How to Rank Your Website on the First Page of Yandex

It will take a lot of work to bring your site to the top of Yandex. Modern SEO promotion is a complex work. Each stage of work must be diligently carried out: regularly publish interesting materials, eliminate technical errors, improve behavioral factors. Below are instructions on what to do and how exactly.
What is Yandex SEO?
Until 2016, Yandex was ahead of the global giant Google in terms of the share of the Internet audience, as it had a number of advantages in the field of search in Russian. Gradually, thanks in large part to mobile traffic, Google gained 60.3%.
Despite this, Yandex’s algorithms are constantly evolving – at the moment they use Yati, whose action is based on neural networks. Yandex is now looking for answers to user requests, taking into account the semantic component. This new approach made it possible to establish the best semantic unity between user intent, passphrase, and web page. It is possible that in 2021 Yasha will be able to catch up with Gosha, and in the future, he will be ahead.
And most importantly, the promotion strategy has changed. Literally, 6-7 years ago, SEOs managed to bring sites to the first positions in Yandex, using the correct keywords in unique content. Today, you can’t go far with SEO texts, and everyone understands this. The SERP is actively cleared of garbage pages, their place is taken by high-quality and relevant documents to users’ requests. SEO’s work has become more complicated, he has to look for better ways to attract valuable traffic.
Why is organic traffic so interesting and is the main goal of SEO? So these are interested users who come to the site themselves. Such a flow of visitors is highly valued by the search engine – and the more there is, the better the resource is in the search results. Therefore, when analyzing traffic, it is necessary to build on the organic indicators first of all.
What to choose: Yandex or Google?
Yandex is a Russian search engine that is popular only on the Runet. Google is known all over the world, has a multilingual interface and more advanced ranking algorithms. From the point of view of promotion, this means that it is easier to bring a site to the top in Yandex than in Google.
And that’s why it’s easier to Rank in Yandex:
- Its algorithms better understand the meaning of content in Russian;
- links from authoritative resources are given less importance;
- It likes the improvement of the PF on the site, and this can be achieved by a competent structure, convenient navigation, and the publication of interesting materials;
- Not as nagging about regularly updating articles as Google;
- Pages are ranked not only for the main keyword, but also for related words – this is also the case in Google, but less noticeably;
- It is not necessary to have an adaptive version of the site;
- Loves low-frequency queries with a long tail – there is less competition for them, and you can safely go to the top.
Services from Yandex that will help in SEO Promotion
Yandex has numerous services – some of them can help in promotion. Let’s consider them in detail.
1. Yandex.Webmaster. Service for webmasters, an irreplaceable assistant. There are many settings and opportunities for SEO promotion of the resource. For example, activate Turbo pages, which will speed up the loading of pages several times. You can also improve the snippet by making it more attractive and informative – a great opportunity to stand out from the competition. And of course, the Webmaster has all the necessary optimizer tools – checking robots.txt and sitemap, analyzing the link mass, studying popular search queries, the ability to send pages for crawling, and much more.
2. Yandex. Metric. Another indispensable tool for a webmaster is to help evaluate and adjust the promotion strategy. Among the numerous reports of this service, stand out: a basic report for assessing traffic, data on search queries, information on clicks and user behavior, etc.
3. Direct. Contextual advertising attracts the target audience. The service is paid, but your advertisements will be circulating throughout the Internet. This will definitely drive traffic to the site, and the positions of the promoted pages will go up.
A study was conducted at PromoPult, which proved that contextual advertising has a positive effect on organic search results – those sites that launch CRs receive an increase in positions for a number of queries.
4. Zen. Today it is Yasha’s second most popular product after the search. More than 70 million people use this platform every month. Why not take advantage of the free opportunity to get a link to your resource, traffic, and even increase sales. Many people promote their projects in this way – simultaneously with the publication of a new article on the site, they post an announcement or rewrite in Zen with a mention of the source.
5. Yandex.Directory. If you are engaged in online commerce, then you just need to add your site to this directory, especially since it is done for free. Users can now easily find your organization on Yandex. Maps and other search services. In addition, the use of the Directory will help to improve the clickability of the snippet, the general SEO-indicators of the website when promoting in a specific region, attract more traffic, increase PF, etc.
6. Yandex. Dialogues. By connecting this service, you will be able to communicate with site visitors directly in the search. Thus, you will be much faster in responding to user requests, which will increase conversion. Besides, Dialogues really improve the quality of the snippet – it becomes more attractive.
