Analyzing Search Engine Land's Periodic Table of SEO Factors

Search Engine Land’s Periodic Table of SEO Factors debuted in 2011. Since the initial release, SEO professionals reference it to better understand the elements essential to a winning SEO strategy. It's frequently linked to by thousands of digital marketing professionals.

Chris Bonney & Zach Wilson sit down and discuss a few of the key "elements" - Quality, Authority, Backlinks & Emerging Markets - for 2020 and beyond.

https://searchengineland.com/seotable

Transcript

spk_0:   0:09
everybody. Thanks for joining us on Web marketing insights Podcast from Ghoul. Oh, I've got Zach Wilson myself. Chris, Bonnie today with you, Zach Really excited to talk about what we have on deck today, which is from search engine land. The periodic table of S E o factors. I will go and throw that up on the screen right now so everyone can see what we're talking about Will give a link to it later in the podcast. But just give me your initial reaction to this. Zach, What did you think about it when you saw it? What were the things that you thought? Hey, we should share this on the podcast today.

spk_1:   0:45
Well, this is the first time I've actually seen this from my standpoint. And I thought it was, uh I thought it was really interesting how they broke down all of these factors and all of these elements and gave the different rating rankings they had Ah, the scale was Ah 32 I believe. Negative, Negative. Negative. Too negative. 332 negative three. And, um, in terms of these factors, Justo illustrate how they feel about different s e o factors that we all talk about the couple of high high level examples. Uh, that we're gonna talk about a little bit here today are quality speed, authority back links, emerging markets, those air. Ah, Is there a couple of the outliers that we wanted to talk about?

spk_0:   1:44
Yeah. No, Agreed. S so if we just, uh, put it on the screen in one more time for folks to look at and, um, yeah, I think I grew with you 100%. It's It's taking what we know. Some of what might be new to folks and just putting it into a format that is fresh and different and new and really sort of helps it resonate with folks as to what the priority levels are of some of the stuff. That's what I really liked about it. Like he said, that rating system, um, up to three. And let's just jump right in on the 1st 1 here, which is quality. There's, ah, there's a area, a column of these elements, and the top one highest rated one is quality. And we know that in the end we can skip all the other stuff about S E O. Right. If it's not quality. Um, then we don't have much to begin with. So what are some of the things that you think you know are factors in the quality of something? How does somebody know if something is? Is a quality blawg post, for example, or not and his s e o friendly?

spk_1:   2:50
Yeah, well, I think the biggest thing to keep in perspective here is speaking to your audience, right? Like were if we're talking about cleaning supplies and our sites about cleaning supplies, we need to talk and right and deliver content that's in the vein and category of cleaning supplies, and you can't get to off into the weeds. So there's there's there's a, um, element of quality, which is, uh, you know, providing the user that sort of answer and answering their intent when they're looking for something for our whole site is about cleaning products and cleaning goods than the quality of the content that we're delivering in. The intersection of the content needs to be in in that category, and that's that's That's the That's the low hanging. That's the low hanging fruit you don't want to know. You don't want to spread yourself too thin. And we see this a lot in people trying to, um, in trying to trying to trying to get too much, uh, go after too many key words, right? So you're instead of staying in your lane on, uh, cleaning products, you'll get, you'll get off, you'll get off into different things that might not be within your lane. And that's that. And that's part of the quality metric and the number. No, I think the second best thing, the second most important thing is you're trying to tryingto answer a question or trying to make sure that you're you're responding to, uh, solving a problem, right? And that sort of answering a question. But what is that? What is that problem that you're trying to solve? What is that question you're trying to answer? Is that what's the What's the user intent that you're trying to respond to? Is it answering a question? Is it uh, some sort of awareness component? Is it, um, is it just is It just isn't just factual of some sort. So there's there's those elements that play into quality, and I think there's this this got getting off into the weeds just a little bit, but you're you're the writer. I want to bring this back to you. Um, after I mentioned the part of quality, that's that's user experience. They This is this was an outlier, I think, in a surprise one that a lot of people talk about. But they put this is it as it as it plus two. So it's the second most important thing. And so what's the What's the intersection of of content, quality and user experience. And we talk. We talk about when we do a lot of writing, we talk about these things and how How, though the user experience for delivering especially editorial content, yeah, you know, plays into that. And Amy, you right, you do a ton of writing for us. What did the things that, um, you focus on from a quality perspective and from a, uh, user experience, perspective and time to get people to pierce out, you know, important data from, you know, 1000 word.

