2021 is just around the corner, so this isn’t the time to sit back and relax. Your SEO strategy must keep up with the times and not fall behind. As you’ve been able to see, the world is slowly but surely changing. Practices that were once popular have now fallen into oblivion. If you want to succeed, stay up-to-date with industry trends and do exactly what the expert marketers are doing. In what follows, we’ll highlight the best SEO practices for the year to come. Revisit your strategy and adapt to the unavoidable search engine changes.
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Identify your competitors’ best-performing pages
The more you know about your competitors, the better your own website can perform. Transform the competition into an advantage. Understand what’s working for your rivals and how you can beat them in the SERPs on top of those insights. However, don’t copy blindly. Look at your competitors’ best-performing pages and ask yourself what approach would best work for you. The outcome will be more valuable. No matter what you’re doing, there’s always room for improvement.
Countless tools such as SEMrush let you see all your competitors’ top pages alongside the traffic they receive, how many social shares they have, not to mention the number of ranking keywords. You’ll learn invaluable lessons by studying the competition. Even the smallest mistakes can be detrimental to your SEO campaign. Know what approaches to avoid when making your next move. For instance, it’s not a good idea to optimize content for the same keywords or key phrases because you’ll be eating away your chances to rank in Google.
Concentrate on user and search intent
A common practice among SEO agencies is focusing on user and search intent. Marketing experts know that searcher intent and behavior are constantly changing and it’s necessary to move away from traditional practices. What you need to do is to try to understand what users want and what their intent is when performing a search query. Understanding what people want enables you to create content that best fits their needs. Follow in Google’s footsteps. The search engine offers results based on users’ intent.
Keep a close eye on search terms to figure out if your branding is working or not. In this respect, you can use Google Analytics. Go to the Organic Search section and see what keywords and phrases people have used. If Internet users are looking for you and find you, they will no doubt visit your website. Thoroughly analyze the search data on the website and focus your attention on the highlighted keywords for all the visited pages. Keep in mind that any query can have several interpretations.
Demonstrate good E-A-T on and off the website
E-A-T is an acronym and it stands for Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness. If you want your content to be promoted by Google, you must produce written material that can actually help users. Google is training bots to make sure the standards are respected and determine whether a business domain or Internet pages satisfy users’ needs. Some sites have been negatively affected by lacking E-A-T. Your website should fulfill its intended purpose, which should be user-centric, nonetheless.
Since people want to receive fresh, relevant, and proven data, that’s what you have to give them. If you don’t offer valuable information, the search engine will make sure that it will display your site last. Google won’t give your website an E-A-T score, but it won’t feature it at the top of the search engine results. Try to obtain links and mentions from authoritative sites, update your content, and, most importantly check the facts. Use trustworthy sources like Wikipedia to verify the information. If you get positive reviews from users, you can improve your rankings.
Optimise for People Also Ask
Chances are that you’ve noticed the People Also Ask box in Google. For every query, the search engine displays questions that others have asked concerning the original search. For instance, if you search for something like “is gmail down”, you’ll get plenty of suggestions such as “is gmail better than yahoo”. New questions pop up every time you type something. It’s estimated that the percentage of SERPs with PAA has grown to 40% for desktop and mobile alike. So, make the most of Google’s People Also Ask.
It’s up to you to identify important search patterns and create on-page FAQs. Have a helpful section on your site that brings in steady traffic. Gather relevant PAA results, group them in sections, and answer the questions on your dedicated FAQ page. This can help you appear at the top of the search engine results. Internet users commonly interact with the People Also Ask box because it’s convenient. More often than not, those interactions result in clicking on the source. Understand what questions are popular and optimize for them.
Leverage aspects of mobile SEO
Not that long ago, Google announced that it will use mobile versions of content for indexing and ranking. The deadline is set for March 2021, so you’ve got enough time to make your site mobile-friendly. Take as much time as you need to understand the issues with your website. Is the page content engaging? Does your site lack cross-platform compatibility? Is the structure of the mobile site too complicated? In an age when mobile devices are everywhere, it makes perfect sense to have a mobile-friendly site.
All SEO will be mobile in 2021, so you can be sure that major search engines like Google will ignore your desktop site. Even if your platform is well-optimized for search engines, you should make an extra effort. To be more exact, reduce redirects, don’t block CSS, JavaScript, or images, and optimize titles and meta descriptions. Your mobile site doesn’t have to be perfect, but it needs to be dynamic and serve visitors’ needs. Don’t worry if the mobile and desktop experiences are a little bit different. Just make sure the user experience is a positive one. That’s all that matters.
