By Search engine optimization (SEO) is the game-changer in internet marketing. The business that understands the rules better and plays by them dominates the Google search engine results pages (SERPS).
Small business owners who have no financial power for paid advertising use SEO to compete with the big brands in the search for quality leads.
However, the SEO rules and strategies are never the same over a long period. They are constantly evolving.
Today your business might be at the top of the SERPs, and tomorrow you won’t even see it on the first page. But why is that so? Why exactly should you pay attention to SEO trends and insights?
What current trends can you leverage to push your brand into the limelight? This article discusses current SEO trends and insights and how you can use them to generate an endless flow of customers in 2023.
Why Should You Pay Attention to SEO Trends?
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The competition among businesses has taken on a new dimension since the introduction of SEO. SEO tools are used by many businesses on a tight marketing budget to achieve record-breaking sales milestones. And this is because it has the power to yield millions of leads at a minimal cost.
Businesses like Amazon (through the use of user-generated content) and Overstock (through the advanced application of structured data) have used great SEO strategies to win online search battles and emerge as key competitors in their industries. From creating high-quality content to constantly improving their Core Web Vitals, these businesses, including Yoast SEO founded by Joost de Valk use all available strategies to remain at the top or displace those at the top of the SERPs.
It is, however, good to know that search engine algorithms are constantly changing. This means your business can come from 10 pages behind to displace the business at the top slot on the first page.
Similarly, your business can be knocked off the top spot for a keyword you’re dominating comfortably if you fail to stay true to trends in SEO. This is why it’s important to pay attention to SEO trends that emerge in response to algorithm changes.
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With the recent Google algorithm core update, learning the latest SEO trends will ensure your business goes into 2023 as a dominant force in your industry. Let’s look at some of these trends and how you can leverage them for business growth.
7 SEO Trends and Insights for Marketers
These are the top 7 SEO trends and insights you need to be aware of as you prepare your marketing strategies for 2023:
1. Mobile-First Indexing
According to official Google reports, more than 60 percent of online searches are done through mobile phones. And the number is expected to increase by a great margin in 2023. As a result of this, Google has adopted mobile-first indexing as a key ranking factor. What this means is that Google will index your website based on its mobile version optimizations.
How can this SEO trend help your marketing plans in 2023? A well-mobile-optimized website will make website navigation easy for your customers, thereby prolonging how long they stay on your site. This reduces your bounce rate and makes Google’s algorithm see your website as being user-friendly. A user-friendly website will definitely rank higher than those that are not.
To leverage this trend, test your website’s core vitals and improve them, make your site responsive on mobile devices, and improve your site’s load speed. Another great SEO prediction for 2023 marketers need to know is the rapid increase in voice search.
2. Voice Search
The rising use of smart speakers like Google Assistant has made optimizing for voice search an important SEO trend. This trend is leveraging the fact that people love to multitask, and merely asking a question and getting the answer from the web instantly is preferable to typing the question on a device.
This is one of the most important SEO trends that can propel your business growth in the coming years. Imagine what happens when someone asks for a product and his smart speaker mentions your product, its specifications, and the purchasing options. That’s the power optimizing for voice search can have on your business.
To optimize for voice search, ensure you target long-tail keywords, that is, keywords in the form of questions. And ensure to provide direct answers to the questions immediately. In fact, your first sentence after the question should be the shortest yet most complete answer to the question.
A typical example is this:
Can SEO make me a millionaire? The answer is yes. However, how much you are able to make as an SEO expert depends on your skillset, ability to scale, and your target audience.
Do you see how I answered that question perfectly in the most simple manner? That’s a good way to rank for voice search.
3. Image Search
Just like voice search, image search is among the top SEO trends you should leverage in 2023. Image search is a new trend where searchers use images instead of keywords to get information.
This trend will yield great traffic to your website and, most importantly, bring sales to you, especially if you use creative, unique images on your website.
Why do customers use image search? Consumers use image searches to fact-check the authenticity of the product they want to purchase.
