How long does it really take to rank on the First page of Google?
NJ Graphica
NJ graphica is an innovative digital company. Our Services are:- Graphic Design Web Design Social Media Marketing
The short answer is six months to a year. The long answer is: it depends.
In the early 2000s, ranking on Google was pretty easy. You add your primary keywords to the title, URL, and content, and boom, you're in the top 10 search results within weeks or even days. Maybe not under highly competitive conditions, but definitely for less competitive ones.
The competition was less intense and search engine algorithms relied only on keywords and links on a 50-50 basis to rank a web page. This meant that if you added a lot of relevant keywords to your web page and built some links, then you had a 100% chance of ranking in Google pretty quickly.
Link farms, keyword stuffing, and footer links all worked and SEO was pretty easy back then. Even three or four years ago it was much easier - you just build links from pages with high PR and your site shoots up. But this "magic" no longer works.
Two and a half years ago, you could start seeing results after six months. You still can to some extent, but nowadays it really takes over a year - unless you have brand queries where lots of people type in your domain name and you have high click-through rates and amazing user metrics.
The variables that come into play
Most marketers are aware that there are over 200 ranking factors that come into play, but the most important ones that directly affect a website's ranking are explained below. These factors play a major role in a website's ranking and decide which sites move to the top faster and stay on top longer.
1) User metrics
If you have high brand queries and amazing user metrics, in many cases I've seen sites rank within a few months. But if you don't have them, in most cases you have to wait about over a year. I'm talking about the domain as a whole, the entire domain.
User metrics decide whether people who visit your site like it or not, to put it simply. Here are some of the main user metrics that are taken into account by search engines.
Page views
A page view counts as a website page visit. If a visitor lands on page A on your site and then leaves it to visit page B on your site, then both page A and page B will have a one-page view each. However, if the visitor leaves page B to return to page A, then page A will now have two pageviews:
The higher number of pageviews indicates the importance of the web page. This means that people visit the page again and again and look for some information that they find useful. In order for a page to rank higher in Google, it must have a high number of page views (probably higher than your closest competitors).
Total traffic
Total traffic is the total number of visitors to your website. It can come from any channel such as organic, social, direct, or referral. A site generating a total of 25,000 visitors each month is considered more valuable by search engines than a website generating a total of 2,000 visitors each month:
Dropout rate
This refers to the percentage of website visitors who leave the site after viewing one page. A high bounce rate means that people don't find your website very valuable – i.e. it doesn't contain the information they were looking for.
A low bounce rate shows that people like the website. Search engines take bounce rate into account when ranking websites, so a site with a low bounce rate has a better chance of ranking faster in Google.
Average dropout rates are:
In the image below, you can see that this site has a 56% bounce rate, which is considered typical:
Pages per session
This shows the average number of pages viewed by a visitor during one session. A session is equal to 30 minutes of activity. A website with higher pages per session indicates that visitors are more engaged with the site and higher engagement leads to better rankings faster:
Scroll depth
This metric measures how far users scroll down the web page. If the scroll depth is high, then people are actually interested in looking more, which is a positive factor that search engines take into account:
Page/Site Time
This is the time a visitor spends on your website or web page. A long time on the page indicates positive engagement and leads to faster rankings, while a low time indicates poor user engagement, meaning the page will take longer to rank:
Unique visitors
This measures the number of unique IP addresses that visitors come from when visiting your website. In other words, it counts the number of individuals visiting your site.
A higher number of unique visitors indicates a popular website and therefore it deserves a higher ranking. Therefore, if you can quickly increase the number of unique visitors to your site, then Google can promote it by ranking it at the top of the SERP:
2) Links
Links count as a "vote" for a website. The greater the number of links to your site, the greater your chances of ranking at the top of the search results.
Links are divided into two categories: high-quality and low quality:
Your site needs to have a lot of natural links pointing back to it to start ranking higher because Google is extremely adept at detecting unnatural or unwanted links.
A new study published on Moz by Eric Enge reveals that links with a score of 0.293 have a strong correlation with rankings. Moz DA (Domain Authority) and Moz PA (Page Authority) also have a strong correlation with rankings, as shown in the graph below:
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Therefore, links still remain one of the main ranking factors in Google. Once a site starts gaining links, it will see an improvement in rankings, but sites that consistently gain natural links over time have the best chance of ranking at the top, and most importantly, staying there.
