[jchook]

sitemap.xml can cause your search result to appear with sub-links.

Keyword density (just the right amount) and total word count seem to have an effect and I’ve seen targeted landers work very well for specific search phrases.

Backlinks will probably always be relevant to rankings as they were the original bedrock principle behind PageRank. If you get prominent blogs to link to you, that can help a lot. Inversely, use rel=nofollow on anchors to avoid seeping relevance to other pages.

Ever since Mobilegeddon your site MUST be mobile friendly or you will get penalized. Also other UI stuff matters (E.g. don’t put ads above the fold)

Not an SEO expert here but I would consider those effective and small things you can do for SEO.

[aledalgrande]

Also performance - make sure you use this tool https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/