Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Is user engagement a ranking signal?
-
Read something about user engagement might be a signal that Google uses, along with links and on-site optimisation, to decide if a search result goes up or down. What should I believe and what are the developments in this field?
-
Wow, 10 years ago EGOL! Must have been tough taking that approach back then when black-hat methods still worked pretty well. You were always in it for the long term I'm guessing.
-
I bet all of my money on visitor engagement years ago. I don't think anybody believed me then, lots don't believe me now. I have not done any real site promotion for a long time.
-
User engagement is a signal for mobile but not desktop-http://searchengineland.com/google-user-experience-as-a-ranking-signal-is-currently-only-for-mobile-results-not-desktop-results-220719
Even if it isn't now, I could see it be a ranking factor in the future.
-
From my experience I say user engagement does play a role. I have a page on my site that was never really optimized and doesn't have high page authority, but the user engagement is great. I get regular traffic to that page through quality keywords. If only I could get all my pages to perform like that. At the end of the day, I think focusing on engagement in addition to links & on-site optimization is worth the additional effort.
-
Thanks for your clear explanation and suggestions!
-
Hi there
One of the best pieces I have seen on this are from Rand's The Massive Ranking Factor Too Many SEOs are Ignoring Whiteboard Friday. It dives into a few indirect tactics and also helps walk your mind through how you can showcase your efforts.
The best advice I ever got was to experiment with ideas or hypothesis on what you think may move the needle - whether on your site or starting a new one just for the sake of experimenting. The beauty about SEO and digital marketing right now is that no one has it "nailed down". There are so many opportunities that there is no right way of doing anything yet.
I will say that you should always mind your annotations in Google Analytics - that way when you make a change you can see what changes had the most impact over time.
You asked...
"They speak of 'indirect but measurable', but does this signal continues to increase or will it remain as it is. I am anxious whether user engagement as ranking factor is further decisive or not?"
No one knows yet, I can only imagine (again, assuming) that usability and user experience will increase as a ranking factor over time as so many KPIs and quality signals can run through those two items, and there are so many different angles you can look at it.
The best thing you can do right now is provide a stellar user experience, engage your audience, empower your team to be thought leaders, and embrace change as it happens in the digital marketing world.
Hope this helps a bit! Good luck!
-
Hi Alick300,
Thanks for your quick reply. They speak of 'indirect but measurable', but does this signal continues to increase or will it remain as it is. I am anxious whether user ungagement as ranking factor is further decisive or not?
-
Hi,
Google never reveal that but yes it is a ranking signal. I'm quoting from Moz
"Usability and user experience are second order influences on search engine ranking success. They provide an indirect but measurable benefit to a site's external popularity, which the engines can then interpret as a signal of higher quality. This is called the "no one likes to link to a crummy site" phenomenon."
You can read full post here @ https://moz.com/beginners-guide-to-seo/how-usability-experience-and-content-affect-search-engine-rankings
Hope this helps.
Thanks
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Huge ranking flux that we cannot explain
Hello, SEO experts from around the world. We need your help; we have seen massive ranking flux across our website and others. We cannot explain what is causing this ranking flux. The content marketing is top quality, so we don’t know why we are moving from 25 to 50th on Google and sometimes even beyond that. Can any SEO experts explain why our agency is moving so much within Google’s rankings? We don’t know whether to make changes or possibly wait. Any help would be fantastic; thank you all.
Algorithm Updates | | sarahwalsh0 -
Can 'Jump link'/'Anchor tag' urls rank in Google for keywords?
E.g. www.website.com/page/#keyword-anchor-text Where the part after the # is a section of the page you can jump to, and the title of that section is a secondary keyword you want the page to rank for?
Algorithm Updates | | rwat0 -
Ranking drop after sub domain to sub directory migration. Usual?
Hi all, We had our help articles on sub-domain help.website.com. Then we moved it to sub directory website.com/help/. We expected ranking improvement of website.com as there is a wide saying of benefiting from sub domain to sub directory migration. We have noticed that ranking improvement of new sub directory pages (website.com/help/) but not for any main website pages (website.com). I presume that link juice from main website has benefited new sub directory pages but main website lost ranking due to the page rank dilution. Do you agree? Any ideas? Thanks
Algorithm Updates | | vtmoz0 -
Google ranking impact: Returning visitor vs New visitor
Hi all, If a website's traffic increase in "New visitors"; will this impact rankings? Do the website overall traffic affect rankings? How much this is related with ranking improvement for main keywords? Just because thousands of visits increased for website, will it count as a strong ranking improvement signal? Thanks
Algorithm Updates | | vtmoz0 -
Ranking For Synonyms Without Creating Duplicate Content.
We have 2 keywords that are synonyms we really need to rank for as they are pretty much interchangeable terms. We will refer to the terms as Synonym A and Synonym B. Our site ranks very well for Synonym A but not for Synonym B. Both of these terms carry the same meaning, but the search results are very different. We actively optimize for Synonym A because it has the higher search volume of the 2 terms. We had hoped that Synonym B would get similar rankings due to the fact that the terms are so similar, but that did not pan out for us. We have lots of content that uses Synonym A predominantly and some that uses Synonym B. We know that good content around Synonym B would help, but we fear that it may be seen as duplicate if we create a piece that’s “Top 10 Synonym B” because we already have that piece for Synonym A. We also don’t want to make too many changes to our existing content in fear we may lose our great ranking for Synonym A. Has anyone run into this issue before, or does anyone have any ideas of things we can do to increase our position for Synonym B?
Algorithm Updates | | Fuel0 -
Personalization for non logged in users
My question is, how does google personalize the search results for non logged in users and incoqnito searches? I already know about the location personalization whether you're logged in or not and auto complete. But, is personalization still helping in the other cases. Does for example Google keep track of your I.P and then match suggestions that way? Additionally, any other resources would be great.
Algorithm Updates | | PeterRota0 -
Rankings changing every couple of MINUTES in Google?
We've been experiencing some unusual behaviour in the Google.co.uk SERPs recently... Basically, the ranking of some of our websites for certain keywords appears to be changing by the minute. For example, doing a search for "our keyword" might show us at #20. Then a few minutes later, doing the same search shows us at #14, and then the same search a few minutes later shows us at #26, and then sometimes we're not ranked at all, etc etc. I know the algorithm changes a lot, but does it really change every couple of minutes? Has anyone else experienced this kind of behaviour in the SERPs? What could be causing it to happen?
Algorithm Updates | | d4online0 -
Is there a way to pull historical rankings for a keyword?
I have someone who's come to me and said that they have lost all of their organic keyword rankings. They did launch a site redesign a few months back so that could be a reason as to why. But after looking at the site, link profile, etc. It doesn't look like they could have been ranking for the terms they say they were. They have never implemented any SEO on their sites btw. I did not build this site and have not done any SEO, they are coming to me to solve the problem. I did notice in SEM rush that a couple months ago they were ranking organically for more terms (20 in July vs. 5 now), so they did lose some. Is there any way to see what terms they WERE ranking for?
Algorithm Updates | | MichaelWeisbaum0