Website no.1 on Google for keyword but why?

[Sparkstone]

Hi Guys,

I'm trying to figure out why a site is ranking for a keyword.

Keyword is "guitar strings"

They have only implemented the following techniques:

-Chosen keyword is within Meta title

-Chosen keyword is used 8 times within content

What else would make them rank so highly?

Thanks,

Dan

[Matt-Williamson]

Well look at you link building strategy so as to improve your DA and PA. How does your currently compare to stringsdirect.co.uk?

[Sparkstone]

Sorry the site I'm trying to beat is stringsdirect.co.uk!

[DHS_SH]

There could be a number of reasons why 1 website out performs another on specific keyword search terms. These include:

1. Inbound links to that page with good Domain authority

2. Inbound links from relevant keyword phrase (in this case "guitar strings" I guess)

3. Keywords used in the right places on the page ie. page title, browser title, meta description (not so much meta tags as Google doesn't recognise these anymore)

4. On-page content that differentiates it from other pieces of content i.e. images, video, bespoke copy that offers real value

5. The website itself is a well respected domain

6. Your website has duplicate content, slow site speed or other on site factors that may negatively impact upon your ability to rank highly?

I'm sure there are many more factors but that's a good few..

[Matt-Williamson]

I must have done the OSE with www. for both thanks. I have done a none personalised search and I am seeing stringbusters.com as 1 and stringsdirect.co.uk as 2.

[RobertFisher]

One thing you could do from there just to check it out is do a non personalized search.

Guitar+strings &pws=0 and see what shows as serps.

And then here is the image using www and non in link comparison.

O1uxe.png

[Matt-Williamson]

Hi Robert

You are not wrong - I wasn't logged into Google and I had the location set to United Kingdom then did a search on guitar strings which brought up the site I mentioned above as number 1.

Now I probably made the mistake of presuming that Dan saw the same results as me owing to the fact he is based in the UK too.

Dan needs to specify the site which he intends - I actually intended to only leave the link to OSE and not to a specific website so that he could take a look and give us some feedback on this. Then due to the positive reply I took it that we were seeing the same results and he was wondering how this could happen.

I am now confused as I don't get the same results as you when using OSE for the two websites mentioned in your screenshot.

I must be going mad - stringdirect.co.uk actually has a PA of 47 from what I am seeing and the DA 36 which is higher than stringbusters.com DA 31 Pa 42, so this wouldn't explain the difference with what I am seeing.

What are your thoughts?

[RobertFisher]

Dan, I know I am older and its early here... but where in this do you have the name of the site...?

I found it in Matt's response link, but where did he get it from??? Also, you are obviously looking at Google.uk I think......

Just trying to remember if I took all my meds.............

That said, here is what I see doing a search from US on Google UK (first image) StringBusters is 6th and stringsDirect is first. 
One thing you may want to try in the future is the Compare Link Metrics in OSE. I also have screen shot here. So, you see at the root domain why stringsdirect would likely be first based link metrics.

Hope this helps a bit

WMQmH.png?1 X1yqK.png

[Matt-Williamson]

Well they would appear to have several of their own sites on their own domains linking to each other and there link profile contains a lot of text to anchor strings. I think the fact that the website has a reasonable link profile and all the internal navigation has anchor text containing guitar, strings or both pointing at a page with the URL guitar strings will have a strong influence on the ranking.

[Sparkstone]

I've had a look and I could only see two inbound links with the Anchor text "guitar strings" surely this couldn't influence it to no.1?

[Matt-Williamson]

Have a look at their link profile in http://www.opensiteexplorer.org/

their website has a links with the anchor text guitar strings pointing at their site from reasonable domains. How does you site compare in OSE as I am guessing you are looking at beating them?

Also take note that they have used the keyword as the url for that page from what I am seeing in the SERPs. I think this always helps strengthen your pages in the SERPs from experience...