The digital marketing industry is rapidly growing and transforming, yet SEO & Content rule the market in attracting prospective clients to the business website. Going by the stats, there are around 3.5 billion Google searches made per day. Out of which, the first and foremost result on Google SERP only gets an average CTR of 31.7%, while there are hardly 0.78% clicks on the second page of Google search results.
In 2020, there was a push in the right direction only in the businesses dealing in digital and technological progress. This rise in tech solutions essentially influenced SEO and digital marketing. In 2021 also, it is clear that organic search and SEO are irreplaceable factors in making the brand’s online presence successful.
However, the tactics in SEO are not static always, they keep changing with the latest trends. Here are listed few rules to take care of SEO in the year 2021.
1. LONG CONTENT TYPES ENHANCE SERPs
As per stats, long-form content of around 3000 words attracts four times the shares and thrice the traffic. Moreover, they attain 3.5 times more backlinks than the content with an average length of 1000 words.
Most importantly, the content must be qualitative and informative enough to engage the users and convince them to share with others. The right kind of font styles and sizes must be used to make it more readable.
2. HIKE IN GOOGLE MY BUSINESS LISTINGS
Due to pandemics, there is a rise in local and ‘near me’ searches. For brick and mortar businesses, it is best to list themselves on Google My Business and enjoy the privileges that follow.
Nowadays, it is normal to see zero-click searches and featured snippets more often. Apart from GMB, one can make the most of local SEO by online business directories, cashing in on local keywords, and creating content emphasized on local news stories, events, and specific places.
3. CORE WEB VITALS FOR GOOGLE RANKING
Last year, Google introduced ‘Core Web Vitals’, three metrics to evaluate user experience, are Interactivity, Loading, and Visual Stability. Overall, all three work together for improving the page speed by examining how soon the page gets interactive, how fast the page gets loaded, and also how stable it is during the loading process.
In 2021, it is essential to work on Google Core Web Vitals to get an appearance on the first page of the Google search engine.
4. VIDEO MARKETING
After Google, Youtube is the second highest search engine with more than 1 billion users. To get the maximum benefits from video marketing, you must optimize your video content for search engines. Start with the basic steps, by working on the video channel description and name. Make sure not to overload them with keywords, rather give a more user-friendly description of what your channel is all about. Also, if you are working on YouTube, apply the YouTube autocomplete feature to ease the task.
5. ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
In 2021, Artificial Intelligence will play a bigger role in the SEO industry due to the personalization it offers. In fact, Google makes use of AI to provide searchers with the findings they are looking for. Google’s algorithm RankBrain is a vital factor in Google ranking on SERP by making AI the highest trend to watch.
Several companies including Frase, HubSpot, and MarketMuse deliver AI-oriented solutions to aid firms with their SEO efforts in the next years.
6. VOICE SEARCH
With the launch of voice assistants such as Apple’s Siri, Amazon’s Alexa, and Google Assistant, voice search technology has massively impacted the SEO trends as well. As per a report, it is expected that over 55% of households will own a smart speaker by the year 2022.
Talking about voice search optimization, it is important to take note of the keywords. Generally, in voice searches, people tend to ask in long phrases. Hence, long-tail keywords with more natural sounding must be worked upon to attain maximum audience to your web pages.
7. GOOGLE EAT & BRANDED SEO
Google has always pushed the quality of content when it comes to ranking. Apart from this, Google emphasizes the EAT principle to attain better results. EAT here stands for Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness.
In 2021, SEO is more inclined towards authority and branding. For instance, the more authentic the brand is, the more is the probability to get a higher and frequent rank on the Google SERP. For this, brand awareness must be created that will further build brand queries. Nevertheless, brand queries serve as a hidden factor in setting up your brand and getting higher ranks on Google.
8. GOOGLE’s BERT
BERT algorithm for Google stands for (Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers). BERT applies natural language processing (NLP) and ML for effectively understanding the needs of a searcher. It functions in more than 70 different languages as well as all queries are also applicable in Google English.
With an update in Google BERT, the ‘bots’ have become much more conversational and can easily compute the intent of a searcher. In other words, Google can now interpret the essence just like human brains. SEO practitioners must upload the content that satisfies user intent, to make it more BERT-friendly. Ultimately, it will only help you to rank higher.
CONCLUSION
To recap, the above SEO trends must be considered while moving forward with your SEO strategies in 2021. Apart from the above trends, keyword search, social influencer SEO, etc. are also the budding pivotal concepts dominating the SEO world. To get the maximum benefits of SEO, always go with the flow and better be updated with the trends.