When it comes to promoting yourself online, lots of companies are looking for the next big “growth hack,” often with the expectation that it will provide quick results. Marketing trends continuously change, and search engine optimization (SEO) is no exception. Recently, some have claimed that SEO is unnecessary in the modern search engine, with some going so far as to say that SEO is dead.
Granted, SEO has always had its critics. To those who don’t understand it or don’t believe in its potential, SEO is often portrayed negatively as an attempt to game the system. The reality is that it takes hard work to generate great online content, and having that content recognized requires effort. That’s what SEO is meant to do — help individuals searching for a service to discover the best one possible.
Not every digital marketing technique will stand the test of time, but a mindset of avoiding what you don’t understand can be dangerous and detrimental to your business. Don’t ax SEO from your marketing strategy.
While SEO isn’t a perfect fit for every business, it can be a reliable way to improve your customer leads and conversions, if you’re willing to put in the work it requires (or pay someone to do so). Like any major campaign, it should be approached with caution; using outdated SEO tactics can wreak havoc on your website’s ranking, which is why understanding how SEO works has never been more relevant.
Here’s what you should know about SEO in today’s realm of digital marketing, and how you can make the most of it:
SEO Is More Relevant Than Ever
SEO isn’t resistant to change. What works to improve search placement today could become a ranking penalty in the future. Skeptics usually point out SEO’s fluctuating nature to assert their point about SEO becoming useless. But it’s important to consider this fluctuation with a bit of context.
How and where each website appears in the list of search results is controlled by a series of algorithms that Google does not share with the public. These algorithms undergo small updates each week (possibly more) and major updates several times each year. Search engines now see a record amount of user activity, with billions of searches made each day. Google uses over 200 ranking factors to determine which results to serve up first, and there are over 1.5 billion websites on the internet. In such a dynamic and changeable environment, it’s silly to think that any website can achieve and maintain search dominance without conscious effort.
SEO is arguably more important than it was in the past. The idea that a good product or service will speak for itself doesn’t hold water when the competition is downright massive. With so many people relying on search engines to discover businesses before visiting them, it’s crucial that your business appears in these searches and has a noticeable presence.
If you’re still skeptical, remember that a growing number of users now perform their searches using digital voice assistants, which bring up the first result rather than the first page. Abandon SEO, and your business may quickly sink into search engine obscurity.
Using SEO To Its Fullest
Given how essential SEO is now, knowing how to use it to its fullest is crucial. Critics of SEO usually point to how quickly searches have changed in recent years. Paid promotions and “local packs” have become the norm, leading some to believe that any attempt to keep up with the constantly shifting field of SEO is futile.
However, ongoing significant change is the very thing that makes SEO a staple of any successful online presence. The belief that SEO is useless often originates from marketers or business owners who set up SEO and then forget about it. Neglect is never a suitable method of promotion, and if it’s what you’ve been doing, you’re missing out.
Instead, be prepared to invest some time into cultivating an SEO stronghold. Many of the most important ranking factors, such as trust and authority, take time to build, and anyone who promises overnight results is selling you snake oil. Your SEO strategy should also be flexible enough to reflect current search trends and popular keywords. SEO isn’t meant to be static; if something isn’t working, find a different way.
Keep Up To Date On Recent Developments
As SEO methodology changes, you don’t have to reconstruct your current strategy over and over. It just requires a bit of occasional tweaking.
For instance, experts suggest that voice searches will substantially increase in the next few years due to the rising popularity of voice assistants. More voice searches mean that SEO will need to adapt to different phrases and keyword searches to better fit user behavior. This has led some SEO professionals to begin focusing on long-tail keywords, those that feature more than three words. For example, a consumer searching for pizza might type, “Chicago pizza restaurants,” while someone performing a vocal search will speak a more natural-sounding phrase, often a question such as, “Where can I get pizza in Chicago?”
Older content is still helpful for text-based searches, which haven’t become obsolete just yet. When adding new content, keep these new strands of words in mind, and work to incorporate them naturally. Try reading your webpages or blogs out loud to test what a searcher using a voice assistant might experience if they visit your site.
SEO Needs Some Time And Attention
It’s fair to suggest that SEO isn’t infallible; it needs attention and a significant investment of time to work as intended. If left to its own devices, your SEO won’t do the job you expect. Luckily, maintenance is pretty straightforward and can easily be outsourced, as long as you put some research into choosing the right SEO service provider.
In the end, SEO is what you make of it. Don’t let your SEO gather cobwebs; it’s here to stay. Keep it in mind as you continue to develop your business’s online presence.
