SEO is often misunderstood, with many people focused on tactics and buzzwords rather than the underlying principles of relevancy and authority. Through these core concepts, you can understand how I rank websites in a way that is robust to algorithm updates.
The Two Pillars of Ranking: Relevancy and Authority
These two pillars operate in a hierarchy, with authority being the overwhelmingly dominant factor. Without sufficient authority, relevant content will not rank for competitive search queries/keywords.
Authority is established by getting backlinks from other authoritative websites (i.e. by getting backlinks from websites that also have a lot of backlinks from other websites).
Relevancy is established, in rough order of importance, from keywords in the:
- Anchor text (the actual text of the backlinks pointing to your webpage)
- A page’s meta title (the page/document title – search engines read this)
- The headers on a page
- The page content
This order of importance for relevancy means that a page can rank for a keyword that is not present in the content (e.g., because of relevant anchor text and/or the meta title).
Relevance establishes whether a page can rank for a keyword; authority determines how high the page can rank.
When I built my first content website in 2019, my domain had zero authority – as all previously unused domains start with (almost) zero authority and must build it through backlinks. I first focused on creating content for keywords that had no/low competition. In other words, because I had zero authority, I targeted my content at long-tail search queries for which I would be the only relevant result. This content then naturally picked up backlinks, helping me build authority.
In the age of near zero-cost AI content, the long-tail strategy is less viable, as there are fewer queries without relevant content as results – we have reached saturation point.
Identifying Persistent Ranking Factors: The Manipulation Test
Many people claim there to be other ranking factors apart from authority and relevance, but these claims should be dismissed.
To determine if other factors influence rankings through time, apply the “manipulation test.” If a supposed ranking factor can be easily manipulated, search engines will not rely on it in the long run.
For instance, keyword density (how frequently a keyword appears in a piece of content) is easily manipulated, so search engines have evolved beyond such simple metrics. Even user engagement metrics – such as how long users spend on a page – can be manipulated with fake/bot traffic.
The only factor that passes this test is backlinks from authoritative websites. These are difficult to accumulate at scale, making them the most reliable indicator for ranking algorithms.
Authority is the Primary Ranking Factor
While SEO involves multiple factors, authority remains the primary driver of rankings. Authority (read as, “PageRank” for Google) is built through backlinks – endorsements from other websites that signal trust/credibility to search engines.
This explains why websites with objectively worse content quality often outrank superior-quality sites. Their established authority overpowers other factors.
This reality underscores why building authority is the primary focus of my SEO strategy.
I learned this lesson the hard way. As the niche of my first content website became more saturated, I saw sites outranking me despite having poorer-quality content. At that point it became clear that I wasn’t really doing SEO in the beginning, as I was initially ranking by avoiding competition! Once competition arrived, I had to build authority to win.
Authority is Scarce, so Building Authority is Difficult
SEO fundamentally operates on principles of economics and social psychology. Backlinks function as a “voting” system, where links from authoritative sites count for more – like how endorsements from influential people carry more social capital.
This system creates scarcity, as there are finite numbers of high-authority websites that can link to yours. The value of these scarce resources drives the economics of SEO, explaining why high-authority backlinks are so valuable and in high demand.
It is far easier to create content than to build authority, and that leads most people on the wrong path, focusing on the easier content task, aka creating “topical authority”. Topical authority is a buzzword that is synonymous with relevance, but despite the name it does not build actual authority.
I got my start in SEO by following a course which preached the “content is king” approach to SEO, targeted at low/no-competition long-tail keywords, and I got great results with these methods (think earning 5-figures a month within my first 13 months) – life was so good that I moved country, twice, in the middle of a global pandemic. Well, things were great, in the beginning.
I remember meeting an SEO agency owner and his biggest client (you’ve probably heard of this company and/or viewed content made using their software) at an event for bootstrapped founders. They were both telling me about how backlinks were important, but I didn’t want to hear it, because my “topical authority” approach was winning, and building backlinks was harder.
When competition arrived in my niche, I didn’t understand what was happening, because I had “great quality content” and with over 1,000 blog articles written, surely, I had also established strong “topical authority”. Yet I was now being outranked by high-authority sites that had written poor-quality content. It was clear that authority > content quality.
All SEO Is Designed to Manipulate Search Rankings
All SEO, by definition, attempts to influence search rankings. Even the most “white hat” strategies – creating quality content, improving user experience, or building legitimate backlinks – are designed to manipulate how search engines evaluate and rank pages.
In my view, the difference between acceptable and unacceptable SEO isn’t about manipulation itself, but about whether the tactics align with what search engines want to reward.
Search engines want to serve good-quality results, so that users return and eventually click on ads. They need to avoid low-quality results ranking at the top of their results pages (SERPs), as that will kill user retention and potential revenue. That’s why they promote the propaganda that “content is king”, rather than admitting the truth about the power of authority – particularly that it can be manipulated.