3) Site design
Google takes into account factors such as mobile performance and page load speed when ranking a website, which means that if there are too many ads at the top of the page, the chance that Google will demote your site increases.
The reason for this is that users will have to put in more effort to find the actual content on your site, thus wasting their time. Any feature on your site that provides a negative user experience will have a negative impact on your rankings.
Focus on small elements of site design (ie user experience) while designing your site. For example, don't use more than one H1 tag per web page because it confuses Google when determining the relevance of the web page with different search phrases. This ultimately lowers the overall relevance score. If your site's UX is great, then you'll climb the rankings really fast.
4) Domain Popularity
The popularity of a new domain is more likely to get a higher ranking in the shortest possible time. For example, if a lot of people type in "Single Grain" every day and Single Grain is a brand new domain name, you'll see really fast rankings over an old domain name and very few people Googling the brand name.
5) Age of the ranked page
Your web pages need to be older to start ranking, especially if you're targeting popular keywords. Key terms have high competition and therefore Google trusts pages that are old enough to provide the most relevant information to searchers.
The average age of a top-ranking web page is about two years or more. This was confirmed in an Ahrefs study and is shown in the graph below:
6) Domain Authority
Assuming you already have some domain authority on your site, then yes, it may take you a few weeks to rank first. If you rank 30, 40, or 50, that's not great because it means you're not on the front page, but it shows you're making progress. This is something you'll want to keep an eye on.
Any increase in domain authority will have a direct impact on your ranking, as higher DA sites rank higher in search results - provided other ranking factors are also taken into account, such as UX, links, and content.
7) Competition
The higher the level of competition, the harder it is to rank at the top of the Google SERP.
Before you start building your own SEO strategy, it's best to know who your competitors are, which keywords they rank higher for in Google and their average ranking position. This will help you analyze their SEO strengths and weaknesses so you can turn their weaknesses into your strengths.
Also, analyze your competition's top-performing content. Look for the information they're missing or the parts of the content they haven't covered in great detail. Use them to your advantage.
That's why it's important to focus on creating the best content you can. This will help you build trust with your target audience, which in turn will increase click-through rates and reduce bounce rates.
When a new website has a higher click-through rate and a lower bounce rate, it will definitely affect Google's position in a positive way. However, make sure you post engaging, high-quality content on a regular basis.
8) Scale of the project
A company's budget is one of the main factors that affect Google rankings. Why? Because if you have a good size budget, you can:
When you take the time (and resources) to do all of these things, then it's hard for Google to ignore your site and the result is a faster ranking.
How long does it actually take to rank with content marketing?
It's the same in my mind. So I'd say you're in for a 12-18 month journey to get your domain going as you'll have good domain authority after that.
When you post something, you should start ranking within a few weeks. It might not be the rank you want at first, but you'll see it move in the right direction.
If you have brand requests and you have amazing user metrics, it can take a few months. If you don't do it - over a year.
Why ranking #1 is critical to your business
All the action happens on the first page of Google. Therefore, not only ranking anywhere but reaching number one is crucial for your business.
According to a report published on WikiWeb, only 8% of searchers click on anything after the first page in the SERP, which is why it's important to get on the first page of search engines. Just getting on the first page of SERPs won't help you increase your click-through rate; you need to be in the first position to attract the majority of your target audience.
How to speed up your Google ranking
Now that you understand that it takes a long time to rank your site in Google (at least 6-12 months) because the ranking depends on many variables, let me look at the factors that can speed up your ranking in Google. By following the tips below, you'll increase your chances of speeding up your site's Google rankings:
Conclusion
Ranking on Google is not easy, especially if you are working on a fixed budget and your business is not very popular. Popular businesses always have a better chance of achieving rankings in the shortest possible time because they already have links, brand mentions, citations, branded searches, and direct traffic.
If you have a fixed budget and your business is new, expect your rankings to rise slowly. Rankings that increase slowly stay stable for a longer period of time, so be patient and wait six months to a year before you expect to see positive results.
Also, don't forget that SEO requires you to regularly undertake many activities that improve your brand's presence on Google, such as full site optimization, link acquisition, and content quality improvement. Your SEO is the best Digital marketing agency to help you with these activities, so trust your SEO specialists team to offer the best products, services, and content to your customers. Happy ranking!