Organic traffic is important for every website as it draws 51% of all website traffic and 40% revenue. That’s why marketing teams constantly and diligently work to generate more search traffic.
But the speed at which SEO techniques are evolving is on a constant incline. Plus Google is also way more smarter than it was before, not only at analysing and understanding web pages, not only that it is also smart at keeping people within its framework effectively.
There are a lot of things that have changed in the world of digital marketing- and there’s a lot of SEO tips and techniques out there but that doesn’t change the fundamentals! For example, targeting keywords for a sole purpose of improving organic ranking no longer works but choosing the right keywords is still an important part of the SEO strategy.
How SEO Changed in 2021
The Internet is no longer a luxury, it has become a necessity in the modern era. We’ve reached an era where the Internet is an essential communication tool, and online advertising alone is valued at more than $400 billion/Year!
Plus, the global pandemic has completely disrupted the scene, accelerating this trend and pushed more companies online. This pandemic changed a lot of our systems, but it also bought out new possibilities. If we look at the SEO industry, we can notice that the online world has taken a leap. As people moved indoors, business turned online. Many people shopped online for the first time in their life and will likely keep doing that. There’s never been a better time to build an online business.
SEO has changed a lot from the previous years, most of it is due to the constant changes in search engine policies and algorithms. Take a look at a few things that have changed the SEO.
#1 Say Goodbye to The Good Old Days of Keyword Stuffing
In the early SEO scene, webmasters often used their website pages with keywords with an intent to rank higher in the SERP. The most common method was to use the black-hat technique of hiding the text within invisible text or inside the website’s code. But with the changes in the algorithm and with the advancement of the search engine, Google eventually caught on to this. Since then, Google rewards and prioritizes the website that deploys proper and natural placement of keywords in the content.
#2 It’s All About Quality, Not Quantity
With that change in utilizing the keywords, came a change in how content is written. We can say that previous SEO was not advanced enough when we compare it with modern SEO, it focused on quantity not quality. That churrend out numerous, poorly written, keywords stuffed, duplicate content, Non-essential pages on the website.
For a period of time, websites that used this technique to rank enjoyed the leverage of ranking higher for multiple keywords, despite having the low-quality, poorly written content.
But as a Google user you always want to find a website that is most relevant and therefore it is in Google’s best interest to ensure that it is directing their users to quality content on reputable sites.
But now the scenario has changed and Google prioritizes well written, informative and user-friendly content. Now it is a must for SEOs to focus on writing high-quality content that naturally includes keywords and illuminate readers.
#3 Mobile is a Priority
Now more people are browsing on their phones than ever before and from the last couple of years more and more websites are optimizing to accommodate the change in how users search. Additionally, mobile-first indexing makes it even more crucial that the website is optimized for mobile devices as Google uses the mobile version of a website for indexing and ranking.
#4 Focus on Local
Customers are constantly searching for the best products and services near them Now a lot of local business owners know the potential of SEO to attract new customers and increase revenue as 46% of all searches in Google have “local intent” and 76% of consumers that search for something local on their phone visit a store that day.
By wrapping the focus on local search, local companies and local businesses have additional opportunities of reaching their target audience. Opportunities for keyword optimization also comes along with the rise in local search as this allows SEOs to optimize the website content for location-specific keywords and easily reach the targeted market.
#5 The end of link building schemes
Previously many SEOs used to participate in link building schemes to rank the website by getting numerous fake links from various sources. Just like every other black-hat practice this practice too was caught by Google and now Google penalizes, bans, or de-lists websites that take part in these link schemes.
Now it’s all about using natural link building techniques. Some most common link building tactics include guest posts or gaining backlinks from relevant and authoritative websites.
Most Actionable Tips to Increase the Organic Traffic in 2021
Making sure that when people look for a product or service like yours, they find you and not a competitor and proves to be a challenge!
There’s plenty of things that you can do to increase organic traffic in 2021, as it is not about mindless search engine optimisation (SEO) and costly pay-per-click advertising.
Ranking high is not easy at all and the ever-changing scenario of SEO makes it even tougher and with so many SEO tips and techniques available, it’s become almost impossible to determine which ones to choose and which you should stay clear of. Just like many others, if you too are struggling to get started with SEO or looking to build on an existing campaign, go through this list of SEO tips that we’ve compiled based on our experience from the past few years.
Tip #1 Find Your Competitors’ Best Performing Pages
No matter if you are offline or online but for any marketing campaign, analyzing your competitors is crucial. Competitive analysis is something that we suggest every website owner to do, but still, many are either not doing it all, or are doing it unsystematically. A comprehensive competitive analysis can help you decide a strategy about what you need to do to improve your site to be as good as your competitors.