Taking advantage of this trend would require you to use images that stand out from the others in your content. Downloading images online for your marketing plans won’t do you any good in this case.
Furthermore, you need to ensure you properly caption and describe your images. This goes on to make the context of your content clearer and make it even more useful to your target audience. The importance of image optimization can’t be overemphasized.
4. Link Building
Link building is still one of the most important ranking factors for search engines. But, just like every other SEO feature, it has evolved greatly over the years.
Before now, websites were judged by the number of backlinks they have. Now, the quality of the backlinks they have is all that matters for ranking. Quality in the sense that, if you receive a link from a high authority website that’s unrelated to your site, it’d cause more harm to your site than good.
Getting backlinks from high-authority websites in your niche would greatly boost your site domain authority (DA) and ranking on search engines. It conveys a certain level of trust and makes Google’s algorithm see the value you share in your content. This makes it easier to display your website to more people who are searching for the keywords you are ranking for.
To leverage this evergreen SEO trend, you need to create a solid link-building strategy. This strategy will help you master how to get thousands of legit backlinks from both .gov, .edu and .com extensions. To do this, start by sharing content that people would find really valuable.
Search for the questions people are asking in your niche and provide extensive, valuable answers to them. This makes your content link-worthy, and when you reach out to authority blogs in your niche, they can only be grateful that you reached out.
5. User-Focused Content
Content is still the undeniable king in SEO. In fact, that is the bone of contention. Every individual, marketer, and business that’s pushing to rank on the SERPs is doing so to have more people consume their content. You can take a few minutes to learn more about how SEO and content marketing work hand-in-hand in growing a business.
The impact of user-focused content on your business can’t be overemphasized. User-focused content seeks to extensively answer the questions users are asking. It seeks to provide an immediate solution to their problems and make them grateful for stumbling on it. A valuable user-focused content strategy draws customers to your business like honey draws bees.
In producing content for your business, focus greatly on user intent. There are basically four types of search intents: informational, navigational, commercial, and transactional.
Instead of writing or recording to rank on SERPS and get customers, pursue it from the angle of understanding why your audience is searching for what they’re searching for. Put yourself in their shoes and produce content that meets their expectations.
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6. Featured Snippets
Featured snippets are new and rapidly gaining dominance in search engine optimization. In fact, it’s one of the top trends that’s expected to help marketers greatly in 2023. But, what exactly are “featured snippets”? They’re short texts that appear at the top of SERPS in a bid to provide quick answers to users’ queries.
In 2023, featured snippets will help marketers sell their products by providing direct answers to users’ questions about their products. Users don’t need to click on content to get the answers they need now. Once they search for a particular keyword, content that’s well-optimized, featured snippets will provide them instant answers. This builds trust with searchers and eventually wins them over as customers.
How do you rank for featured snippets? To rank for featured snippets, you have to produce well-written content and focus on producing direct answers to long-tail keywords. Your direct answers can come in the form of a table, a sentence, or a listicle.
7. Artificial Intelligence
The last on this list of the top seven SEO trends for 2023 is artificial intelligence. The use of artificial intelligence has made Google’s algorithms smarter and more productive in indexing. The algorithms are using artificial intelligence to better understand user language and intent.
As a marketer, artificial intelligence can help you produce better content and optimize your website for SEO. We are not saying you should use AI to write the article. That could get you penalized. There are artificial intelligence tools for keyword research and content optimization that will give you much-needed guidance in SEO.
To leverage this trend, use AI tools for in-depth SERPS analytics and use the results to make your content and services better.
Are You Ready to Leverage SEO Trends in 2023?
The impact of the internet on business operations in modern times is massive. From anywhere in the world, you can reach people all over the world and get them to not just know about your services but also patronize you. This is made possible through paid and organic marketing strategies. One of the most effective organic marketing methods available to marketers is SEO.
To stay ahead of your competitors, you need to be up to date with the latest SEO trends and also know how to leverage them effectively. Hopefully, you’ve learned from this article the latest SEO trends you need to dominate your industry in 2023.
