“When will Google rank my website?” is a common question asked by entrepreneurs and business owners the world over, but you may have found yourself wondering why nobody seems to be able to give you a solid answer, right?

The reason for that is that Google itself doesn’t give a solid answer! After adding or updating a page, Google can crawl your website anywhere from 4 days to 6 months! 

Now, we know that you don’t want to be waiting 6 months for your changes to start ranking on Google, so we’ve made a list of a few things you can do to improve the chances of Google ranking your website’s new content.

If you’re interested to find out how and when Google will rank your website, we’ve put together a handy checklist for you below: 

1. Make sure your sitemap has been submitted on Google Search Console.

This is a really important step to take as your sitemap tells Google the specific URLs on your site, so it knows where to crawl and will rank your website accordingly.

When you have added or updated a page, you can ask Google to recrawl the page using the URL inspection tool. Head to Google Search Console and paste the URL you’d like to inspect into the search bar, then click “Request Indexing”. This won’t guarantee your page will be crawled sooner or that Google will rank your website, but it can help. Patience is key when it comes to Google rankings and SEO!

2. Create pages with clear titles that are relevant to the content of the page.

Google looks for content that can answer user questions and will rank your website accordingly. So, creating content that clearly answers the questions your audience is asking is the best way to get Google to rank your website pages for the topics you are targeting.

3. The user journey from your homepage is essential as Google will crawl your site in the same way and then rank your website based on what it finds!

Make sure all of your pages and links are easily accessible from the homepage so Google can navigate the site easily – this also helps you gain more leads as users themselves can find what they’re looking for quickly. It will also help with your bounce rate (when people quickly leave your site because they can’t find what they’re looking for).

4. Keyword research is vital for your overall ranking success.

Blindly posting blogs and updating pages won’t do much, if you don’t understand what you want to be found for.

Brainstorm the types of queries people may use to find you and what you want to rank your website for (your frequently asked questions are a good place to start here). Then, research variations of those words and phrases to find the best ones. Generally, keywords with high search volume and low competition are good ones to pick. Some good bits of software to help you with this are:

Raven

Moz

Semrush

5. Don’t be tempted to stuff your copy full of keywords!

If you’ve never heard of keyword stuffing, it’s when you cram as many of your chosen terms into one page as possible. For example, if you were a company wanting to rank your website for “the best red trainers” you may be tempted to write a piece of copy that looks like this:

“We have the best red trainers you can buy. The best red trainers offer you style and help you stand out from the crowd. Whilst wearing the best red trainers, you will be the envy of all your friends as they won’t be wearing the best red trainers”

You get the idea!

Whilst it might seem like a good idea, Google will penalise you and you may be hit with a penalty for attempting to use these tactics. This means that Google will be less likely to rank your website page for that term.

Instead, look to have a keyword density of around 2% to keep the copy flowing nicely, delivering a good user experience that offers something of value to your reader.

To work out your keyword density, divide the number of words in copy by the number of times the keyword appears in copy. For example, this piece is 745 words long, and we have used our keyword 10 times, giving us a density of 1.3%. See if you can work out what the keyword is…!

And, if you’re thinking this sounds like a lot of work…

Which it can be if you’re not savvy on the latest Google strategies, then you can give us a shout, and we’ll do the legwork for you!

Want to learn more? Read about how to get to the top of Google!