How To Make My Website Appear On The First Page Of Google? - Important Tips From Semalt Expert



This is a question that is often asked immediately after the launch of a new website, and most of the time - and rightly so - even before its release, from the time of its design. How do I get my website on the first page of Google?

In the year 2020, everyone now knows that the existence of a site alone does not offer anything. Creating a site is not enough. This site must be found by our potential customers. It should appear when looking for it.

The web page should appear on the first page of Google.

Advertising listings usually appear in the first places of the Google ranking. The next positions, those of the so-called organic results, are occupied - usually again - by older, reputable websites. For the owner of the new website, the question "how to display my website on the first page of Google" turns urgently and seeks an answer.

What he/she may not know is that the question is completely wrong.

But let's take this in order.

What we will see in the article

In this series of articles, we will try to see and analyze:
  • What appears in the Google rankings and why they are not ranked "websites". And consequently, because it does not make sense to try to "display a web page" on the first page of Google. 
  • How can we see if part of our site appears in a Google search?
  • How can we check if our website has been indexed by Google? So, if potentially it can ever appear…
  • How long does it take to appear in search engines? And finally, in the 2nd part of the article!
  • What are the key steps you can take to begin the process of preparation for mediation?
Let's start.

How do I get my website on the first page of Google? 


Good question, but as we said before, it is wrong.

Google does not rank web pages. What ranks in the search engine results are individual subpages, articles or products of a specific website. So, if we want to appear in the search of users, we must decide:
  • Which subpage or article of our site we want to display. And:
  • With which specific keyword phrase do we want the specific subpage or article to appear.

The most common mistakes

Adding a keyword or phrase to the title of every page of a site is not helpful. The rules of SEO when creating a subpage or an article must be followed, but it is necessary to focus on the "where". Overall, if I wanted to comprehensively write the most common mistakes I find from time to time on (not a few) websites in terms of their SEO, I could end up with the following list:

1. Complete absence of SEO

The content of the website is written only based on what the owner wants the visitor to read, and not on how it will appear in the visitor's search. No subpage of the site is focused on any keywords, and the rules of the article are completely unknown to the manufacturer or its administrator. You can therefore use the Dedicated SEO Dashboard tool to determine the specific keywords that best match your website and its content


2. Absence of meta-description

The basic rules of SEO must be respected (focus on a keyword, its appearance in the title and content, etc.). However, if the said meta-description does not exist or is badly formulated, the page or the article will have no value. Indeed, it is important to understand that the meta description allows the user to have a brief overview of what the article or page contains before clicking on it.

So avoid sharing articles on social networks without any description or poorly formulated description.

3. Services

The services page is important for a website. On this page, the visitor will focus to see if he/she is in the right place, whether or not the business offers what he/she is looking for.

Very often, on the services page, we write all the services we offer as a business. This is generally wrong. From an SEO perspective, it's extremely difficult to focus on all the key phrases that apply to each of the services we offer. The most important of our pages will never appear in searches.

What do we need to do? Have a page that

  • summarizes all the services we offer. 
  • refers with a button perhaps for each of them, to a new subpage, in which this service will be developed in detail.
The interested user will thus receive focused information about the object of interest. And the website builder (or SEO designer) will focus on this page in the keyword related to this service and only.

4. Portfolio

Do we have (for example) a construction company and want to present our projects? We are doing very well. So we make - very correctly - a Portfolio page. We develop our works there - and very correctly - in detail. And in each of them, we take care in all the key points of the content (title, image description, meta-description, etc.) to have the title of our business and its status (construction company).

This, in no case, can be described as correct.

Once again, the brand or the status of the company appears in a large part of the website without any specific optimization. Obviously, both will appear on most of the site, but it is necessary to clarify two things.
  • 1st is that each of the company's projects must be optimized, in terms of SEO, as it is, i.e. as the specific project. And
  • 2nd, both the brand and the type of business, must find their own page that will display them in search engines. Will it be the Home Page that will be optimized with the phrase "Construction Company" and the page "Who We Are" (or "The Company") that will appear in search of the company name? Will it be upside down, or maybe an article will be written that will play this role. The owner, together with the SEO strategy designer, should decide on this.

"My website appears on the first page of Google!"

We have mentioned in the past that the phrase that appears in the above title is heard more often than it deserves. Many website owners in various searches they do, see the results showing their website.

Sometimes this is because the page that is displayed is properly optimized for that particular search, and it does appear. Most of the time, however, this result only appears to a limited number of users.

Let us remember the following. When we search on Google, the results that come to us are what Google itself considers to be important content for us. Each user displays different content for most searches. Depending on the total
  • of our searches;
  • of our interests, as recorded by Google through the pages we visit.
Google evaluates and shows us the content that best fits what we really want to see. In short, we see our website on the first page of Google because our browser has stored cookies from our website. 

How can I see what the "average" user sees for a particular search? 

The word "average" is in quotation marks, because there is simply no "average user".

Each user gets something different in a particular search, however, some websites have been listed as useful by Google so that they are likely to appear to all users. To see if we are on this list, we will need some specialized tools.

If we have a Google Ads account, we sign in to it and look for "Ad Preview and Diagnosis". On this page, we see if a specific ad appears or not when we search for it, but we can use the tool for any search.

Type in (or ask your advertiser to type in) the keyword phrase you are interested in. And see what appears in the list of results to the average user.

If you're not there, your website needs work.

Does Google know about my website? 

The professional who undertook the construction of your website immediately after linking it to its domain name did two things. The first is its connection to Google Analytics. And at the same time add to your page the so-called Google Global Site Tag. Among other things, this tag is responsible for listing your website on Google.
The second thing he/she has done is the so-called mapping:  the statement - with the addition of site maps - that it contains dynamic content that is updated. This way, at regular intervals, Google will "read" your website to keep it up to date with new content.

If Google reads your content, it will be able to rate it. And potentially, in the future, display it in search engines.

It's simple to find out if all of your page content is visible to Google. Open a search tab. If your website has a domain name "xyz.com", enter in the search: xyz.gr.

If your website is indexed, all your subpages (articles, categories, portfolios, etc.) will appear in the search results.

Conclusion: How long does it take for Google to "see" new content? 

Here we must understand that no one has an idea. This is not another of Google's famous hidden secrets. But indexing a website is at Google's discretion. All experts agree that this takes from 2 days to 4 weeks, and from personal experience, I will say that in most cases, this requires a maximum of 4-6 days.

Let me also point out the following. By the way, a website, according to Google's criteria, contains useful content, it displays new content much faster in the search results than if the same content is found on a relatively new web page. If our website is in its first steps, we need patience.

If you need to learn more about the subject of SEO and website promotion, we invite you to visit our Semalt blog.