Search engines consider various factors when ranking websites in search engine results pages (SERPs). These factors are constantly updated and can vary between search engines, making it challenging for digital marketers and website owners to adapt to the latest algorithm changes.
The tricky thing about search engine optimization (SEO) is that ranking factors are never publicly disclosed. Because search engines constantly update their algorithms, it can be difficult to identify which factors are currently prioritized.
However, on January 27, 2023, the SEO community was shaken when key ranking factors of the world’s fourth-largest search engine were revealed to the public.
What Is the Yandex Data Leak?
Yandex, a Russian multinational technology company, suffered a massive data leak that revealed source code for many of the company’s apps and services. Around 45 GBs worth of source code files, seemingly taken in July 2022 and dating back to February 2022, were allegedly stolen by a former employee and posted as a torrent file. The Yandex leak shows around 1,922 ranking factors used in Yandex content algorithms.
Many of Yandex’s ranking factors are mostly what you’d expect, including:
• End-user behavior signals
• PageRank
• Text relevance
• Content age and freshness
• Host reliability
• Some sites like Wikipedia get preference
Of the 1,922 ranking factors, 988 were deprecated, and 244 were categorized as “unused”. Although 64% of the document is not actively used, reviewing these factors is critical to stay on top of Yandex content algorithms.
Why the Yandex Leak Matters to Your Google SEO Content Strategy
Yandex and Google are two completely different search engines. So a ranking signal listed by Yandex may not hold the same weight in Google’s algorithm. Yandex has even publicly claimed that the leaked code base is already an outdated version of the repository.
That said, many of these ranking factors may be similar to the signals used by Google’s algorithm. So if you want to adjust your content strategy for SEO and rank higher, reviewing the leaked source code could provide useful insights into how search engines work. Likewise, investing in content writing and local SEO services is crucial for businesses that want to perform better on search.
Top 11 Yandex SEO Ranking Factors
The Yandex ranking factors can be classified into three categories:
Static – Factors that relate to your website, including ads ratio, headers, inbound backlinks and inbound internal links.
Dynamic factors – Factors that relate to both your website and the search query, such as text relevance and keyword inclusions.
User search-related factors – Factors that relate directly to the user’s query, including the user’s location, query language and intent modifiers.
Out of the 1,922 ranking factors, 11 signals hold notable weight:
1. On-Page Advertising
The Yandex data leak suggests that a high ratio of adverts to the visible screen is a negative factor. Excessive ad placements can obstruct the page’s main content and slow down page loads. This can lead to poor user experiences and negatively impact the page’s search ranking.
2. URL Construction
How URLs are crafted is also included in Yandex ranking factors. More specifically, Yandex SEO guidelines focus on:
• The presence of numbers in the URL
• The number of trailing slashes (“/”) in the URL
• The number of capital letters in the URL
The Yandex data leak also highlights the importance of keywords in the URL. According to the leaked code, the best practice is to include up to three words from the search query. It’s also worth noting that these URL ranking factors are similar to Google’s URL Structure guidelines.
3. Page-Level Factors
Yandex SEO takes into account notable page-level factors, including:
Page freshness – This factor prioritizes newer, more recently updated content, especially for blog content and news websites. Content that is older than 10 years will no longer be favored, so make sure to refresh your content frequently.
Healthy traffic source ratio – Yandex prefers pages with multiple traffic sources. Your page must attract a combination of paid, direct and organic traffic.
Last destination – Yandex rewards pages that end the user’s search journey, meaning content that has provided users with the information they need.
Content quality – Content must always be unique, informative and not stuffed with keywords. Having your text cited or linked on external domains can also help boost your ranking and refine your SEO content strategy.
4. Website-Level Factors
According to the Yandex data leak, the search engine favors well-established websites that have been active longer with frequently updated content. A website’s overall quality is also evaluated by its clickability perspective. This refers to how likely users are to click on a search result, depending on different factors such as the page’s title, description and URL. Additionally, Yandex favors websites with .com domains.
5. Overall Page Quality
A web page’s quality is measured according to the:
• Number of actions taken on a page
• Time spent on a page
• Number of unique visitors
• Number of visits
6. User Behavior and Engagement
The leaked source code revealed a vital finding: the Yandex search engine tends to favor pages that include user reviews. Yandex also takes into account the following:
• Number of clicks and impressions
• Page’s mobile-friendliness
• User behavior on mobile devices (session duration and time spent on the page)
7. Host Rank and Location
Yandex search algorithm gives preference to content that is geographically close to the user. The search engine also gives considerable weight to crawl depth or the extent to which a search engine indexes a website’s content. A website with a high crawl depth will get more pages indexed for search than a site with a low crawl depth. As such, important pages must be kept within two clicks of your home page.
8. Backlink Quality
The Yandex search engine utilizes different methods to penalize websites engaging in unethical and manipulative linking practices. Yandex link algorithms determine the percentage of hyperlinked text and assess the links’ quality to a site. Websites with a significant number of paid or low-quality links are penalized.
9. Search Traffic
Yandex search algorithm prioritizes websites optimized to satisfy the user’s search intent. This can include using relevant keywords in the page’s content, title tag and meta description.
10. Video Content
Yandex search algorithm favors websites that contain video content. On top of that, pages that host videos on Yandex rank higher in search results. Standard measures are used to assess a page’s video content, such as the average watch time against the total length of the video.
11. Wikipedia Pages
The leaked source code shows that the Yandex search engine strongly prefers Wikipedia pages and tends to rank them higher.
How the Yandex Leak Will Impact SEO
Previously, SEO teams and digital marketers had depended on testing to understand how to make their content rank higher on SERPs. But for the first time, people have been given a golden opportunity to study the inner workings of a major search engine.
Is it safe to assume that Google uses similar ranking factors? The Yandex source code unveiled many factors that resemble what Google has emphasized for years, such as keyword usage, backlinks, customer reviews and user experience.
The truth is, we’ll never know what Google’s ranking factors are unless the company has explicitly stated them. But studying the source code might give SEO teams and digital marketers an advantage. Yandex ranking factors can allow you to re-evaluate your SEO content strategy and discover new ways to improve your search visibility.
Yandex content algorithms are constantly evolving to improve the accuracy and reliability of search results. Adapting to the latest changes in search engine algorithms is imperative to ensure your content remains competitive in SERPs.
Optimize your content strategy for SEO by investing in professional SEO content writing services. Thrive is well-versed in SEO best practices and Yandex link algorithms. We can help you turn challenges and algorithm updates into opportunities.
As a full-service digital marketing team, we proudly offer SEO content writing services and local SEO services. Our team will spend time understanding your unique goals, industry, competitors and target market. Afterward, we’ll develop a powerful content strategy for SEO that attracts high-intent leads and maximizes conversions.
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