When I was looking to understand how backlinks worked (and rescue my cash-cow website), I took a job as an SEO consultant at an agency, serving as their de-facto content tsar, and advising American CEOs and CMOs on the wonders of high-quality content.
I got solid results because I learned from the founder how to do proper keyword research in competitive markets. Good keyword research and great on-page optimization drove tons of new traffic. However, during my time there, I noticed something strange happening.
I could see that Google’s algorithms were readjusting rankings to promote pages from higher-authority sites, regardless of content quality. It was becoming clear that, as AI content was beginning to flood the web, Google were placing even more emphasis on authority.
Specifically, Google’s so-called “Helpful Content” algorithms seemed to be rewarding off-page optimization (i.e. backlinks) rather than on-page, content optimization.
Plausible Deniability: The First Rule of SEO
The fundamental principle for evaluating any SEO tactic is asking if the result could plausibly occur without manipulation. Search engines aim to reward “natural”, “organic” signals while penalizing artificial manipulation – even though all SEO efforts technically are manipulation.
For example, would a website naturally acquire hundreds of identical anchor text backlinks pointing to the same page? Of course not. By evaluating tactics through this lens, I can better predict what strategies will prove sustainable versus those that might trigger penalties.
My priority when working with my clients is to build authoritative backlinks for their sites in a way that produces a natural-looking link profile.
I’m not saying that you can’t win by aggressively building backlinks with hyper-optimised anchor text; however, I have seen that competitor sites doing this tend to be more vulnerable to losing rankings during Google’s core algorithm updates.
SEO Is a Never-Ending Competition, Not a Step-by-Step Process
Most guides present SEO as a checklist of tasks: optimize title tags, create quality content, build backlinks. It kind of is that simple! However, this approach fundamentally misunderstands how search engines work. SEO is not about meeting a set of fixed criteria – it’s about outperforming your competitors.
A website doesn’t rank because it has “good SEO”; it ranks because it has better SEO than competing pages for a given query/keyword. This competitive nature means there’s no universal standard for “good enough” – the requirements vary dramatically depending on your competitors for each keyword.
A strategy that works brilliantly in a low-competition niche might fail completely in a more competitive space. Before declaring any approach “good SEO,” you must analyze your specific competitors.
The determining factor isn’t whether you’re following best practices in isolation, but whether you have more relevance and authority than competing pages for your target keywords. This is the first thing I look at when working with you.
I think this competitive element is the main reason that most web developers are bad at SEO (sorry, not sorry!). They are typically too inward looking, focusing on on-page optimization, hoping that Google will reward them for good content, clean code, schema markup and fast page speed. It’s the authority, stupid.
The Margin of Victory in Search Rankings: What Position Charts Don’t Show
Search ranking position charts can be misleading, as it might be assumed that the difference between ranking positions is uniform. In reality, the “margin of victory” varies dramatically. The gap in ranking signals (authority and relevance) between positions 1 and 2 might be massive, while positions 6 through 10 might be separated by tiny margins.
Understanding this concept helps me to prioritize my efforts for you. In highly competitive niches, moving from position 5 to position 1 often requires exponentially more resources than moving from position 20 to position 6.
This non-linear relationship affects strategy development and resource allocation. It is precisely why I do not offer fixed-price plans. I must tailor my strategy to your competitive landscape, and this determines the cost of my SEO services.
If an SEO consultant or agency offers you tiered pricing plans: run, Forest, run! Are they really trying to get you to the top of the search rankings, and taking the level of competition into account? Or, are they just taking your money, applying the same cookie-cutter process to your site that they do for everyone else’s, and hoping for the best?
The Impact of Competition on SEO Timeframes
One of the most common questions I get is “how long until I see results?” The answer depends almost entirely on your competition. In low-competition niches, results might appear within days or weeks. In extremely competitive spaces, significant progress might take 1.5 years of consistent effort.
This variable timeframe highlights why competitor analysis is essential before developing any SEO strategy.
Understanding the level of competition in your industry allows me to set realistic expectations and allocate appropriate resources to achieve your ranking goals.
If an SEO consultant or agency doesn’t explain the timeframe for SEO goals with reference to your competitors: run like the wind! Also, do not work with anyone that gives ranking guarantees. Can they guarantee that your competitors will not compete harder than before?
Wrap Up
By grasping these fundamental concepts, you’ll understand how I compete for visibility. Rather than chasing tactical trends, I focus on these enduring principles to boost rankings in a sustainable manner.
This is where I’m supposed to tell you that you should hire me… Nope! Read all my SEO 101 articles before you contact me… Please! I only work with clients that really understand SEO. Fortunately, if you read my articles, you will qualify, because SEO is not rocket science! Also, there aren’t that many articles to read, so it won’t hurt. Put it like this, if you contact me, and you don’t mention that you have read all my articles (which I have put a lot of effort into), I may not reply, or if I do, I will simply ask you to read all my articles.