Most Important Off-Page SEO Ranking Factors in 2026

Off-page SEO factors, i.e., external factors that lead to a site’s better rankings, are crucial in today’s landscape because they build your website’s authority, credibility, and trustworthiness. As a result, they lead to better search engine rankings and thus more organic traffic.

Brand Mentions

The first item on our off-page SEO factors list are brand signals and mentions. Search engines consider brand reputation when ranking, and a significant part of that comes down to brand mentions, or how often your company, product, or service is mentioned online without providing a link. 

To increase mentions, it’s essential first to optimize your Google Business Profile. The rest is mostly up to others. What Google and other search engines favor are positive reviews on Google, Yelp, and industry-specific review platforms. These might not be as important as technical SEO factors, but search engines still use them to determine your brand’s quality. 

Social Signals

Social signals encompass likes, comments, shares, and various other forms of social media engagement on platforms such as Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, X, and LinkedIn.

They are not direct ranking factors, but they do lead to increased visibility and backlink generation. For example, if your content goes viral on social media, more people will engage with your brand, while bloggers and websites will start adding links to your content. These off-page SEO backlinks are a crucial ranking factor, and social signals are a catalyst for them. 

Moreover, social signals are also great for building trust and brand reputation, even among search engines. 

Online Reviews

Online reviews are not a direct ranking factor, and they are often overlooked, despite their importance. They excel at enhancing trust and local visibility for your brand. More importantly, they can heavily influence your customers' behavior.

The more positive reviews you have online, the more authoritative and credible your site will appear in the eyes of search engine algorithms. This will indirectly lead to better rankings as search engines favor more credible brands.

You can get more reviews from customers and your audience by directly asking satisfied customers and responding to existing reviews, even if they are negative. 

Social Media

I’ve already listed social signals among off-page SEO ranking factors examples, but it’s important to dig deeper into social media content.

When you post content from your site on social media platforms like X and LinkedIn, you make it easier for search engine crawlers to find and scan your content. That way, you can get a head start on your competitors.  

Domain Age

Whether the age of a domain is an off-page SEO ranking factor is up for debate among SEO professionals, but it’s certainly at least a minor signal, primarily because it indicates credibility and trust. 

In essence, it’s always good to have an older domain, but you shouldn’t think that this is a deciding factor in any way. A well-written blog post on a year-old site will still outrank a poorly-written post on a decade-old and trusted website. 

Building Brand Reputation

Building your brand reputation is becoming one of the most important off-page SEO techniques. It’s a very broad factor and not a single signal like many others here, so it’s really an effort you should constantly be making. 

That’s because the better your brand reputation is, the more trust you’ll gain from both search engines and users, and the better your click-through rates will be. 

In addition to the points we’ve already covered here, it’s crucial to improve the user experience on your site, as this is likely to lead to an improved reputation. 

Proper Internal Linking

Internal linking is considered an on-page ranking factor, but it also plays a significant role in off-page success. In essence, effective internal linking on your site is essential for distributing authority on your website appropriately. 

It’s always good to strategically link to other pages on your highly authoritative pages, as you’ll effectively transfer some of that authority to them, thus improving their rankings.

For successful internal linking, you also need to consider the anchor texts you’re using. They should be descriptive and relevant to both the link content and the content surrounding the anchor texts. 

Directory Listings

Directory listings, or citations, are online entries that have your company’s name, phone number, and address. They are among the most important off-page SEO examples, particularly for local businesses. 

Although SEO has undergone significant changes over the years, maintaining accurate listing information online remains crucial, as it helps build trust. More importantly, it will improve your business’s local search visibility. 

To reap these benefits, ensure your key information is consistent across all online listings. You should also focus on having listings on all major directories, such as Google Business Profile, Bing Places, and Yelp, as well as industry-specific directories. 

Google Business Profile

Having a Google Business Profile is among the most important off-page SEO types, especially for local businesses. It’s a directory listing, yes, but it’s also your company’s presence on some of the most important Google services, notably Search and Maps. 

An optimised GBP is key if you want to rank in the Local Pack, which is the first result that appears for local business searches, featuring a map with three highlighted businesses. 

It’s thus crucial to provide as much information as possible on your GBP.

Guest Posting

Guest posting, where you’re writing and publishing articles on other websites from your industry, is one of the most powerful and widely used off-page SEO tools. What you get from this is backlinks, one of the running themes of this article, and also an important ranking factor.

However, this tactic is often misused, so it’s crucial to do it properly. You need to focus on the quality of writing, not quantity. In other words, it’s important to write original and valuable content. Moreover, focus on relevant and reputable websites. And yes, you should avoid guest posting networks, i.e., sites that sell guest posts or belong to networks made for link building. 

Conclusion

Even though off-page SEO ranking factors rarely directly influence your online search engine rankings, they do so indirectly. They improve your brand’s visibility and reputation, lead to more backlinks, and ensure you’re seen as an authority in your industry and location. 

It’s important to consider all these factors to improve your chances of becoming one of the leaders in your industry, so get to work. 

FAQ

What is the ranking factor for off-page SEO?

There’s no single ranking factor, but rather several, including quality and relevant backlinks, brand mentions, robust social media signals, and positive online reviews. 

What does off-page SEO focus on?

The focus and main goal of off-page SEO is to build up your website’s and, consequently, your brand’s trust and authority. This is achieved through tactics that focus on aspects not directly related to your website. 

How do you measure off-page SEO success?

The easiest way to measure the success of off-page SEO is to track key metrics, including domain authority (DA), backlink quality and quantity, social signals, brand mentions, and referral traffic. You can do that via Google Analytics or paid tools like Semrush, Ahrefs, and Moz. 

Is off-page SEO still relevant?

Yes, off-page SEO is absolutely relevant. What’s more, it’s more relevant now than it has ever been for building authority and improving search engine rankings.