Honestly: How long are you willing to wait for a website to load completely? 3 seconds? Maybe even 6 seconds if you are patient? The rule is: the faster your website loads, the better. That is why Google penalises websites with loading speeds that are too slow. UX designers and web developers should therefore ensure that a website is not overloaded with images, animations, and extra features. Images, functional elements, and design components that are essential should be compressed accordingly.

The bounce rate—or in German Absprungrate—describes the share of users who enter a website and then leave again quickly without taking any further action. This indicates that the website does not offer what was being sought, or that something else is wrong with the page. This results in a poor user experience—and is penalised by Google.

Session duration indicates how long a visitor stays on a website on average. Depending on the intent behind a user’s search, session duration may be longer or shorter. Google distinguishes between navigational, informational, commercial and transactional intent. Since searches of an informational nature, for example, imply a corresponding reading time—i.e., session duration—a (much) too short session duration can be a bad sign. It shows that a user either did not find what they were looking for, or did not like the page for some other reason.

Pages per session (Pages per Session) indicate how many pages on a domain the average user visits. The average varies by industry and also by search intent. If the average is below two pages, that can be a bad sign: something may be preventing users from engaging more deeply with the website—for example, irrelevant or poor content, or unclear navigation and user guidance.

In content marketing, the goal is to meet users where they are along the customer journey. These can be very different touchpoints within the familiar AIDA process, which is why you should support the customer journey with a mix of different content formats. You should also take the topic at hand, the target audience or persona, and their preferences into account. Before creating new content, ask yourself: Can I cover this topic as a blog post? Or would it be better as a lead magnet in the form of a white paper with a checklist? Perhaps videos or infographics are better suited? The different topics can (and should) also be prepared in more than one format. Google, in turn, rewards content that is relevant, original, unique, and helpful—and content that follows the so-called E-E-A-T concept: Google attempts to assess the factors Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness of content.

In 2015, mobile devices accounted for around one third of global internet traffic. Even then, that figure was remarkably high, but it has since risen to almost 60%. We are now far more often on our phones or tablets not only in the consumer segment, i.e., B2C, but also in B2B. The number of different end devices used is staggering. To ensure a good user experience, designers and developers should make sure that a website looks good on all devices—this is known as responsive design. Google, of course, is also aware of the popularity of mobile devices and evaluates a website’s mobile-friendliness as a positive or negative ranking factor.

No one likes searching for something for a long time—especially not when you know that this “something” exists somewhere on the internet. It is therefore imperative that your website is easy to find when users enter certain terms in search engines that are relevant to your products or services. The art lies in finding out which terms those are. If a website is continuously optimised for search engines, it is easy to find—and that avoids frustration and improves the user experience.

Google and other search engines display those websites high up in the search results that match the presumed search intent. One example: Someone searching for “how hydraulics work” wants to learn how a hydraulic system works—ideally from an expert. This search query is informational. A suitable search result answers this question (and any follow-up questions that may arise). Someone searching for “hydraulic jack test” apparently has a latent purchase interest and wants to find out which products are best suited. This search query is commercial. Someone searching for “Stier 3-ton jack offer” (or similar), for example, is much further along the customer journey: the purchase decision has been made; now it is about where the purchase will be made—Google refers to this search intent as transactional. It is up to companies themselves to determine the nature of a search query—and which search terms might be associated with it. Receiving suitable results as quickly as possible, in turn, has a positive impact on the user experience.

Anyone who wants to be understood should express themselves clearly—and that applies to spoken communication as well as to writing and design. Google rewards clarity and structure: heading hierarchies (H1 to H6) should be observed, make sense, and also be clearly highlighted visually, to name just a few basic design rules. Content should be what Google calls “holistic” or “comprehensive”: it should cover a topic as thoroughly as possible, but at an appropriate length. More content (on a single page) does not automatically mean a better ranking. In fact, too much text can even be counterproductive—keyword: clarity. Nevertheless, a user should feel “picked up” by a website’s content. To stay with our hydraulics example: Anyone looking for how hydraulic systems work will be pleased to also learn something about the relationship between pressure and energy. A paragraph on the differences from pneumatics would also be quite appropriate. But starting this topic with Archimedes—or even the discovery of fire—would probably be too much.