Top SEO Trends in 2018

How effective were your SEO strategies and initiatives? 

Were they better or worse than expected? 

Still struggling to improve rankings for your website pages in Google and other popular search engines?

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Search engines are becoming more intelligent. Google is now answering more and more search questions directly on the search results pages, and the number of voice-activated searches is increasing. Website operators are concerned that they may have to drastically change their optimization strategies. So that you know what to watch out for when optimizing your website this year. While 2017 has brought about the dominance of Google AMP (accelerated mobile pages), the rise of HTTPS, the importance of backlinks, the precaution of the overuse of 301 redirects and representing of rich snippets to accommodate the increasing popularity of voice search, some of these trends will continue into 2018 and some will fall away. Do you wish to stay in the race and make your mark in the search rankings, have a look at the SEO trends 2018 anticipated by industry experts?

HTTPS:

These days, a Maximum number of the Domains that are positioning high in prominent Keywords and high volume keywords have https locales. In low volume catchphrases, there is a low level of destinations with https. This implies having https will give you leverage over your rivals and even Google has prescribed this before.

AMP

AMP is meant for fast-tracking content to mobile devices and improves the traditional way of surfing the internet on mobiles. As most marketers aim to provide mobile users with an app-like experience, AMP is a big help.

AMP is also useful for SEO. As Google states, mobile-friendliness is one of the major determiners of ranking.  

Rich Snippet Will Need Careful Structuring 

There are rich snippets and regular snippets. Both include a clickable title, a URL, and a meta description. Rich snippets have more condensed titles that include “|” instead of a dash (-), reviews and an image. How you structure the data, however, is important in how search engines will display the information.While the difference may seem insignificant, it has been shown that search results with properly formatted rich snippets receive more clicks and have a higher click-through rate, which in turn increases potential sales.If you’re not sure what properly structured rich snippet structure looks like, you can check out Schema.org which features a step-by-step data structure guide.

Structured Data Will Become More Important

With the Advancement of the SERPs, Google is using more and more structured data, meaning that the search engine can create meaningful meta-descriptions from existing content. Google also uses structured data to generate rich snippets. Since there is now less space in the SERPs for organic search results due to the factors mentioned above, you should definitely make sure your meta descriptions stand out.Rich snippets can be used to significantly increase the CTR for your website – some sources speak of an increase of up to 30 percent. Google needs to use structured data in order to display rich snippets.

Google can use the structured data in the snippets in different ways, for example in the form of:

• Rating stars 
• Calories 
• Opening times 
• Event details

Voice search and digital assistants 

Voice search technology presents a big opportunity for changing the way we communicate and process information. The rise of digital assistants has presented a growing market that can change the way search queries are performed. According to Google, 1 out of 5 searches already come from voice queries.This changes the search market and we’re expecting to see an even bigger shift towards voice search in 2018. When it comes to setting up an SEO strategy, the increase of voice search brings out the need to focus on more long-tail search keywords and a natural language that matches the user’s conversational tone.

As accuracy improves in digital assistants, there will be more people using voice search from their mobile devices, seeking for quick and relevant answers. It becomes important to inspect the voice user intent will provide more accurate results, helping the algorithms provide the best answer.

Building Valuable Backlinks

In 2018, building valuable backlinks will still a critical factor for ranking in the SERPS. This is one of the major ways that Google knows that a website can be trusted. Quality should be used over quantity when backlinks are created. It’s better to have one link from a highly trusted website than it is to have multiple links from directories. Another important factor to consider is backlinks that come from unassociated sites. Some competitors will create poor links from un-trusted sites and send them to their competitors. They do this in hopes of deal with their competitors and dropping their rank. A good search engine optimization specialist understands how to disavow these type of links so that a website does not have rankings dropped.

Mobile Optimization

Smartphone use has skyrocketed in the past few years. This has increased the use of mobile search at the same rate. Traffic that used to flow to desktop computers is now starting to flow to mobile devices. In fact, since 2015, mobile searches on Google’s SERPs have been higher than searches from desktop computers. This makes mobile optimization the Best priority for SEO 2018. Google already announced that they are experimenting with mobile-first indexing, which shows that it’s one of the most important SEO trends that they are serious about prioritizing. While Google still supports the desktop point of view for its search index, it’s probably a good time to start optimizing for mobile too.

If a website has not already been changed to look great on a mobile device, it’s time to start. Google is recommending that a site should have a responsive template or theme. Mobile friendly websites are able to be easily seen on mobile phones, tablets or desktops. E-commerce platform should also be updated so that products or services can be easily scrolled through.

User Experience Will Have a Bigger Influence on Rankings

Anyone who speaks of “search engine optimization” today is anachronistic. Ultimately, we don’t optimize for search engines, but for the users of search engines and websites. For this reason, the user experience plays an increasingly important role.

Content is Still King

Even though Google’s algorithms are constantly improving, Google still needs textual content to determine the relevance of web pages to a search query. Google has improved enormously in recent years regarding the analysis of textual content, using the latest technology with Rank Brain to better understand the content.This increase in quality will continue in 2018 because the system will learn increasingly on its own. Your goal should, therefore, be to continue offering the best content on your topic on the internet. 

By paying attention to these top SEO trends and implementing specific strategies, it will ensure that a website is fully optimized and ready to receive targeted customers.

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