By now, almost all Digital Marketing professionals will have heard about the Yandex leak and what it means for SEO – especially seen as though many are calling it the biggest news in SEO for years!
But, what does it actually mean for Digital PR?
First of all, it’s worth establishing what Yandex actually is and how it relates to Google. Yandex is essentially Russia’s search engine – it works in a similar way to Google and therefore the leak is very interesting. A former Yandex employee has leaked the various different ranking factors that Yandex considers and how much weight they hold over search results.
It’s worth noting that Yandex isn’t Google, so we can’t be sure that the ranking factors are the same – but they are very close so we can still take some key learnings away from the leak.
For Digital PR’s, perhaps the most important thing to note is that Yandex’s first ranking factor is PageRank, which we can assume works in a similar way to Google’s PageRank.
PageRank isn’t always considered or talked about in SEO anymore, but it still exists and is influenced by a number of things – namely, LINKS!
Essentially, what we can take away from the Yandex leak is that links are still incredibly important when it comes to ranking – but not just any links, they must be relevant and authoritative to improve PageRank.
So, we thought it would be a good opportunity to discuss the importance of securing relevant links for digital PR.
What makes a ‘good’ link?
It can be hard to define what makes a ‘good’ link but essentially it is one that is relevant and authoritative.
A good link is essential when it comes to building a brand’s SEO ranking. The more high-quality backlinks a page has, the higher it can rank. Backlinks are one of Google’s most important ranking factors.
Google consider backlinks as “votes of confidence” for the website getting the links. Each vote suggests your content is valuable, credible, and useful which therefore drives rankings.
How do you assess the relevancy of a site within Digital PR?
A few years ago, a good link was defined solely by the domain authority of the linking site with Tier A targets (DA 50 and above) considered to be the best type of linking coverage.
However, in recent years Google has expanded its parameters and now considers relevance of the site to be equally as important. For example, if you are a shop selling fishing gear and get coverage on a fishing trade title, the audience is likely to be much more engaged in your company.
Digital PR Best Practice
Digital PR refers to utilising PR tactics developed for online and digital channels. With the right strategy, digital PR can help drive both brand awareness and organic performance (SEO rankings). Digital PR is not all about building links anymore, but it does play a big part in SEO rankings – and if we can take anything away from the leak, it’s that this is still very much the case.
With that being said, it is also important to note that the Yandex leak confirmed that penalised sites had their PageRank reduced to zero so it is essential to ensure you are using best practice when it comes to SEO and Digital PR.
It will be interesting to see if the leak has any impact on future Google updates, and how it plays out.
For more information on how we can help with your Digital PR strategy, drop us a line at hello@hatch.group
