Key Insights
Essential data points from our research
The #1 result in Google's organic search results has an average CTR of 27.6%
The top 3 Google search results get 54.4% of all clicks
Moving up one spot in the search results increases CTR by 30.8% on average
The average top-ranking page on Google contains 1,447 words
Content with at least one image gets 2x more shares and traffic than content with no images
Updating and republishing old blog posts with new content and images can increase organic traffic by as much as 106%
58.99% of all global website traffic comes from mobile devices
As page load time goes from 1 second to 3 seconds bounce rate increases 32%
96.5% of pages in the top 10 Google results use HTTPS
90.63% of all content gets no organic traffic from Google mostly due to lack of backlinks
The number one ranking page on Google has an average of 3.8x more backlinks than positions 2-10
66.31% of pages have zero backlinks pointing to them
Google currently holds 91.9% of the total search engine market share
46% of all Google searches are seeking local information
72% of consumers that did a local search visited a store within 5 miles
Backlinks & Authority
- 190.63% of all content gets no organic traffic from Google mostly due to lack of backlinks
- 2The number one ranking page on Google has an average of 3.8x more backlinks than positions 2-10
- 366.31% of pages have zero backlinks pointing to them
- 4A high number of referring domains is the factor most correlated with higher Google rankings
- 5The average cost of buying a link is $361.44 according to a study of link selling services
- 643.7% of top-ranking pages have some reciprocal links
- 7Companies that engage in link building report a 45% success rate with broken link building tactics
- 8Only 2.2% of content generates links from multiple websites
- 9Long-form content receives 77.2% more links than short articles
- 1094% of the world's content gets zero external links
- 11Top earning results have links from 3x as many diverse domains as lower results
- 1241% of companies consider link building the most difficult part of SEO
- 13Google representatives have confirmed that backlinks are one of the top 3 ranking factors
- 1413% of search experts say link building provides the highest ROI of any SEO tactic
- 15Pages with more backlinks tend to rank higher but the cost of acquiring them is rising by 10% annually
- 1652% of marketers say link building directly impacts their organic rankings
- 17Guest posting is the most popular link building tactic used by 64.9% of link builders
- 18Cold outreach for backlinks has an average response rate of only 8.5%
- 19Disavowing links is only necessary for sites with manual actions or massive spam attacks according to Google
- 2038% of businesses spend between $1000 and $5000 per month on link building
Interpretation
Think of backlinks as Google’s VIP pass, because these stats show most content dies unseen without them while top pages collect many diverse links from long-form pieces, guest posts and outreach, yet acquiring links is getting harder, pricier and low-response, so link building remains a difficult but often high-ROI necessity for organic success.
Content Strategy
- 1The average top-ranking page on Google contains 1,447 words
- 2Content with at least one image gets 2x more shares and traffic than content with no images
- 3Updating and republishing old blog posts with new content and images can increase organic traffic by as much as 106%
- 4Top-ranking pages are 3.5x more likely to have a video embedded than lower-ranking pages
- 5Companies that blog get 55% more web traffic than those that don't
- 657% of SEO experts say that content creation and marketing is the most effective way to drive search traffic
- 7"How-to" and list-based articles are the most popular content formats for earning backlinks
- 8Content longer than 3,000 words gets an average of 77.2% more referring domain links than content shorter than 1,000 words
- 9Headlines ending with a question mark get 23.3% more social shares than those that don't
- 1072% of marketers describe content marketing as their most effective SEO tactic
- 11Using an H1 tag is correlated with higher search rankings although the correlation is relatively weak
- 12Articles with lists (e.g. 10 ways to...) get 2x more shares than other content formats
- 13Pages with a table of contents usually appear in search results with sitelinks
- 14Including the target keyword in the URL slug is a ranking factor for content relevance
- 1533% of eCommerce sites do not use H1 tags on their category pages
- 1629% of keywords with over 10k monthly searches consist of 3 or more words
- 1747% of pages have H1 tags that are different from their Title tags
- 18Search intent optimization is prioritized by 71% of marketers
- 19Listicles generate 80% more traffic appearing in featured snippets than other content types
- 2088% of B2B marketers use content marketing as a lead generation tool for organic search
Interpretation
Treat SEO like dating: earn Google's affection by publishing long, updated how-to listicles packed with images that double shares and embedded videos that top pages favor, using clear H1s, keyword-friendly URLs and a table of contents, posing a question in the headline, and blogging consistently, because search and social behavior reward depth, format, and intent.
