Google Searches Demystified
Have you ever wondered how Google knows what results to show when you search for you favorite funny meme? More importantly – ever wondered how Google knows to display your website when someone else searches for your business?
After launching new websites we often get an email a week or so later with the following question:
“I did a Google search for my company name but I don’t see my website. Why is it not showing up? Can you please fix this.”
To help explain why this happens we need to understand the process that Google uses to index a site. Check out this quick video for a full explanation:
To summarize – there are 3 things that have to happen for your site to show up with Google:
- Crawling – After your site goes live we have to wait till Google crawls the site.
- Indexing – Google stores information on your website such as your meta titles, meta descriptions, and image alt tags.
- Serving Results – A user has to search for something that Google deems relevant to your website.
At Ramp we design all our websites so that Google indexes your site properly and your business is found for relevant searches. Here are a few ways we do this:
- SEO Optimization – Your site is setup to have the correct pages, categories, and posts be indexed by Google.
- Meta Titles – Your company name and relevant information is in the meta title of every page.
- Meta Descriptions – Each page has a unique meta description that relates to the content of that page.
- Alt Tags – The important images on your site all have proper alt tags.
- Responsive Design – Google penalizes websites that aren’t mobile friendly and we make sure your website looks great on all devices.
While Google’s algorithm is extremely complicated it’s important to remember why they do this. Their ranking factors help preserve the integrity of your website and thousands of others by limiting spam websites that try to steal traffic from legitimate businesses such as yours.
Building your website correctly makes Google a great tool for growing your business!