As a website owner, you might wonder if SEO is still relevant in 2021 or 2022. If you’re investing your time and resources on SEO and worried if it’s going to help, here’s some good news. SEO isn’t going anywhere and in the coming time, it will only get more sophisticated.
However, the SEO tactics that were relevant a few years back may become useless because of the ever-changing Google algorithms. Over the years, the focus of SEO has shifted from keyword stuffing to user intent. As search engines become more advanced, it becomes even harder to rank in the Google SERPs.
To stay on the top of the game, you need to stay up-to-date with all the recent developments in the world of digital marketing. The SEO industry is unpredictable and the continuous changes in the Google algorithm can render your months-long SEO efforts useless.
So, to avoid wasting your time and efforts, make sure to keep updating your SEO plan to ensure that you’re following all the latest trends.
Female Hand Clicking Seo Key Word On Virtual Panel With Seo-Optimization Tools On Blue Background. Web Content, Search Engine Optimization Concept. Collage, Cropped
Search engine optimization (SEO) is one of the most important components of digital marketing. This online marketing technique focuses on increasing visibility and organic search engine result pages (SERPs) ranking.
As 2021 is about to end, some SEO tactics continue to dominate the digital marketing industry but some SEO trends come and go.
You must be familiar with some SEO methods such as optimizing metadata and creating quality content using relevant keywords. These are the proven methods that aren’t going to change. But what about other new tactics that should be included in your SEO plan?
Top SEO Trends of 2021
All SEO experts are obsessed with the latest SEO trends to ensure that they are moving in the right direction. If you don’t keep up with the changing algorithms and updates such as Maverick and BERT updates, all your efforts will go in vain.
With that in mind, let’s check out the major SEO trends that dominated the digital marketing industry in 2021 and will likely continue in 2022.
- Core Web Vitals
SEO is increasingly becoming user-focused. In 2020, Google announced introducing Core Web Vitals as a prominent ranking factor. This year, Core Web Vitals become a crucial part of the SEO that includes performance metrics to ensure a smooth user experience. It measures the health of the web pages and stresses the importance of optimizing websites to achieve quick loading times and easy mobile navigation.
The metrics included in core web vitals are Content Loading Speed, Visual Stability, and And Interactivity. It means that factors such as how long it takes to load a page, interaction time, and how stable a website is. With the introduction of Core Web Vitals, the focus is shifted on the factors such as page speed, mobile-friendliness, image optimization, and more. A website optimized for these factors will rank higher on the SERPs.
- Local Search
Local SEO is not a new factor but lately, it has gained prominence in SEO. This type of SEO tactic is particularly helpful for small businesses, franchises, and local brick-and-mortar stores. Local SEO includes adding area-specific keywords and using online business directories to rank in the Google local search results. To rank in the Google “local pack”, you need to create a Google My Business account.
Keep updating your Google My Business page and create content with location-specific keywords. Doing this will help you get more visibility and reach your local customers. Your business directory page should have information such as location, products/services offered, and operation hours, business type, social media accounts, customer reviews, website link, and more.
- BERT to MUM Algorithm
In 2019, Google introduced BERT (Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers) algorithm that allows the search engine to understand the relationship between words and the intent behind a search query. This algorithm was used by Google to serve voice assistants users. Now, this approach is taken further and during the Google I/O 2021 conference, a new model known as Multitask United Model (MUM) was introduced. The Head of Search at Google Prabhakar Raghavan said: “Google’s new Natural Language Processing Model is “1,000 times more powerful (than BERT) and can multitask to unlock information in new ways.”
This new model is designed to analyze images, text, and videos from 75 languages and can even understand the user’s feelings and context to answer complex queries. It means that soon you would be able to take a picture of your shoes and ask Google if you can wear the shoes for hiking. To take advantage of this update, webmasters will need to utilize structured data and long-form content.
- Passage Indexing
Another latest algorithm introduced by Google is called Passage Indexing. If you’re engaged in writing long-form content, Passage Indexing can immensely benefit your web pages. This new algorithm focuses on using the natural language for indexing web pages.
So, even if a relevant piece of information is buried inside a long article, the algorithm can find a particular section and show it in the search results for relevant search queries. For instance, if a user wants to know that the windows in his/her house have UV glass or not, finding the exact information can be tricky. But Passage Indexing algorithm can identify a particular passage in a long article that tells how a flame reflection can be used to identify a UV glass.