spk_0:   6:15
Yeah, well, I think yeah, yeah, I know. Right? And I think there's a couple elements to it. I think there's some nuts and bolts pieces that are worth talking about. It doesn't necessarily mean this leads to something that is quality, but without these nuts and bolts than the quality just can't be there. And that is one like you just referenced length of post. So we know that post now. The average of the most highly ranked posts are somewhere around 1200 words, and that may sound daunting to folks, and they may not be in that world right now. But that's the world you need to get into. Secondly, using imagery and multimedia within your post that's relevant. Those are signals for high ranking as well. In fact, the more images you tend to put in a post, and the longer the post uh, generally speaking here, it's seeming that those air ranking higher as well. Now there's another factor that's completely on the rise with bloggers, and that is the time spent writing a post. So sure you've got all the words. Sure, you've got the relevant imagery, but how do you know that you've done a good job? If you're writing 1200 words in 45 minutes and posting it, I'm going to say

spk_1:   7:33
that's a rough draft, right? What we

spk_0:   7:36
found is the top bloggers that air ranking the highest. Spend upwards of six hours on average per post, hosting once a week. That's pretty significant, and that's a lot of your time. Doesn't mean everybody has to spend six hours. But for anyone that goes to the GULA website and looks at the our voice search S e o block post that took more than six hours. Probably double that and double triple hat, maybe to put together because it was a pillar piece of content for us. So if you're throwing things together, it's not going to be where it needs to be. And then the other piece is this the audience for which you're writing to you need to know and also not to get too flowery in your language. You want to keep it very simple. Short sentences, easy words If you get to jargon E and too many clauses in your sentences that tends to diminish where you're going and also just not bring the best quality content to the most people, just from a delivery of message goes. So those were a couple of things that I would just throw out right off the bat to see if you're not doing those things that you're not even gonna get close to, meeting the quality threshold.

spk_1:   8:52
So when you do this, what you're talking about time and quality and all of the components of that does Does that include research? They put research. Research was another only dimension at the onset. I mean, that's that's just an important quality. You gotta write mean what e have time. I swear,

spk_0:   9:12
if I spend 15 hours Ah, on it, let's just say might have been more. But I would say half that time was research to be on.

spk_1:   9:19
Yeah, yeah, yeah. You gotta get your get your get your original content and you can't. It's hard to do original content and original quality content without doing some research for sure. And again, that's that's that's that's, Ah, that that that that scored a three is Well, so, um, the other thing that we wanted to Segway and talk about here was the the the element of authority and gas links and and the one separating those two out to the I think the score of back links which which that was, was the lowest of the lowest positive score that you could get, which was a one, um, and and authority was was a three. And this thing is we all know is is it really is a really important one, which includes coveted links, shares and sort of other signals. Um, so what a what? A your hide it What were the original thoughts when you saw that?

spk_0:   10:33
Yeah, well, I mean, yeah, I can tell you what I thought. I'd love to hear what your you think about the duality of those two things. But for me, what always stands out And, you know, especially, you know, we work with small to midsize businesses and associations and nonprofits, right? So when you're talking about, um, a association, for example, they may not think they have a lot of competition. They may not even think s CEO is important. But the mini, because, you know, they're not looking for people to find them online and join necessarily Not all of them. So But the word that tends to resonate with associations is authority, because it's not about using search engine optimization to get people to go to your event or to sign up and be a member. It's about making sure when your members go online and they do to help themselves in their job, let's just keep it simple as an example, and they're looking for assistance or information about their industry. If your website as an association comes up because you optimized s CEO around key topics, then you're showing authority. Okay, So take aside that what authority means with SCL and just say, What is authority mean for us, an organization? Don't you want to position yourself as an authority? So that's what I think really resonates. And what comes to my mind just when I hear that word. But let's take that just a little bit deeper. What? How do you think? I mean, we know back links, and it's debatable. Esto I know it's debatable, but it's it's It's a debate that people have about how relevant it is, um, and how important it is. But when you see them matching these two up one as authority that mentions links and then one is back, Ling's is just a mechanism. I mean, what are some of your thoughts about that?

