Search Engine Optimization (SEO) For 2018
SEO has been a buzzword for a long time in marketing, however every year there are changes within the industry that lead to radical differences in approach. So, what are the projected SEO trends for 2018?
There are more than 200 different factors which are in Google’s algorithm and that makes SEO pretty complex to understand and even harder to get right. However, keeping up with the rules is key to success, since the changes put in place to improve the search results quality, means there are ongoing shifts in the rankings. If your company is going to stay ahead, you need to be up to speed on the latest SEO trends for 2018 so you can work out how to incorporate them into your strategy.
Search Engine Optimization Trends For 2018 – Sure Exposure, Inc.
SERP Features
If you’ve been under the assumption that top place organic ranking is the best way to drive traffic to your site, you’re wrong. SERP features are increasingly becoming more important as searchers’ attention is turned away from clicking on organic listings. SERP features mean that you need to effectively track your company’s ranking within those features and monitor all the features that appear for your chosen keywords that could be stealing traffic from your site. This can be done with a Rank Tracker tool so that you can easily analyze the various opportunities posed by SERP features and use them to your advantage.
Structured Data
This is simply a method of HTML formatting which uses specific vocabulary to tell the search engine how it should interpret content and then how it should be displayed in the SERPs. The great benefit of structured data is that it allows you to enhance the search listings in a number of ways. With rich snippets, you can increase your click-through rate by up to 30%, and since search results are diversifying all the time, it’s imperative to always seize every opportunity to stand out from the crowd.
The major search engines Google, Bing, and Yahoo have developed a project called Schema.org where you can find all the structured data markup supported by the search engines.
Speed
Speed isn’t just a ranking signal, it’s a key UX factor, and since UX impacts on rankings, speed couldn’t be more important. Your page needs to load in less than 3 seconds to meet Google’s expectations, so the first thing to do is test your page with Google’s speed tester and then check for advice on how to fix any problems that shows up.
Relevant Content
In the past, it was fairly easy to persuade Google that your website’s content was interesting and relevant, even when it wasn’t. However, these days, it’s surprisingly difficult since there are several ways in which Google can assess the quality of content – for example by using Latent Semantic Indexing and RankBrain. To deal with this, you need to research the highest ranking pages for your business niche and check for all the shared features. This will give you all of the key phrases and terms that are relevant to your company which you can then use to your advantage.
Consider Voice Searches
Voice searches are the way of the future, with over half of teens using their voice search facility on a daily basis. Voice searchers work differently in that they use conversational style sentences rather than query style lingo. This means you need to research the sorts of questions that a voice searcher would use.
These are some of the leading predicted SEO trends for 2018, and if you want your business to feature highly in the rankings, you need to take the necessary to steps to make that happen so you can stay ahead of your competition. One of the best ways to do this is to hire an expert SEO team who can maximize your company’s potential.