Most SEO clients would love to know how long it takes to get to page 1 on Google – and the sooner the better! It is a difficult and long process optimising a site for keywords, especially if they are highly competitive with a lot of other websites competing to out-rank each other.
One of the world’s foremost analytics companies, Ahrefs undertook a study that found the majority of ranking pages on the 1st page of Google are over 2 years old! But fear not – there is still a chance of ranking within 2-6 months, although this was only 5% of pages in the study, with low volume keywords. Great news if you have a niche site with low search volumes, but even if you have an ecommerce site in the most popular of sectors, with some great ongoing SEO you can rank on page 1 of Google in just over a year.
How to get to Page 1 of Google
There are several factors that affect how quickly your website can rank in the top 10. These are principally, but not limited to:
- Which keywords you are targeting
- How competitive is your industry
- Where the site is ranking for your targeted keywords
- Quality of on-page content
- How popular and authoritative the website is
- Where the site is ranking for your targeted keywords
- The link profile of the website
- Page Speed
There are a large number of other factors, but these are the main variables, and with so many variables at play it is difficult to give a concrete answer as to how long it can take to reach page 1 of Google, especially with a brand new website.
Start by targeting less competitive keywords, to gain some traction and rise in the rankings with those, Google can see the website has an established presence online, and you can begin to target the more competitive keywords to reach Page 1 of Google.
Creating and implementing a consistent content strategy is incredibly important for improving a website’s visibility and rankings, and there are so many other channels for people to discover your content that isn’t just organic search. Use email marketing, ads and social media to distribute your content to a wider audience.
Can you pay to be on the 1st Page of Google?
The simplest way to get your website on Page 1 of Google is to take out Google ads, bid on the keywords you want to target and pay every time someone clicks on your website. The more money you bid on a keyword, the higher up in the ads section of Page 1 you feature. This can become incredibly expensive, and if not done correctly with a PPC agency it can cost your business a lot of money. This also doesn’t help your organic rankings, meaning as soon as you stop paying for ads you will no longer be on Page 1 of Google.
The safest and most long-lasting way to appear on Page 1 of Google is to implement an ongoing SEO strategy with an agency like ourselves. This ensures you have SEO experts working on your website, who understand all ranking factors and gives you the best chance to reach Page 1 of Google and stay there.