spk_1:   12:25
Yeah, well, in your quest to promote in, in in one's quest to promote ones content uh, you can't do that without some sort of back, like right? Yeah. You know that the only way that we're going to get any recognition for the things that we put out their recognition not the right word but any readers or eyeballs on the things out there is disseminating that information through different channels. Obviously, we've got social email and then that the other one is is they're organic. And then the last one is which organic plays into role are placing the role in organic is the web or the graph the back Linc graph. Right. So, yeah, that's how people are gonna find this. And that's how we're gonna build, um, up our own authority. But you know, that quest to find that is challenging because, you know, we're not all gonna get nor is it relevant for us all to get back wink from, you know, Puff Post or something like that. So I think you've got it right, yeah, inc dot com and things like that. So, you know, we've got it. We do have to find, you know, synergistic mechanisms to promote are related content. And so there's There's the back wings and there's a combination of authority. But where does authorities sort of come into play with all this? And you know what is considered an authority of sight? That's that's the sort of That's the $1,000,000 question we've got. Yes. You know, we've got these metrics out there with domain authority and, um, you know, the Google authority and things like that. And what what does that actually mean? So, Hee, I think the takeaway there is is really You know, make sure if you're doing if you back linking is part of your strategy and trying to find opportunities to promote your content or disseminate your content, just use common sense, you know, look for look, for people that have that are that are within your industry related industries that you're gonna be you're gonna be able to do some sort of promotional exchange with, or something like that one. You know, one great way is to try, and but you've actually done this too. Is it? Is promoting your content and trying to get your content, um, disseminated through different, uh, different channels. Such is And have yourself quoted or something at that. Yeah, um, you know, things things like that are great and our great great little tactics to do that. So

spk_0:   15:32
agreed. Agreed. Yeah, and I mean, I think one thing. Just another just a little a tip. Here is what we have found, and I'm sure it's similar in many industries. There are journalists out there that are always needing the next idea and always looking some fresh insight into an article. And there go to Twitter for that. It's just plain and simple. So if you make a point to stay in front of, find the HASHTAG for your industry, find the key journalists in your industry, and maybe you don't want to go for the big names. Maybe you can take it down a tear or two that might mention you in a bog post as opposed to The New York Times. But that's huge because they want to either talk to you. Or they may even just linked to your article as a reference within a bigger article, cause you've prompted them for an idea so well, I mean, I think I think Twitter and Lincoln isn't is another option to, but I I really found that Twitter can be a place where people pick you up and you can really get some tracks around that. So that's something.

spk_1:   16:32
We're content cannibals these days, and and Yeah, and so are the editors that air responsible for these thes sites. You know, there were always looking for good ideas and good things to bring to our own. Yeah, our own sites in our own promote ourselves. So it's people are more willing. I think the takeaway there is people are more willing than you think.

spk_0:   16:54
Yeah. No. Agreed. 100%. Um hey, so as we, uh, progress here and and and think about the last thing we want to talk about from this, um, periodic table of S e o Factors from search engine land, um is the what they call emerging verticals, which implies these air things we're gonna need to be thinking about more than we do now. That's how I'm reading this. However, what's interesting is local search is part of the emerging. And, you know, we know that's been around. It's evolving, though, but can you just I mean, just give, you know, a couple quick pointers when it comes to a local search? What people should be thinking about what's the absolute bare minimum they should do locally for S e L

