SEO Strategies have evolved into a complex set of analytics, algorithms, and machine learning systems that are looking at much more than keywords to rank your site for search engines. It’s no longer enough to slap on a few meta tags and get a few backlinks to signal the web crawlers to get you better search engine results.
Today’s SEO strategies have more robust criteria than that of yesteryear. It behooves business owners and their marketing teams to stay on top of trends to gain better search engine visibility —and trends change from year to year.
Here are 7 important pieces for SEO strategies to focus on for 2018.
Improve your content relevance with comprehensive, in-depth information that is well presented.
Content that engages your audience keeps people on your site longer, improving your site’s dwell time.
Dwell time is the duration of time from the first time a user clicks on your website to when he/she leaves. Dwell time is measured with a tool like Google Analytics and is a significant metric used in google rankings.
If your content doesn’t deliver what your headline promised, the user will leave your site and keep looking elsewhere to find what they need. Relevant, informative, and interesting content helps keep readers on your site and learning about your offering. It’s good for your site and good for your business.
Master your Organic CTR (click-through rate)
Because organic traffic is still significant to Google indexing, it is a very important part of your SEO strategies. Click-through rate, usually associated with ad marketing, refers to the ratio of clicks on a direct link to your site to the total number of visitors who view that website or page.
How do you improve your Organic CTR without paid search ads or display ads? Optimize your webpage title and descriptions for search engines with content that succinctly answers your target audience’s pain. Websites appearing on a search result with a description that compels the user to click the link accomplishes higher CTR.
Make your site mobile-friendly: Google’s Mobile-First Index.
In 2017, Stone Temple Consulting released a study that said 55% of all web traffic is coming from a mobile device. That number is expected to continue to grow. It’s clear that websites with a mobile-friendly, responsive design are the ones that will thrive in Google’s mobile-first indexing.
Employ the smarter use of keywords and LSI (latent semantic indexing).
Unlike the (often rudimentary) use of keywords from 10 years ago, today they should be a natural, relevant part of your content. (see #1 on relevance)
If you want a robust set of keywords to work with, try using latent semantic keywords in your SEO strategies. These are synonyms related to words a user might type into a search engine. Since there are several variations of words and phrases people choose to search with, tools that use LSI can help to identify those variations.
RankBrain, Google’s artificial intelligence algorithm, attempts to better interpret search queries by associating them with more common queries and providing better search results in response. If you can incorporate some of this latent semantics into your content, it can improve your website’s visibility in Google search results.
Add video content —it’s what consumers want!
Relevant, high-quality video content is in many ways a turbo-boost for your website ranking.
Among other reasons, video content is a key-player in your SEO strategies because videos are easily shareable and increase engagement with your audience.
Optimize your website for voice search.
Not everyone types to search. Smartphones, tablets, and some laptops and desktops are equipped with voice search commands for a reason. People use them.
With the advent of smartphone devices and voice assistants like Google Home and Amazon Echo, voice searches have changed the way people find information. Voice search strings tend to be longer than typed searches and are more conversational.
Often, voice searches initiated on mobile devices are done with the purpose of finding local services while on-the-go. One way to optimize your site for voice searches is to list your business with the locality in mind.
Direct link whenever possible.
Direct linking matters to google when you engage with your audience in a way that links to your site. If you have a blog, use social media posts that include links to your blog. Other places to deploy a direct link strategy include:
If you do any email marketing, your emails likely have links to your website (and if they don’t, add them). Your email signature should also contain a link to your site.
Call to Action Buttons
CTA buttons can be placed on landing pages, lead magnets, or any on-site elements like images and headlines.
In both email and CTAs, be sure to optimize the linked element for maximum clicks by using best practices on things like power words and strong headlines.
It’s a new world for SEO in 2018. Tweaking your website today will help position your business to be on top of its game in the world of search engines.
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