Just recently, Google has released “Search Quality Rating Guidelines,” which is a 157-page document designed to help human quality raters assess and rate a list of sites. These guidelines reportedly give insights into what Google deems as a high quality site. Here’s what you can learn from the guide so you can adjust your online strategies and ensure the success of your small business.

[Tweet “1. A high quality site is one that satisfies visitors’ goals”]

If you have an e-commerce site, the amount of content you have on each web page is really not that important. What matters is that your site can provide visitors with excellent research and buying experience. Here are the elements that Google’s search algorithm uses to determine the quality of a site:

• Products specifications – Product specs aid in the buyer’s decision making process by providing them with key information about the goods they want to purchase.
• Original content about the product – Creating an original description of the product is essential as it helps shoppers determine if the product can solve their problem.
• Review – Reviews also aid in the buyers decision making process as they let them know the experiences of other shoppers with a particular product.
• Shipping and returns – According to the guidelines, concise information about your shipping and returns policy indicates trustworthiness of your business and the quality of your products.

2. A high quality site is one recognised by other sites

In Section 2.7 of the guide called Website Reputation, Google encourages the human quality raters to use reputation research to determine if the site they are reviewing have reviews or awards from third-party websites. The tech giant instructed them to look for “reviews, references, recommendations by experts, news articles, and other credible information created/written by individuals about the website.”

According to online experts, this could be an indication that Google is using awards and reviews as an algorithm signal to determine a site’s search ranking. If you want your site to rank, therefore, getting reviews or distinctions from other sites could help.

3. A high quality site is one that is comprehensive

According to Google’s quality rating guide, a quality web page must contain the main content and supplementary content such as videos, manuals, and user reviews among others. For e-commerce sites, their web pages should help consumers compare products, find alternative products in case the one they want to buy isn’t available, and make informed buying decisions.