Not just that, it also helps you to identify the strengths and weaknesses of your site and as well as your competitors’ sites. This surely helps you to discover the areas you are weak in and areas that you can improve, as well as identifying the areas where your competitors are weak, and then exploit their weaknesses for your site and search performance.
Tip #2 Improve User Experience Across Your Entire Site
User experience or UX is one of the most important parts of any SEO strategy. User experience directly affects your SEO rankings through user engagement metrics. To improve SEO rankings, increase brand credibility, and better audience retention one should take time to improve the websites UX design.
Tip #3 Optimize for Voice Search
Voice search is the fastest growing form of search as 55% of teens and 41% of adults were already using voice search. With the growing use of personal assistants such as Siri, Cortana, Alexa and Ok Google, voice search is most popular in the world of the internet.
As a digital marketer while implementing an SEO strategy it is time you include voice search in order to take the advantage of the increasing number of people who are using these tools for web search. Remember searchers are hungry for fast answers and voice search allows website owners to provide fast answers that users need. This terms in increasing the user experience which is one of the most important factors that Google emphasizes today for website ranking.
Tip #4 Design for Mobile First
The internet is changing rapidly allowing users to access the internet in a number of ways that couldn’t have even been imagined 10 years ago. Google widely uses the mobile version of the content for indexing and ranking. Mobile websites are important for businesses that want to acquire more customers, increase sales and stay ahead of the curve.
Tip #5 Focus on Topic Clusters Instead of Keywords
For a few years now topic clusters have been a popular trend in blogging and SEO. When done properly, it can prove to be a catalyst that can launch your website to the top of the SERP. Topic cluster is one of the most powerful SEO weapons in gaining industry authority, as well as rankings.
Tip #6 Rank for Featured Snippets
The first thing that most people see when searching for a word or phrase is a featured snippet. Featured snippets also become more and more popular each year because they give answers to the questions in a way that’s convenient, quick, and easy to read.
Featured snippets are on the rise. That means that pages with featured snippets are dictating search queries. Earning a featured snippet means that you rank for position zero, the highest-ranking spot possible without any advertising.
Tip #7 Create Comprehensive, Authoritative, Evergreen Content
Many publishers Underestimate the necessity of publishing evergreen content which is infact a very important factor of failure for many publishers. Comprehensive, Authoritative, Evergreen Content will eventually rank in Google and potentially generate traffic for years.
Comprehensive, Authoritative, Evergreen Content helps you build E-A-T which stands for expertise, authority, and trustworthiness. These three factors are important as they play a huge role in Google rankings.
Tip #8 Use Long-tail keywords
Long-tail keywords are easier to rank when compared with more common keywords, that is because fewer websites compete for high rankings in the result pages of Google. The longer your search terms, the easier it is to rank for the term.
Another benefit of focusing on long-tail keywords is that the visitors are more likely to buy your service or product that finds your website using them.
Tip #9 Measure SEO Performance
For SEO success, client retention, and perceived value, it is important to measure the impact of your work and ongoing refinement. And when something goes wrong It allows you to pivot your priorities.
Remember SEO is all about constant improvement and improvement is only possible when something can be measured.
#10 Use Digital PR IN Your SEO Strategy
PR has changed massively over the years. With the expansion of digital PR, this allows to spread the news further and faster to the targeted audience, allowing you to maximise news like never before.
When it comes to digital PR and SEO, these services go together like burger and fries! Along with digital PR, Content marketing, SEO, and social media can work together, to bolster organic rankings, boost brand awareness and increase traffic.
#11 Target Local Searches with Local Landing Pages and Listings
Any business that is located or offers services in more than one area, local landing and listing are must have for them. Local landing pages help you to show up for local searches, no matter how many locations you have.
Conclusion
I hope you’ve found these SEO tips helpful! Remember there isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution to increasing organic traffic. Experimenting with the above mentioned tips and tactics will help you find the perfect mix that nourishes growth and stable traffic
SEO is rapidly evolving but, if you follow the tips above, you’ll be able to achieve higher rankings and more traffic and remember in the changing scenarios business owners and marketers have to adapt the changes ASAP! but it’s still possible to give your website the edge on your competition.
Author Bio
Kshitij is a digital marketer and owner of a Dintellects Solutions. With more than 10 years of experience in the digital marketing industry, he loves blogging on seo & digital marketing and shares his ideas, views on how to market a business.