According to Moz, there have been as many as 83 major search algorithm updates since 2011. That's almost 2-3 updates every month. As we have entered into the new year we'd like to take this opportunity to look back at what changed in SEO in these last 12 months.
This was a year of substantial change and even confusion at times, but SEOs have always relied on their acute vision through the fog with a bit of help from data measurement and statistics. As we move forward into a new online environment, it’s important to note that this coming year will most likely be a continuation of the trends of 2014, not a revolutionary change in a completely new direction.
Be Mobile Friendly
Catch the nerve of the users by leveraging upon what users’ access the most –mobile phones! Yes, optimize your mobile strategy with immediate effect. In case you do not have a mobile accessible website, then first and foremost, make a mobile friendly website in 2015. This is so because it has become the need of the hour to focus on a responsive designed website. Moreover, it is anticipated from the trends that the traffic generated through mobile devices will surpass that of laptops and desktop.
In October 2014, Google Webmaster Tools released “mobile usability reports” so that webmasters and SEOs could measure and evaluate how friendly each of their webpages actually were. This seemed to be a heavy hint that pages that scored higher on mobile usability would rank above those pages that had less than friendly experiences for mobile users. Then, in November 2014 Google integrated “mobile friendly” labels into its search results, putting more value on mobile experience than ever before. With Google’s removal of authorship photos and reduced video snippets, mobile UI (user interface) is beginning to heavily influence the overall search UI. The time for focusing your time and energy on mobile experience is now!
Contents and Key Words
Keywords remain one of the most critical parts of an SEO strategy. It is important for the content in the body section of your page is represented by keywords that not only reflect your title tag but position your keywords at the front of your title tag. It is also a good idea to repeat your title tag by repeating the keyword again in the first 100 words of body text, and definitely use it in your H1 tag. Also, the keyword should, as a rule, appear in your page’s URL, but make your URL short and direct.
Always use hyphens instead of underscores in the way you form your permalink. Google AdWords has now eliminated “exact match”, requiring all campaigns to use “close variants”. This will make it easier for someone to find what they’re looking for before they even know exactly what that is. Google wants SEOs to put less focus on matching keyword strings and more focus on answering questions the users ask in conversational search. With voice search on the rise, customers are adopting more of a conversational approach to search, rather than the traditional search of typing in keywords. SEOs will need to adapt to this new web environment in order to have our websites visible on Google for the world to see.
Add Videos In Your Posts
Videos should be a must have in your 2015 SEO strategy. The second largest search engine in the world –YouTube as well as Google are strong mediums through videos are accessible to the users. Moreover, videos have a huge impact on how to get connected with the targeted set of audience and make it more interactive. Furthermore, videos are easily sharable on several social media channels. So, videos clubbed with good content will surely fetch good amount of traffic on your website. So, include as many videos as you can.
Social Media Integration
Google’s search algorithms are moving ever closer toward legitimate artificial intelligence. Does this mean the robot apocalypse is upon us? Hardly! But it does mean that human signals will begin to play a more pivotal role in the future of SEO efforts. A strong social media presence and strategy that entices users to find and share your content can go a long way toward enriching your sights SEO. Most importantly, stay updated on social media platforms viz. Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+, Twitter, the list is endless. It is important to keep your customers updated about the latest happenings as it helps to generate more leads as well. A healthy social media presence is essential. Moreover, they offer free ways to build connection with your connections who in turn will trail back to your website and ultimately generate more traffic.
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