Top 7 SEO trends of 2021

We are currently living in a digital world where everything has moved to the online platform. From buying pen to finding life partner, everything is being done digitally and that’s why, as a business, owner, it has become paramount to strengthen your digital presence. It doesn’t matter whether you are selling anything online or not, you will have to be present on the digital platform as people are going to search for your product online first before finally buying from you.

Well, there are many things that you will need to do in order to strengthen your digital presence but all the things that you will do will be based around SEO. On the online platform, SEO acts as a backbone for each and every business as it allows firms to become visible and pop up at the top of the search result as well. But the world of SEO keeps on evolving and that’s why you need to keep updating your SEO practices. What you used in your SEO strategy a couple of years ago might not be feasible in the current scenario. The changes in the search engine algorithm along with the modification in the user behavior and practices, all these things have an effect on SEO.

So, in this blog post, we are going to look at the top 7 SEO trends of 2020 so that you can improve your SEO practices for this year.

Google’s SERP gets richer

With modern marvels like AR, 3d images and Cameos on Google becoming a part of the search, everyone is expecting that the SERP will surely become an ideal multimedia hub. You should know that every new element of this media-rich SERP will be one specific ranking algorithm and the core algorithm will bring together these rankings into one holistic overview. This will have a big effect on SEO and that’s why you will need to keep an eye on Google’s SERP getting richer. In addition to using structured data, you will also have to keep on innovating with high-quality content.

Featured snippets

A featured snippet is basically a summary of an answer to a particular type of search query. When you type ‘Top 5 smartphones of 2020’, you get a box with the exact answer to questions and you don’t have to visit any website for it but you can if you want a more detailed answer. This box is known as featured snippets and it is going to play a key role in your SEO strategy. Featured snippets are having a big impact on Google Search results, website traffic, and website ranking. You will be surprised to know that almost half of all the searches result in no clicks before the user gets their answer from SERP. And according to a study, it has been found that features snippets generate more traffic than organic search results.

If your content will be optimized for general queries then you will get featured in the snippet and your website will come on the top of the search result. This is why, in order to take advantage of the featured snippets, you will have to optimize your content for general queries.

BERT

The Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers or BERT allow people to train their own questioning answering system and this is one of the major changes introduced by Google in its algorithm after the introduction of RankBrain in 2014. You should know that the BERT will affect one out of ten queries and all those businesses that will apply the BERT model will maximize their chances of coming on the top of the search results. It is expected that BERT will have an impact on controversial queries common prepositions like ‘to’ and ‘for will dominate the search query. But you will also need to optimize your content on an intent basis as it is going to play a major role.

Voice Search

The number of people using mobile phones for accessing the internet is increasing very rapidly. You will be dumbfounded to know that by the end of 2025, more than 72.6 percent of internet users will be accessing the internet through their mobile phones. This means that you will have to optimize your website and you will also have to optimize your content for voice searches. Without voice searches, your SEO strategy will never be able to work effectively, and even after dedicating time and effort, you will not get expected results from your efforts.

You should know that voice searches are increasing day by day because when it comes to smartphones then people prefer voice search rather than typing everything. In the year 2017, there were more than 33 million voice searches and you can imagine the increase in number during the last two years. This is why you will have to shift your focus on long-tail keywords as voice searches are based around long-tail keywords. So keep tabs on long-tail keywords and increase in voice search in order to stay relevant with your SEO strategy.

Videos

Video-based content will keep on growing in 2020 as well and YouTube, despite being the second most famous search engine after Google, will continue to act as your digital TV. The current internet users prefer to get their queries resolved through online videos (6 out of 10 people prefer YouTube over TV) and that’s why you will have to optimize your SEO strategy around video-based content as it has become one of the most effective and popular forms of contents on the digital platform.

You must have witnessed the growth of YouTube and how Facebook has slowly started including more and more videos in their content as well. Using videos the right can do wonders to your SEO strategy In pure SEO language, video is a fantastic channel and it doesn’t matter whether you use YouTube or your own video platform, getting your videos in Google search results will be strategic for your SEO strategy.

Content length

There is no denial in the fact that high-quality content is the way to go for businesses looking forward to improving their ranking in the search result but you should know that in 2020, the length of your content is also going to play a major role. The debate over the ideal length of content will keep going on and we might never agree on a common point but you should know that the average length of the top 10 contents is at least 2,000 words.

But this doesn’t mean that in the rush of making your content lengthy, you will start including anything in your content. You will need to find the proper balance between length and quality if you want to rank up in the organic search. But you should never limit your content, especially onsite blog content to only 500 or 700 words. Keeping it between 1000 words to 2000 words will be much better.

Mobile search

Taking mobile into consideration while designing your content strategy is not a new thing but this trend will continue to grow in 2020 as well and this is why we have included it in our top 7 SEO trends of 2020. You should know that 87% of internet users are on mobile phones and more than 40% of transactions happen on mobile phones. And the movement of Google to mobile-first Index in mid-2019 will influence the mobile-based SEO in a much deeper way.

If you will not include the mobile platform in your SEO strategy then you will never be able to get expected results from your efforts. And you can begin your journey of taking advantage of the mobile-first index by first optimizing your official business website for mobile platforms. If you have already optimized your strategy for voice searches, then you will have to do the same with voice search as well. Instead of just focusing on long-tail keywords, you will have to include technical SEO as well.

SEO is surely the soul of your digital presence and without a good SEO strategy, you will never be able to get expected results from your online presence. The main motive of digital presence is to be easily discoverable and reach more customers and both these objectives can be fulfilled by an excellent SEO strategy. This is why, instead of just focusing on building a good looking site with an attractive, theme, you will need to take care of your SEO strategy as well. If you don’t have much idea about SEO then hiring an SEO firm will be a better option.

If you will keep tabs on the current SEO trends then you will be able to maintain or improve your ranking on the digital platform. Every year brings along some new SEO strategies and in this blog post, we have tried to cover all those SEO trends that will rule the year 2020. Use these SEO trends in your SEO strategy and get expected results from your efforts.