Market & Local SEO
- 1Google currently holds 91.9% of the total search engine market share
- 246% of all Google searches are seeking local information
- 372% of consumers that did a local search visited a store within 5 miles
- 497% of people learn more about a local company online than anywhere else
- 588% of searches for local businesses on a mobile device either call or visit the business within 24 hours
- 628% of local searches result in a purchase
- 7"Near me" or "close by" type searches grew by more than 900% over two years
- 849% of marketers report that organic search has the best ROI of any marketing channel
- 9The SEO industry is expected to reach a value of $122.11 billion by 2028
- 1086% of people look up the location of a business on Google Maps
- 1158% of companies struggle to prove the value of their SEO work to executives
- 1276% of people who search on their smartphones for something nearby visit a business within a day
- 1361% of B2B marketers stated that SEO and organic traffic generate more leads than any other marketing initiative
- 14Voice search accounts for 20% of all queries on mobile devices
- 1542% of the US population uses voice search
- 1651% of smartphone users have discovered a new company or product when conducting a search on their smartphone
- 17In-house SEO professionals earn an average of $72,672 per year
- 18B2B companies generate 2x more revenue from organic search than any other channel
- 1944% of businesses say they will increase their SEO budget this year
- 20Yelp appears in the top five search results for 92% of Google web searches that include a city and business category
Interpretation
With Google owning nearly 92% of search, local and mobile "near me" queries exploding, voice and Maps steering customers straight to storefronts, Yelp capturing top spots, and SEO delivering the best ROI even as budgets and industry value climb while execs still demand proof, treating organic search as optional is less a strategy than willful blindness that hands your customers to competitors.
Technical & Mobile
- 158.99% of all global website traffic comes from mobile devices
- 2As page load time goes from 1 second to 3 seconds bounce rate increases 32%
- 396.5% of pages in the top 10 Google results use HTTPS
- 4Core Web Vitals became a confirmed ranking factor in June 2021
- 5A site that loads in 1 second has a conversion rate 3x higher than a site that loads in 5 seconds
- 673.06% of domains have valid Schema.org markup
- 7Mobile-first indexing is now the default for all new websites on Google
- 8Approximately 25% of all websites get hit with a manual action penalty from Google eventually
- 9Websites with a "Good" rating on Core Web Vitals are 24% less likely to see users abandon page loads
- 1053% of mobile site visits are abandoned if pages take longer than 3 seconds to load
- 1182% of websites have issues that affect their structured data implementation
- 12Duplicate content issues appear on 50% of websites audited
- 13Pages with a slow Time to First Byte (TTFB) tend to rank lower on Google
- 1461% of mobile searchers are more likely to contact a local business if they have a mobile-friendly site
- 1540% of consumers will leave a page that takes longer than 3 seconds to load
- 16Only 17% of websites currently pass the Core Web Vitals assessment
- 17Google crawls JavaScript content but it can take up to 9 times longer than HTML content
- 1880.8% of keywords with 0-50 monthly searches have a keyword difficulty score of less than 30
- 19The average domain authority of the 1st result on Google is significantly higher than the 10th result
- 20Broken links were found on 42.5% of websites analyzed
Interpretation
These stats are a blunt wake-up call: with nearly 59% of traffic on mobile, mobile first indexing the norm, Core Web Vitals a confirmed ranking signal yet only 17% passing, and speed, HTTPS, clean structured data and low TTFB directly affecting bounce, conversions and rankings, any site that is slow, insecure or sloppy with content, schema or links is essentially handing customers and search positions to competitors while inviting penalties and crawling delays.
User Behavior & CTR
- 1The #1 result in Google's organic search results has an average CTR of 27.6%
- 2The top 3 Google search results get 54.4% of all clicks
- 3Moving up one spot in the search results increases CTR by 30.8% on average
- 4Only 0.63% of Google searchers click on something from the second page
- 565% of Google searches end without a click to another web property (Zero-Click Searches)
- 6Long-tail keywords (descriptive phrases) have a 3% to 5% higher click-through rate than generic searches
- 7Title tags that contain a question have a 14.1% higher CTR vs. pages that don't have a question in their title
- 8Titles with 15 to 40 characters have the highest CTR of 8.6% higher than outside that range
- 9Organic CTR for branded keywords is roughly 2x higher than for non-branded keywords
- 10URLs that contain a keyword have a 45% higher click-through rate than URLs that do not
- 11Writing meta descriptions can increase click-through rates by up to 5.8%
- 12Emotional titles generally have a higher organic CTR than neutral titles
- 13Featured snippets receive approximately 8.6% of clicks while the result below it receives 19.6%
- 1470% of marketers see SEO as more effective than PPC for driving sales
- 15Desktop searches have a slightly higher CTR on position 1 (32%) compared to mobile (23%)
- 16Only 35% of product searches start on Google with the rest starting on Amazon
- 1759% of shoppers use Google to research a purchase they plan to make in-store or online
- 1815% of all daily Google searches have never been searched before
- 19Image search accounts for 22.6% of all search queries
- 208% of search queries are phrased as questions
Interpretation
Treat Google like a ruthless cocktail party where the top result and top three hoard most of the attention, so to win clicks aim for position one with a keyword-rich branded URL, a concise emotional question title and meta description, chase long-tail and featured-snippet real estate, optimize for mobile and image intent, and remember that anything below page one is effectively invisible, many searches end without a click, and a large share of product discovery begins on Amazon.
