Every year there are many ranking factors charts that are published that will tell you what factors are the most important in ranking.

However, don’t start reading them and then think that’s exactly how you should create and design your site.

There is no magic to SEO. There is rarely just one thing you can change and your site starts to rank number one for your chosen terms.

First Read The Entire Charts for Unknown Factors

The first step you should take is to read the entire charts.

This first read should not be based upon looking for factors that are supposedly the most important in ranking.

The first time you read the chart; look for things you do not understand. When you find factors that you are unfamiliar with – this is a place to learn. Read more about this factor so that you can learn more about SEO.

I can’t stress how important this step is. By understanding the global set of factors, you can start to see how one item can influence another; which will help you make much better decisions about where to spend your SEO efforts.

The Grain of Salt

My two favorite charts are created by ‘experts’. These are generally some of the best known practitioners of their craft – but SEO is opinion.

In fact, according to the SearchKing vs Google lawsuit, the judge found that PageRank is and organic rankings are protected by the first amendment (free speech) because search results are opinions.

These ranking charts are opinions from SEOs about how search engines for them opinions.

The reason I like these two charts is because when they poll experts they ask how important each factor is. Then, they show the importance across these factors as rated by the experts but also show the degree of consensus across those same people.

For instance, if everyone thinks it’s important then the consensus is high. If half think it’s important and half think it’s not important then the consensus will be low. This gives you an overall indication of not just the factors important but also if everyone thinks that factor is important or just a few people.

How to Use These Charts

Once you have read and researched the factors so you understand what all of them mean; then start making checklists.

The first checklist should be the high importance, high consensus items. Look through your website to see how you are doing on these items. Some of these will take a lot of effort (such as link building) and need to be put into an ongoing task list. Some of these factors (such as is your site listed in Google Places) are one time items (and maintaining them is essential; but the bulk of the work can be done quickly) and start there.

Continue to evaluate your site according to these charts to see where to spend your time. By starting with the high importance and one time tasks, you can start to work through these charts overtime.

The Two SEO Factor Charts

If you are working on organic SEO; then my favorite chart is by the folks at SEOmoz: Search Ranking Factors.

If you are working on Local SEO (such as Google maps) then David Mihm’s chart is fantastic: Local Search Ranking Factors.

Other helpful optimization posts:

• Video Ranking Tips
• Product feed optimization
• Google News optimization
• Image SEO