Keyword Ranking Basics

Keyword ranking is the position of a page for a specific search query. A website does not have one universal search ranking.

Search intent

Google tries to match results with user intent. Informational, commercial, navigational, and transactional queries may require different page types.

Ranking changes

Rankings can vary by location, device, personalization, language, and time. A single manual search is not a complete ranking report.

Track pages, not just domains

Specific URLs rank for specific queries. Optimizing one page does not automatically improve the entire site.