3/5/2016
3/7/2016
3/9/2016
3/11/2016
3/13/2016
3/15/2016
3/17/2016
3/19/2016
3/21/2016
3/23/2016
3/25/2016
3/27/2016
3/29/2016
3/31/2016
4/2/2016
4/4/2016
4/6/2016
4/8/2016
4/10/2016
4/12/2016
4/14/2016
4/16/2016
4/18/2016
4/20/2016
4/22/2016
4/24/2016
4/26/2016
4/28/2016
4/30/2016
5/2/2016
5/4/2016
5/6/2016
5/8/2016
5/10/2016
5/12/2016
5/14/2016
5/16/2016
5/18/2016
5/20/2016
5/22/2016
5/24/2016
5/26/2016
5/28/2016
Exact Phrase Control
Changes Pushed ?

14. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
Not as much as we were expecting
URLs with phrase match often times did just as well or sometimes
even better than exact targeting
How much does exact match keyword targeting matter
in title tags?

15. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
How much does exact match keyword targeting matter in title
tags? Not as much as we thought
CTR is related to meta descriptions which has been thought to
impact rankings. Does it really?
Is there a diminishing return on content investment?
Three Lines of Inquiry

16. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
How much does exact match keyword targeting matter in title
tags? Not as much as we thought
CTR is related to meta descriptions and has been thought to impact
rankings. Does it really?
Is there a diminishing return on content investment?
Three Lines of Inquiry

17. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
CTR is related to meta descriptions and has been thought
to impact rankings. Does it really?
-
2.00
4.00
6.00
8.00
10.00
12.00
2.50%
2.60%
2.70%
2.80%
2.90%
3.00%
3.10%
3.20%
3.30%
AveragePosition
CTR
*CTR Avg. Position

18. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
CTR is related to meta descriptions and has been thought
to impact rankings. Does it really?
-
2.00
4.00
6.00
8.00
10.00
12.00
2.50%
2.60%
2.70%
2.80%
2.90%
3.00%
3.10%
3.20%
3.30%
AveragePosition
CTR
*CTR Avg. Position

19. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
CTR is related to meta descriptions and has been thought
to impact rankings. Does it really?
2/28 3/6 3/13 3/20 3/27 4/3 4/10 4/17 4/24 5/1 5/8 5/15 5/22 5/29
*CTR 3.08% 3.03% 2.91% 3.09% 3.22% 3.24% 3.24% 3.20% 3.15% 3.03% 2.96% 2.91% 2.81% 2.87%
Avg.
Position
10.08 9.38 9.15 9.47 9.00 8.55 8.86 8.90 9.12 9.67 9.59 9.78 10.29 10.09
+0.33% points
-0.29 positions
-0.16% points
+0.42 positions

20. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
They are definitely inversely related
But…
Average position fluctuated minimally
CTR is related to meta descriptions and has been thought
to impact rankings. Does it really?

21. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
CTR is related to meta descriptions and has been thought
to impact rankings. Does it really?
2/28 3/6 3/13 3/20 3/27 4/3 4/10 4/17 4/24 5/1 5/8 5/15 5/22 5/29
*CTR 3.08% 3.03% 2.91% 3.09% 3.22% 3.24% 3.24% 3.20% 3.15% 3.03% 2.96% 2.91% 2.81% 2.87%
Avg.
Position
10.08 9.38 9.15 9.47 9.00 8.55 8.86 8.90 9.12 9.67 9.59 9.78 10.29 10.09
+0.33% points (+11.4%)
-0.29 positions (-3.2%)
-0.16% points (-5.3%)
+0.42 positions (+4.3%)

22. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
They are definitely inversely related
But…
Average position fluctuated minimally
CTR is related to meta descriptions and has been thought
to impact rankings. Does it really?

23. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
How much does exact match keyword targeting matter in title
tags? Not as much as we thought
CTR is related to meta descriptions and has been thought to impact
rankings. Does it really? There’s a discernable inverse relationship,
but rankings fluctuation was minimal compared to change in CTR
Is there a diminishing return on content investment?
Three Lines of Inquiry

24. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
How much does exact match keyword targeting matter in title
tags? Not as much as we thought
CTR is related to meta descriptions which has been thought to
impact rankings. Does it really? There’s a inverse discernable
relationship but rankings fluctuation was minimal compared to
change in CTR
Is there a diminishing return on content investment?
Three Lines of Inquiry

25. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
Website #1:
• DA 77/100
• Sample of 79
URLs
No discernable
relationship
between word
count & avg.
position
Is there a diminishing return on content investment?

26. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
Website #2:
• DA 36/100
• Sample of 52
URLs
Negative
correlation between
avg. position &
word count
Is there a diminishing return on content investment?

27. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
Website #3:
• DA 46/100
• Sample of 1,006
URLs
Biggest cluster
between 500 and
600 words
Is there a diminishing return on content investment?

28. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
There seems to be a strong indicator that 500-600 words is the
sweet spot for 2 of the 3 websites I examined
But…
Since results are not conclusive, an analysis on that point of
diminishing return should be examined on a case-by-case basis
Is there a diminishing return on content investment?

29. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
How much does exact match keyword targeting matter in title
tags? Not as much as we thought
CTR is related to meta descriptions which has been thought to
impact rankings. Does it really? There’s a inverse discernable
relationship but rankings fluctuation was minimal compared to
change in CTR
Is there a diminishing return on content investment? Inconclusive
Three Lines of Inquiry

30. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
• Why Test Old-Guard Ranking Factors
• Old-Guard Factors: Titles, Descriptions & Content
• Understanding RankBrain
Agenda

31. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
“RankBrain is one of the ‘hundreds’ of signals that go into an algorithm
that determines what results appear on a Google search page and
where they are ranked, Corrado said. In the few months it has been
deployed, RankBrain has become the third-most important signal
contributing to the result of a search query, he said.”

32. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
But How Good Is RankBrain at Interpreting Searches?

33. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
Explicit Targeting Implied Meanings
“mobile best practices” à
“top ranking factors” à
“why manual bidding” à
“pivot tables” à
“improve content reach on facebook” à
Explicit vs Implicit Targeting
“ways to optimize for mobile”
“how to improve organic visibility”
“automated vs manual bidding”
“how to create pivot tables”
“why does some content get more reach
than other content”

34. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
“design banner ads in photoshop” vs “how to create banner ads in photoshop”
RankBrain on “Explicit vs Implicit Targeting”

35. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
“design banner ads in photoshop” vs “how to create banner ads in photoshop”
RankBrain on “Explicit vs Implicit Targeting”

36. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
“is manual bidding better” vs “why manual bidding”
RankBrain on “Explicit vs Implicit Targeting”

37. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
“is manual bidding better” vs “why manual bidding”
RankBrain on “Explicit vs Implicit Targeting”

38. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
“how to choose best seo company” vs “hire the right seo agency”
RankBrain on “Explicit vs Implicit Targeting”

39. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
“bing ads certification study guide” vs “bing ads certification tips”
RankBrain on “Explicit vs Implicit Targeting”

40. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
• As RankBrain gets better at interpreting searches, the pool of
total keyword permutations will shrink (slowly…)
Why should you care how RankBrain is interpreting
searches?

41. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
• As RankBrain gets better at interpreting searches, the pool of
total keyword permutations will shrink (slowly…)
• Because of this, you’ll also have to get better at figuring out
implied meanings of keyword searches in order to take
advantage of RankBrain’s conflating abilities
Why should you care how RankBrain is interpreting
searches?

42. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
• As RankBrain gets better at interpreting searches, the pool of
total keyword permutations will shrink (slowly…)
• Because of this, you’ll also have to get better at figuring out
implied meanings of keyword searches in order to take
advantage of RankBrain’s conflating abilities
• Even though it’s the “third most important ranking factor”, it’s
unclear how we can optimize towards it
Why should you care how RankBrain is interpreting
searches?

43. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
• As RankBrain gets better at interpreting searches, the pool of
total keyword permutations will shrink (slowly…)
• Because of this, you’ll also have to get better at figuring out
implied meanings of keyword searches in order to take
advantage of RankBrain’s conflating abilities
• Even though it’s the “third most important ranking factor”, it’s
unclear how we can optimize towards it
• Understanding how it works gets us one step closer to being able to use
it to our advantage
Why should you care how RankBrain is interpreting
searches?

44. #SMX #11A @itsleslieto
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SEE YOU AT THE NEXT #SMX