SerpLogic Discuss The State of SEO in 2020

There are over 200 factors that Google takes into account when looking to rank a website – so it’s often hard to know which ones matter more.

2020 has been a wild ride so far for SEOs according to Tommy McDonald from SerpLogic. Google algorithm updates and other changes have made for a tumultuous landscape. However, SerpLogic is always ahead of the game and their testing and analysis have shown that these are the factors that are working in 2020.

 1. Voice Search: People Will Use Voice Search More

“Google, can you help me find a taco place near me?”

In 2017 alone, 33 million voice search queries were recorded. In March 2019, the data shows that voice searches were 20% of mobile searches.

Voice search allows people to use their spoken voice commands to type search queries, so voice search is becoming more popular.

Remember people type very specific and long-tail search queries. Why? They want the correct answer to the question they are asking.

It is easy to convert users searching long-tail keywords because they are in the consideration stage, but it is hard to convert users in the awareness stage.

To rank for voice queries, use bullet lists, and optimize your website for local SEO because most voice queries are local.

2. Featured Snippets Will Continue Dominating Search Results

What is a featured snippet? It is the summary of the answer to a search question. It is displayed on top of Google’s SERP results, above organic and paid ads.

Featured Snippets have been around for a couple of years and they have led to big changes in the search results of Google. Users get the answer they are searching for from the SERPs, so around half of all searches lead to no clicks. Ahref studied 2 million featured snippets and the study revealed that featured snippets receive more traffic than the first page on top of the search results.

Target question-based keywords and queries. To get more related questions, check the questions from the “people also ask” section. This will also help you write a more in-depth answer.

Resources

Analytics Ever-Changing GoalPosts – SEO Challenges and How to Overcome Them

SEO SEO for Website Redesign and Migration

Analytics How to Do Online Competitor Analysis

Development Improving SEO & Developer Relationships

 3. Many Marketers Leverage Influencers for SEO

Around 17% of business owners will spend more than half of their marketing budgets on influencers. Statistics show that businesses can benefit from influencer marketing, especially the businesses in lifestyle, travel, eCommerce, beauty, and fashion.

Ads overwhelm online users. They want authentic and trustworthy information. In most cases, reviews from influencers are the source of that information. So, it is easy for them to trust information from their favorite influencer than from an ad.

What is the relationship between SEO and influencer marketing? You can amplify your content reach, increase your online visibility, and generate traffic by working with an influencer.

Most businesses fail to plan and execute their sponsored content properly, so they do not see a return on investment using influencer marketing. If your marketing does not align with your audience’s needs, then your marketing will fail.

How do you increase your return on investment? You work with the influences in your niche, especially the ones who have a good relationship with your target audience. You will get backlinks from influencers. These backlinks enhance your SEO efforts because they show your authority to Google.

4. BERT Will Remain

Since RankBrain in 2014, BERT is the first main change Google has made to its search algorithm. BERT allows users to train their question answering system. BERT is Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers.

BERT impacts one in every ten questions. SEO marketers can increase their chances of ranking for the featured snippets in Google’s search engine results by applying BERT models.

If the prepositions, such as “for” and “to”, matter to the meaning of the search questions, then BERT will have a big impact on these conversational questions.

To clarify this, it is not possible to optimize for BERT. To better understand the natural language, Google uses BERT.

Intent matching is important when creating successful content, so optimize for the intent behind search questions.

Analyze the pages on the first page of Google’s search results for your specific search query before writing your copy. Is the result navigational, transactional, or informational? Create content matching the user’s intent that is based on the analysis you did.

5. People Want Digital Experiences

Many companies want to improve customer experience, so 44% of companies have already shifted to a digital-first approach. 56% said their revenue has grown since they made the improvements.

Another important ranking factor is page load speed. If the web page has a complex user interface or takes a long time to load, then great content means nothing.

Successful businesses focus on improving the customer experience because they understand the importance of building a long-term relationship with their customers. Also, improving customer experience can help with search ranking because the users will spend more time on the website due to the good user experience.

Your user experience should help customers find the information they are looking for. And allow your users to proceed to the next step easily.

Wearing the shoes of your visitors can help you provide the best user experience because you will know the cause of poor experiences. Use simple words because many people do not understand complex words. Lack of clarity in your message can negatively affect the SEO of your site because it increases your bounce rate. Speak to the experts at SerpLogic and ensure that your visitors have an enjoyable experience on your site.

6. Video Will Become the King of Content

Videos should be an important part of digital marketing efforts and SEO strategy because Google loves video. Forrester Research shows that a video is 50 times more likely to appear on top of the search results than a web page with just plain text. Also, video is included in the 62% of Google universal searches.

You can support your existing content on your website by creating helpful YouTube videos. Even though videos are not guaranteed to rank on the first page of Google, you will still get traffic once Google indexes your video.

You can get more traffic by embedding videos on your website. Do not forget to optimize the video for the width of your blog. To help Google under the content of your video content, add a copy on the page.

7. The Length of Content Determines Search Rankings

To beat your competitors to page 1 ranking, create highly-quality content. It is also important to consider the quantity of content.

There are so many opinions on the perfect length of a blog post. Research shows web pages with high-quality, long-form content appear on top of the search results and the average length of the top 10 search results is around 2,000 words.

However, the content needs to answer the user’s search query comprehensively and it should also answer the queries related to the main search query.

Long articles increase dwell time, which shows Google that your website visitors love your content. Increasing dwell time can help you build authority, so Google will rank your website for the search question.

Addison

Addison is a student of the Aust Abbottabad University of Science and Technology. He started his graduation in 2016 and graduated in 2020. I’m a professional article and blog writer, has written dozens of content on different topics and worked with professionals all over the globe. Feel free to contact me for any assistance. [email protected]