SEO ranking factors can really make or mar your website/blog rankings, and also the frequency of the results showing up in search results. Every year at the SMX Advanced conference SEO experts share their analysis of the ever changing trends in search engine optimization owing to the algorithm changes and upgrades by Google search engine. There are many interesting revelations at the SMX Advanced meet, some controversial and some that help end-users enhance their search experience without doubt.

One of the panelist for this year’s conference was Marianne Sweeny, a Search Strategist at Portent. She has some interesting points to share which all were centered on Distracted Search User Experience which revealed that 56% of the searchers come up with very poor queries. Meaning that although search results have got better as far as user experience goes but the search queries have not got any better.

According to her since the Google Panda update emphasis is more towards user experience (UX) and there are some basic relevance points that are as follows.

1)    Selection

Search aggregators have found that people only read the first three results in searches and therefore Google has reduced the number of characters and tweaked the pixel spacing to make the results scannable. Here comes the importance of keyword placement in title tags and meta-description which should always be placed on the left side of the page as compared to right hand side.

2)    Visuals

Users prefer a good blend of images and text in the article they are looking for. Too many images can confuse them and should be avoided at all costs. Text should be given priority and images should complement the text.

3)    Locus of attention

The user looks at the center of the page with much more attention, so your most important message should be located somewhere in the middle.

Other than that content should be your main focus and the hyperlinks in your article should be strictly according to the content requirement.

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