By Kelly Grainger, CreoLogic Design Inc.
165. Brand Name Anchor Text: Branded anchor text is a simple — but strong — brand signal.
166. Branded Searches: People search for brands. If people search for your brand in Google, this shows Google that your site is a real brand.
167. Brand + Keyword Searches: Do people search for a specific keyword along with your brand (for example: “Backlinko Google ranking factors” or “Backlinko SEO”)? If so, Google may give you a rankings boost when people search for the non-branded version of that keyword in Google.
168. Site Has Facebook Page and Likes: Brands tend to have Facebook pages with lots of likes.
169. Site has Twitter Profile with Followers: Twitter profiles with a lot of followers signals a popular brand.
170. Official Linkedin Company Page: Most real businesses have company Linkedin pages.
171. Known Authorship: In February 2013, Google CEO Eric Schmidt famously claimed:
“Within search results, information tied to verified online profiles will be ranked higher than content without such verification, which will result in most users naturally clicking on the top (verified) results.”
172. Legitimacy of Social Media Accounts: A social media account with 10,000 followers and 2 posts is probably interpreted a lot differently than another 10,000-follower strong account with lots of interaction. In fact, Google filed a patent for determining whether or not social media accounts were real or fake.
173. Brand Mentions on Top Stories: Really big brands get mentioned on Top Stories sites all the time. In fact, some brands even have a feed of news from their own website, on the first page:
174. Unlinked Brand Mentions: Brands get mentioned without getting linked to. Google likely looks at non-hyperlinked brand mentions as a brand signal.
175. Brick and Mortar Location: Real businesses have offices. It’s possible that Google fishes for location-data to determine whether or not a site is a big brand.