spk_1:   17:44
Yeah, that's Ah, that's a great question. And I think that, yeah, that I think the takeaway there was kind of a surprise that that was emerging, right? I mean, that was kind of for both her. Our responses, I would say, Your voice absolutely emerging video, um, emerging in the sense that there's signals that people are saying, you know, there are signals that Google Google's putting out that there, um, giving emphasis to people with, as you mentioned earlier, with more mixed media in their in their content videos, writing images, etcetera So and images is part of that. So but but local was kind of like how does that fit in this puzzle? And, um, I don't know what they were thinking, but my thought on it was particularly with with regard to, um just the inflection that we've seen with, um, the near me searches right, Um and, uh, different things and different things like that. And I think the real thing that the rial, the real thing to think about it is like from a local perspective is and how it pertains to your business or your service is? Yeah. You know where What is Your locality is your locality Earth? Is that Asia? Is that North America? Is it? Is it? Illinois isn't Chicago. You know what? What is your What is your actual locality? And and and And if it is, let's just drill down. Tow us Chicago, for example. Um you know, uh, age, digital agency near me, Web design near me. Uh, how can you How can you How can you appear in those local packs and Google maps, searches and things like that And having making sure you're either your internal s e o person or your agency is dialed into those things and that you have strategies in place? Ah, and keywords in place to make sure that you're aligned And one of the one of the, um, tangential elements of that, of course, is having schema, uh, making sure your team is in place for that. Um, they have Ah, that's a local local scheme is really important for that, having, um, my business listings. And this is something that people don't this not everybody agrees with, but again, you gotta You gotta look at your data. Look at your customers and who are identify who your who your customers are. Going out of business is obvious. The obvious one we have. Interestingly enough, we have, ah, couple customers that get a disproportionately high amount of search from being. So we put we put a lot of emphasis for those customers on, um on on being one and two into being local and make sure that they're they're appearing for those local searches. Because that's again, that's just what the data shows and where their customers are coming from. So we don't We don't want to just show that sort of be naive and and and believe that Google is 100% of the search ecosystem. It's It's damn high, but it's not 100%. So there are other people out there and we have to identify know who our customers are, So yeah, okay. Yeah. Anyway, there. Well, that one. Great one. Well, we could put a screenshot up for this to one. Interesting. Uh, I saw this recently, uh, in I was at my in laws in Ohio and searching for Home Depot. This was just kind of the importance of the importance of local search. And if we have, will put up a screen shot for this and showing searching for Home Depot and I could not find a home. People, You're like Hauser, not a Home Depot in southern Ohio. Well, as you can see in the screen shot, somebody had changed on the Home Depot local team. They changed the Home Depot, Uh, Google Maps, titles to list cabinets, furniture, and, um, something else. I don't remember what it was, but it was like when you looked at Google Maps, you're just like, nowhere. Where's go? There's all these dots And it wasn't registering in my head that it was like Home Depot, but they essentially changed there. It wasn't exactly there, made a description, but put their made a description in their title tag. Yeah, tag in the maid of description. And visually, because we're so attuned to how the map bubbles appear. You couldn't You couldn't. You couldn't tell it. You couldn't tell anything, and it actually it we post this was a while ago was like three weeks ago and had a conversation on Twitter about it, and it it kind of Ah, um, for me, it kind of blew up. And it was really interesting conversation about just I mean, thes people. People are testing different things and trying different gangs. And visually, it was just this just a disaster, because you could I know you can find people broke all the conventions, but yeah, well, it's interesting.

spk_0:   23:35
I mean, Pete, like you said, people are trying new things and even the biggest of the big Home Depot, they've got no local search is a huge part of their strategy. It's gotta be all retail. And for them too kind of, whether intentionally or not, sort of mix it up a little bit. Ah, the repercussions of that are pretty interesting. So that's that's an interesting anecdote. Um, so it's about knowing audience, knowing who you're trying to serve and where making sure your data clearly, Home Depot is correct and formatted correctly. Those are just you. That's a cost of entry and their understanding how you're going to promote yourself locally as well and we can attest to this is, Well, how does that local, uh, search record appear when it comes to your ranking? We have a particular key word If you remember that ranks three or four, but it's for the local pack listing. It's not for any page on our website. So that's just something else to keep in mind as you look at your traffic and where your ranking that local a listing kid actually organically rank while another page that you might think is relevant or you're trying to optimize for for a particular key. Word isn't s so that's just a new Wannsee kind of thing that people might not be thinking toe look for. Ah, but it's also the kind of thing that we help our clients with. Um, with the kind of service is that we provide us well, so, um, that's all Good, man. Hey, listen, I think this is a really cool thing. Periodic table of S e o. Factors from search engine land. We're going to share a link in the comments, um, and s so everyone could go there. You could just simply google it and find it as well. But it's really something to look into and to take with you and to show your team. And if nothing else, might give you a frame of reference for yourself just how to think about these elements. Don't you think it's all on one page? It's something that you can just kind of sink your teeth into and go. Oh, here's how important these things actually are. I think that's the brilliance of this myself.

spk_1:   25:45
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Good job, guys. This is enjoyable to talk about. And we look forward. Thio 20 twenties version of the periodic table of Seo factors.

spk_0:   25:59
Awesome. Cool. All right, well, thanks, Zack. Today this is all really good stuff, and ah, will be getting together with you to get our next podcast out to the world. Hi, everybody. Thanks for checking out the podcast today. Go to Google. Oh, solutions dot com to learn more about us. Subscribe to our newsletter. Also, if you can hit subscribe on our channel here on YouTube, that would be great as well