Everyone always wants to know will this tactic or that tactic get my site higher in rankings? Building quality ranking sites isn’t rocket science, but there are a lot of moving parts to Search.
Late in 2015, Google gave us a pretty hefty tool to clarify exactly what it considers signals for good performance of the algorithms. You see, Google uses Search Quality Raters to evaluate and provide feedback on the results from algorithmic experiments. These guidelines are provided to the raters to help with their understanding of good search results.
For the first time, we have the full guidelines released by Google. These guidelines will change over time as needed to adapt to new focus and how people search. But, this light reading will satisfy those who are really looking to learn more about what Google considers a quality site. Grab this version to dig into crawling, indexing and what is considered highest quality vs. low quality content.
Bonus: It goes without saying that mobile is a huge factor in quality, but there is a great section on Understanding Mobile User Needs.
Download the full Google Search Quality Evaluator Guidelines