You will be able to name the broad factors Google says it uses to rank results and give an example of each.
A parent in Tampines types "P5 maths tuition" into Google on her phone. Ten results come back, plus a map with three centres pinned on it. Somebody, or something, put those results in that order. If you run one of the centres that missed the list, the obvious question is why the others got in and you did not.
Priya, who runs a small maths centre in Tampines and who you may remember from Digital marketing foundations, asked exactly that. She had read three blog posts that answered it with total confidence and no agreement. One put an exact percentage on backlinks. Another said page speed was the biggest factor. A third said word count mattered most. None of them said where their numbers came from.
Google does publish an answer, and it is less dramatic than the blog posts. Its How Search works material describes the broad things its ranking systems look at. It does not give you a formula, but it gives you a frame you can trust, and that frame is what this lesson covers.
Google lists five broad factors. The first is the meaning of the query. Before it can find good results, Google has to work out what the person wants. That includes correcting spelling, recognising that "maths tuition" and "math tutor" are close in meaning, and telling whether the person wants to learn something, buy something or find a place.
The second is the relevance of the content. Does the page actually deal with what was asked? The third is the quality of the content: of the relevant pages, which ones seem most helpful and trustworthy? Lesson 1.3, Helpful content and E-E-A-T in plain words, covers how Google describes quality.
The fourth is usability. Google says that when other things are roughly equal, pages that are easier to use may do better. Think of a page that loads properly on a phone and does not bury the content under pop-ups.
The fifth is context and settings. Google uses information such as your location, your language, your past searches and your search settings to make results more useful to you.
The simplest sign of relevance is that the page contains the words in the query. If someone searches "P5 maths tuition Tampines" and your page never mentions Tampines, primary 5 or maths, Google has little reason to think it fits.
Google says it goes well beyond matching keywords, though. It looks at whether the page covers the topic in ways that suggest it really answers the question. A page about P5 maths tuition that explains class sizes, the topics covered in P5, how progress is tracked and where the centre is located looks relevant in a fuller way than a page that repeats "P5 maths tuition" eight times and says little else. The second page matches more words. The first one answers the question.
This is also why stuffing a page with the search phrase does not help. Lesson 1.4, What gets a site demoted or removed, explains that keyword stuffing is a breach of Google's spam policies.
Run the same search in Tampines and in Johor Bahru and you get different lists. Google uses your location to show local businesses and results from your country, and it uses your language settings to pick pages you can read. That is why a parent in Singapore sees Singapore tuition centres and a parent in Malaysia searching the same words sees Malaysian ones.
Your own search history can shape what you see as well, which matters when you check your own rankings. If Priya searches for her centre every morning on her own phone, Google may learn that she likes her own site. What a stranger sees could be quite different. When you check results for your business, sign out or use a private browser window, and use your phone if your customers search on theirs.
Google does not publish how much each factor counts, and it uses many systems that work together rather than one score. Any article that says links make up a fixed share of ranking is guessing, however precise the number looks. The same goes for long lists of ranking factors with percentages attached.
That does not mean you can learn nothing. You can study what ranks for your searches today and ask why. Each of the top results has some mix of relevance, usefulness and trustworthiness. Looking at that mix, query by query, teaches you more than any percentage table, because it tells you what Google currently rewards for the searches your customers actually use.
When Priya did this for "P5 maths tuition Tampines", the top three were all centres with a page made for that exact level and area. Each listed the class schedule, showed real teacher names and had recent reviews. Her own site had one general page for every level from P1 to Sec 2. She now had a much clearer idea of why she was missing, and it had nothing to do with secret factors.
Do the same for your own business. Pick one search your customers really use, open it on your phone while signed out, and look hard at the top three results. The activity below asks you to note, for each, what makes it look relevant, useful and trustworthy.
Search one query your customers use while logged out and on mobile, and note for the top three results how each looks relevant, useful and trustworthy.
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