SEO is a fairly interesting topic. It never gets old and it never gets boring. There are so many things to discuss – so many branches, developments and new trends.
Moreover, SEO is not a one time big time setup but rather, it is an ongoing process. You need to consistently produce quality content and optimize it from time to time. SEO is always a work in progress.
On this blog, we want to walk you through the Top 10 SEO trends in 2021. Find out what needs your attention, the latest updates, what’s working, how to stand out and what you can do today to succeed in 2021 and beyond. If done correctly, keeping up with these SEO trends can help you dominate search engine results, create more leads and grow your sales.
A Solid Foundation of SEO is Important
For sure SEO trends in 2021 may introduce some new transformations. But many of the emerging SEO trends can be traced back to the “basics of SEO”.
In general, SEO is about being “user-centered”. To effectively apply SEO means delivering the best possible user experience. You need to intentionally keep in mind the user who will visit your site – analyze how they consume the information, what they are looking for, what they are seeing, their overall experience of the page, and what they are more likely to do next. Paying attention to how users engage in your website can help identify areas that need to be improved or optimized.
It is crucial to have a good grasp of both the basics of SEO as well as the emerging SEO trends in order to succeed in the competitive world of SEO.
Top 10 SEO Trends in 2021
Keeping up with the emerging SEO trends will reinforce your sustained SEO efforts. Here, we listed down the Top 10 SEO Trends in 2021 that you need to watch out for:
SEO Trend #1 Voice Search
Voice search technology is changing the way that people search. Instead of traditional “typed” search, more and more people are now getting into voice search technology in getting the information that they need. Users wanted to find quick answers and want them delivered to them right away. It is observed that voice search is more conversational and people tend to ask more specific and direct questions than typed-search. For example, they ask “how do I install gutter guards on my tile roof?” instead of just typing “DIY gutter guards installation” on traditional search. Integrating a helpful voice search can help make a difference.There are 4 Types of Voice Search Assistants
The following are the widely used voice search assistants that allow users to generate voice search results using varied sources of information:1) Google Assistant
2) Amazon Alexa
3) Microsoft Cortana
4) Apple’s Siri
Source: businessnewsdaily.com Voice search is on the rise and it will become more and more popular over time. The earlier you optimize your content to this SEO trend, the greater your competitive advantage will be.SEO Trend #2 Google My Business Listings | Local Search
Creating a Google My Business Listing helps generate local searches, increase local brand mentions and dominate Google maps rankings.
If you aren’t familiar with Google My Business yet, well, it is a free marketing tool by Google that allows businesses and organizations to set up a business profile. This way, potential customers can easily find you both in Google Maps and on Google Search. It is like an online directory that allows potential customers to easily find you.
Google My Business can help get you a higher ranking on Google Maps. You can also generate customer reviews, answer directly to audiences’ questions, publish posts and boost your visibility on Google searches. This way, you are increasing the chance of being found on local searches, increase leads and later on, produce higher sales.
Google My Business listing of Kapwa Marketing
To get started, first, you only need to create an account for free at https://www.google.com/business/. Then you further optimize your business profile by adding relevant details, photos or even videos.
SEO Trend #3: Video Marketing | Youtube Marketing
Users see videos as excellent educational materials and are highly entertaining. Thus, adding videos on landing pages can help add value to your content, generate longer engagement and can even increase your conversion rates. Videos are also proven to increase the amount of time spent on your page thereby affecting the overall SEO metrics.
Consumers want to see videos in the brands that they support. According to Hubspot.com, 90% of customers say that videos help them make buying decisions and by simply mentioning the word “video” in your email subject line, it increases open rates by around 19%.
Interestingly, Youtube is still the go-to platform for many users who want to learn something new. In fact, Youtube is the 2nd biggest search engine and 2nd biggest social media platform with over 2 billion users worldwide. It’s no surprise that video marketing or Youtube marketing will continue to be a strong SEO trend in 2021.
Sample video marketing content uploaded on our Youtube Channel
SEO Trend #4 Pagespeed
Pagespeed generally affects the overall user experience of a site. It is an important SEO factor then and now. Thus, optimizing page speed can never go out of style as far as SEO is concerned. The use of online tools like PageSpeed Insights, LightHouse, Pingdom, GTmetrix, etc. can help guide your page speed optimization.
