How Google RankBrain Works - Part 2

How Google RankBrain Works - Part 2

So, by reading part one I hope you've understood the general idea behind Google RankBrain.


Now we are going to talk about what RankBrain really wants, what kind of content and what type of signals does RankBrain look for when ranking websites.

Important Signals:

1. New content - Very important, probably the most important signal on this list, in the previous post we've talked about "best HBO shows" - think about it, most people don't really want to hear about shows HBO did 10 years ago because chances are, they already know about that shows, they are searching for fresh stuff and Google understands that.
   
2. Organic Click-Through Rate (CTR) - Very important signal, a high organic CTR tells Google that your page gives users what they want and your title tag and meta description are convincing enough for that click to be given. A low bounce rate also matters here.
   
3. Similar subjects - Having content on your page that relates to our main subject, in this case, "hot HBO shows", chances are RankBrain already knows about those shows and if you are not talking about them you will lose ground behind other websites that do!
   
4. Big content - For some years now Google has shown time and time again that it love big in-depth articles that are helpful for the user and gives them everything they need without doing additional searches on the matter. So having a 100 words article with just a list of shows is a big mistake and you won't rank on the first page!
   

Irrelevant Signals:

1. Exactly matched keywords - on this subject Google has become far too smart to be tricked by exacted matched keywords, these simply don't matter.
   
2. Backlinks - Since RankBrain puts a lot of value on how "fresh" the content is, well backlink juice simply won't help you here. That's good news for lots of SEOs that are simply tired of creating backlinks
   

So those were the main RankBrain signals, do you guys have any other signals you may add?