The passing of each year brings new search engine algorithm updates and other changes to SEO, and 2019 is no exception to this. This always begs the question, near the beginning of each year, of what aspects of SEO you should concentrate on in order to maximize your results. When it comes to staying above your competitors on search engine results pages (SERPs) and maximizing your impression to people viewing those SERPs, the following pointers should be helpful.
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- Focus on What Actually Appears on SERPs. This could be called on-SERP SEO and is also known as no-click searches. Anytime you type a search into Google, you don’t just get a list of links comprised of a few words. You’ll see a link, and then you’ll see a short blurb mentioning information about the link related to what the person searching typed into the search engine. Sometimes this little blurb on the SERP actually answers the searcher’s question, so they don’t bother clicking on the link to go to your site. Depending on what you’re searching for, Google will even appropriate content from websites and put it at the top of the SERP so searchers don’t even need to scroll down to see your listing. This doesn’t help you since you’re trying to get people to click through to your website where you’ll sell them on your product or service. To counter this trend, you need to increase the amount of real estate your listing gets on SERPs and make them more compelling. If you’re advertising a physical store, you might try using Google My Business and manage your locations along with ensuring the consistency of your NAP information. You also want to target answer boxes and making video content can only help. If you have a local business, using Google Posts is another good idea.
- Keep Writing Quality Content That Helps Your Customers. This is not exactly new advice, but it’s more critical than ever today. You should emphasize the creation of content that answers questions and solves problems that potential customers may have. Perhaps they won’t click through to your site on this particular search because your content on the SERP may answer their question. That being said, they may see your website linked at the bottom of the answer they were looking for, and this will increase your authority and credibility in your field and the chances that they will go to your site at some point if they need more information.
- Make Sure Your Site Is Technically Sound. Even with the best content, you may still be deprived of the top spot on a SERP featuring your best performing keyword if your website is not as technically optimized as possible. This means making sure your webpages load quickly, ensuring mobile-friendly pages, handling any Javascript rendering issues and making sure your site is easy for Google to crawl. You should invest in a tool, such as Screaming Frog or DeepCrawl, that examines your site for errors regularly and then stay on top of fixing them.
webpages load quickly - Voice Search Is Overrated for Now. Voice search has been all the rage recently, but it has one big problem. Let’s say you’re the marketing manager for your company. There are analytics tools that will show you the return on investment (ROI) that you’re getting from just about any type of marketing efforts you undertake. The problem is that there’s no such reporting yet on the effectiveness of voice search optimization. When your higher-ups ask you about the ROI on your voice search marketing spend, “I don’t know” is probably not an answer they want to hear.
Professional SEO
Staying on top of search results pages under those keywords that bring your business high-quality traffic can be extremely challenging. If you’re not large enough to have a dedicated staff for this purpose, you’re going to need some professional help.
At Planet 8 Digital, we know how to get your company above your competition under those competitive keywords. We can do this for you locally, nationally or internationally depending on your needs and goals. If you want to maximize your online presence, you should contact us at your earliest opportunity. We also handle web design, paid search marketing, social media promotion and other digital marketing services.
