Although the core principles of SEO remain the same from year to year, algorithm updates and search trends evolve and influence the way we execute optimizing SEO across our website.
So as search engines advance this year, what does it mean for your strategy? Below are the top 5 SEO trends to pay attention to in 2022 to keep your traffic and keyword rankings trending upward.
Follow New Algorithms Created By Search Engines
Search engines update their algorithms yearly, and if you don’t keep up with them regularly your search rankings could be affected. This year, Google changed its character count from 160 characters for a description tag to 156 characters. Each year you should plan on reviewing the new algorithm updates across popular search engines (i.e. Google, Yahoo, Bing) to make sure you’re still following the most popular search engine’s latest guidelines.
Use Google Search Console to Index Your Page for Google
Google Search Console is a free service that helps you monitor your website traffic, optimize your rankings, and make informed decisions about the appearance of your site’s search results. You can even expedite the process of having your site indexed on Google. Proper website indexing allows search engines to see all of your important pages on your website and gives your site a major boost.
Mobile-Friendliness is Critical for Search Engine Rankings
Ensuring that your website performs well for mobile devices is something that you must continue to take care of in 2022. Some examples of mobile friendly design changes include installing a mobile menu and compressing your images and CSS. Remember, simplicity is the key to user-friendly web design. You also need to personalize your website content according to the needs of your users.
Shift to more long-form content
In order to ensure that you captivate and engage readers who visit your website, you will need to shift to a long-form content strategy. Long-form content of 3,000 words or more has been shown to get more traffic and more shares than short-form content. Blog pages and similar content-focused pages are perfect candidates for long-form content pages. Shifting your focus to creating quality long-form content can then greatly improve your search rankings. However, in order for long-form content to be successful, it must be able to keep readers engaged.
Keyword clustering
Keyword research is the foundation of SEO. But as Google’s natural language processing (NLP) technology has gotten more advanced, effective keyword targeting has become a more complex process. Keyword clustering is a more advanced keyword strategy to level up your total keyword rankings. It involves identifying multiple keywords with similar search intent and creating web pages that target those “clusters.” Let’s market a UX agency for example… instead of just using keywords for “UX agency,” try “2022 UX web development agency.” The keywords “2022” and “web development” add specificity to the keywords. Keyword clustering is a more effective way to increase the total keywords your web pages rank for and establish your website as an authority in key topic areas.
SEO continues to play a critical role in how your content is ranked. However, it is continually evolving and growing more complex. Keeping up with current trends will require you to do more than pack your content with keywords; you need to be deliberate and create quality content that will rank well in Google’s algorithms. If staying up-to-date with the latest SEO trends feels overwhelming, feel free to contact us for advice on how you can best optimize your content for SEO.