Top SEO Trends to Watch in 2018

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  Posted by Adam Smith February 7, 2018 - Filed in Web Development / Web Management - #gillsolutions  - 2,968 views
  

  Search Engine Optimization forms the core of any competent digital marketing campaign. A good SEO campaign will not only enable you to improve your visibility on the internet but will also help you expand your sales. The primary aim of SEO services is to drive more and more visitors to a website, influencing them to convert into customers. SEO campaigns are usually shaped by the browsers’ search patterns and what Google shows to them. Today, the internet is booming with digital marketing companies that offer competent SEO Services. SEO constitutes a number of components which include website designing technology, PHP and HTML management, domain management, SEO Copywriting, link building and backlink analysis, Keyword research, social media promotion and much more.

   

  A website’s ranking in the top pages around an effective keyword can attract a large volume of traffic to a website. The ranking of a website is determined by several on-page and off-page factors. This article will walk you through the top SEO trends in 2018 that will help you flesh out your digital marketing campaigns. [Information Credit: https://www.gillsolutions.com/]

   

  • Improved SEO Features:

  With more than 200 factors in Google’s algorithm, SEO has become a complex domain. What makes it exceedingly challenging is its volatile nature; it’s always in a flux and the rules are constantly changing. With more and more search engines striving to improve the quality of search results, the ranking factors are rapidly changing, while some are falling into oblivion, others are making a comeback with improved features. If you think organic ranking alone can fetch you traffic, then it’s time to clear the misconception. Discernibly, SERP features, such as local packs, knowledge panels, and featured snippets are drawing viewers’ attention. With the introduction of SERP features, companies can track their ranking, monitor features that are depleting your traffic.

   

  • Structured Data:

  Structured data is a method of formatting HTML that prompts search engines to interpret content appropriately. Although Google did not confirm that structured data is a ranking signal, it actually improves your search listings in different ways. For instance, rich snippets can increase your listings’ CTR by a huge margin.

   

  There are multiple structured data formats available that can be integrated into the SEO campaigns. Most internet companies go with Schema.org for its convenient features. After the mark-up is successfully established, you can track the rich snippets with rank tracking tools.

   

  • Voice Search:

  Statistically speaking, voice search accounts for one out of five mobile search queries. According to the Google survey, almost 55 percent of teenagers and 40 percent of adults use voice search on a daily basis. Voice search requires a completely new keyword search routine, as voice searchers often use colloquial phrases instead of any odd lingo. As the popularity of voice search continues to grow, we are likely to witness a boost in featured snippets, from where Google draws its voice search. Going by the study published by Stone Temple, featured snippets account for 30 percent of the queries that were tested.

   

  • Video Search:

  With the surge of social media channels, our online interactions are rapidly becoming more visual. Factors like faster internet speed, image-friendly social media platforms, enhanced engagement with images and videos have revolutionized much of our online interactions. Quite naturally, the parameters on which search engines assess image and video content will also change. Under such circumstances, image search and video search are likely to gain more recognition in the coming days.

   

  • Artificial Intelligence:

  Almost two years ago, we were introduced to Google’s machine learning AI system called RankBrain which enables us to process search results. While it was managing only 15 percent of search queries earlier, today it caters to almost all the search queries. Following the popularity of RankBrain, Google launched the Cloud Vision API which can recognize a variety of objects. Evidently, AI is not entirely free of limitations. Often AIs have a tendency to confuse correlation with causation whereby they tend to make connections between contradictory things. Most developers just develop the machine-learning algorithm, so they don’t know how the algorithm operates. This is why they find it difficult to predict how it will behave differently from the traditional programs.

   

  • Mobile-first Index:

  Today, almost half of Google searches come from mobile devices, so the mobile-first index is a huge ranking factor in 2018. Mobile-first indexing has become the talking point in SEO and Google is likely to rank pages on the basis of the mobile version of the page. As the trends signal a massive shift to mobile, mobile indexing is likely to play a big role in the evaluation of a website’s relevance to users. It’s undeniably one of the major algorithmic changes in the history of Google that can affect ranking in a big way. Most SEOs are adopting accelerated mobile pages these days to optimize the user-experience, from page load time and navigation to website design.

   

  • Linkless References:

  As revealed by Bing, unlinked brand mentions will influence ranking considerably. With AIs playing a big role in ranking, it is not absurd to expect such mentions playing a huge role in search rankings. The techniques that are employed to earn brand mentions are quite similar to the techniques used to earn links. As the people who mention brands are larger than the people who link to them, such mentions can boost the smaller brands.

   

  Keyword placement and backlinks don’t always yield success in SEO. With Google frequently updating its features, it has become easier to draw information about us. With the introduction of these developments, search results have become highly accurate and personalized. Today, SEO methods go far beyond just keywords and backlinks. In fact, metadata optimization and content optimization, which were a hot topic in 2017, have taken a back seat this year. Google has undergone a sea of change since it was first introduced in the 1990s. To thrive in the highly competitive market, marketers are relying on new strategies for efficient results. Gone are the days when SEO campaigns were synonymous with keywords and backlinks. Today, SEO efforts constitute a variety of things, intent optimization, mobile-index tracking, voice search, AIs to featured snippets, and much more.