7. Yandex. Kew. A question/answer service similar to Western Quora and Reddit. Popular questions automatically go to the top of the search results, so this opportunity should not be missed. You will not only improve the ranking of the site, but also collect the target audience, earn their trust and declare about your brand.
8. Yandex.Collections (Favorites). Similar to Western Pinterest – offers similar features. Users find interesting pictures and save them in their selections. The benefit for the site is that through this service you can post links and attract traffic, increase brand awareness, publish products/services, and build communications with users.
9. Yandex. News. First of all, it is a necessary aggregator for news sites. Here you can get a lot of traffic if your resource passes the selection. In principle, this is not difficult to do if you regularly publish reliable, varied, and interesting content.
10. Yandex. Services. A specialist search service that cannot be ignored by an online businessman. Through the Services, many promote their brand, receive applications and increase the position of the site in the search results.
11. Yandex. Real estate. An up-to-date service for owners of construction sites. For example, here you can promote your ads, which will even appear at the top of Yandex for relevant queries.
12. Yandex. Market. A paid service, but you get impressions right away in search and on maps, and you also set up targeting so that your products are shown only to an interested audience. From here, you can get feedback from users, and improve the rating of the online store.
Instructions for promoting the site yourself on Yandex
If you cannot afford to hire a cool SEO-Expert, you will have to promote your site in Yandex yourself. Only here you don’t have to wait for an instant effect from the promotion – at least 1-2 months should pass, and attempts to artificially accelerate the growth of positions can only harm the resource.
Other difficulties of self-promotion:
- You have to work hard – a team of specialists should work on the site in a good way;
- You will have to take into account the peculiarities of the search engine, the algorithms of which are constantly changing – yesterday the page was at the top, and today it is 20-30 positions (you must be ready for this);
- Constantly learn new skills – design, programming, and layout, marketing, SEO, copywriting.
Below is a 10-point checklist for self-promotion of a web resource in Yandex.
- Setting up analytics systems. Metrica and LiveInternet counters are installed, Webmaster is configured.
- Improved indexing of pages. Robots.txt and sitemap are generated. The indexing of the site in the Webmaster is checked. Duplicate pages are searched. The secure protocol HTTPS is established.
- The technical component. Last Modified / if-Modified, CNC, canonical, and pagination pages are configured, cyclic links and unnecessary redirects are removed. Broken links are redirected to the working pages of the resource. The correctness of the server operation, layout errors are checked, micro-markup and caching are introduced.
- Internal optimization. The correctness of filling in titles, descriptions, headings is checked. Internal linking is carried out, bread crumbs are introduced, images are optimized.
- Semantics. Key queries and suggestions from Yandex are collected using the LSI method. Clustering of the syllabus is carried out – the keys should be collected in groups, informational and commercial phrases are divided into two large clusters.
- Setting up commercial factors. Information about delivery / payment / return of goods / purchase on credit is added. Information about the company is published in the “About us” section. User registration via social networks is configured. Own e-mail is installed, several feedback options are indicated, product cards are optimized.
- External optimization. The link profile of the site is created and built up. Crowd marketing, posting through social networks, guest posting is carried out.
- Checking for filters and viruses. Warnings in the Webmaster are analyzed.
- Working with content. New articles are published regularly. All texts are scrutinized for spam and a lot of advertising.
- Improving PF. Statistics on refusals, viewing depth, and time spent by the user on the site are analyzed. Added social media buttons for sharing.
These points are just the tip of the iceberg. There is actually much more work, and concrete actions appear in the course of progress.
Conclusion
You will be able to bring your site to the top of Yandex if you implement good SEO and usability. Also, do not forget to monitor your competitors and adopt their chips.
Are the promotion methods different between Yandex and Google?
It is important for Yandex to provide good content and usability, as it prioritizes visitor satisfaction with the site. Google attaches great importance to external links – here it is beneficial to build up the link mass, the authority of the resource.
What can you get a filter for in Yandex?
First of all, for low-quality and non-unique content, cloaking, a large amount of advertising, the use of purchased links, spam, and PF promotion.
Can a young website improve its position in Yandex?
Yes maybe. The main goal when promoting a site in Yandex is to get into the user’s intent and satisfy his demand by providing the necessary information or services. To do this, you need to carefully work on the quality of content, usability, and the technical component of the web resource.