Creating a lightning-fast page speed of your site can definitely have an implication on your SEO and overall user experience.
Pagespeed score result from Google Pagespeed Insights
SEO Trend #5 Image SEO
Optimizing images is a basic SEO essential.
Optimizing images does not only help improve the ranking of your content but it can also generate additional traffic through the Google image search. Optimizing images and paying attention to the little details like using seo-friendly filename, adding an alt text, title, caption and context, compressing image size and so on can only bring positive SEO results.
A video tutorial on “7 Tips to Optimize your Images”
SEO Trend #6 Mobile Responsiveness | “Mobile Only”
Since the majority access Google Search using a mobile device, Google has now turned into Mobile-first indexing and ranking. This transformation will forge many to radically improve mobile responsiveness and make it more SEO-friendly. You want everything to load fast, stay in place, have proper sizing, bear similar content and offer an overall good user experience.
Optimize mobile responsiveness
SEO Trend #7 Core Web Vitals
Core Web Vitals is the newest ranking factor by Google which will be implemented sometime in 2021. There is no fixed date yet but Google said they will give a 6-month prior notice. The earlier you adapt to this upcoming SEO trend, then the more than you can get ahead of the SEO battlefield.
Core web vitals pertain to a set of user-centered metrics that aims to improve the overall user experience. It covers aspects related to speed, responsiveness and visual stability.
Google defined the following as the Core Web Vitals:
- Largest Contentful Paint(LCP) The time it takes for a page’s main content to load. An ideal LCP measurement is 2.5 seconds or faster.
- First Input Delay(FID): The time it takes for a page to become interactive. An ideal measurement is less than 100 ms.
- Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS): The amount of unexpected layout shift of visual page content. An ideal measurement is less than 0.1. | Source: searchenginejournal.com
In order to evaluate your Core Web Vital, Google has added a new feature on Google Search Console to help you find out exactly how your site is performing with Core Web Vitals.
SEO Trend #8 Featured Snippets | “Position Zero”
Ranking for a featured snippet is so much better and effective for driving visitors to your site than ranking for #1.
Featured snippets or a position zero spot refers to the short snippets that appear on the topmost portion of Google’s search results. It usually takes up the most space on a search results page and it appears inside a snippet.
Featured snippets that appear on top of the Google search results
The content that appears in Featured Snippet is automatically pulled from web pages in Google’s index. Featured Snippets can be in a form of tables, definitions, steps and lists.
According to Neil Patel, there’s really no exact formula for earning a featured snippet but the easiest way to position zero spot is to produce high-quality content that the audience and Google will love. You also have to format it well and make your content “snippable” so that Google will easily recognize your link.
SEO Trend #9 Semantic Search | Artificial Intelligence (IA)
Google’s semantic search or artificial intelligence has the ability to temporarily adjust search results based on individual search intent and natural human language. It is mindblowing how Google is capable of presenting only search results that are most relevant to your search queries.
Ahrefs.com defines semantic search as an information retrieval process used by modern search engines to return the most relevant search results. It focuses on the meaning behind search queries instead of the traditional keyword matching.
There are 3 three Google search algorithm that sorts information in order to give the users the best search result. These are Hummingbird, Rankbrain and Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers (BERT).
You can check out this blog to learn more about the 6 steps on how to adapt your SEO to semantic search.
SEO Trend #10 Podcast SEO
Podcasting is an interesting and fast-growing medium that offers a different approach to consuming content. It is a modern platform with its audio-only format where users can easily consume content no matter where they are or what they are doing.
Podcast has the ability to offer a deeper learning experience and can foster a one-to-one relationship with the content creator. It can help boost your online presence, attract a specific interest niche and create more leads.
Aside from social media accounts, Podcast is an excellent medium that can be added to your collection of content platforms to help expand your reach.
SEO podcast continues to attract more users globally
Keep Up with the Latest SEO Trends in 2021
Staying updated and effectively implementing the 10 SEO trends is essential in improving your digital strategy for 2021.
The SEO Specialist
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