SEO Trends To Boost Your Rankings in 2021 – Part 2

  1. Zero-click searches

Eventually, Google makes changes in the SERPs’ design and layout to provide faster and more effective consumer experiences.

Recently, the platform started to focus on zero-click searches, i.e., the results that appear on the very top of the first results page.

Now, Zero-Click is more present than ever: more than 50% of Google searches end without the user clicking on anything.

Such content should be able to directly answer the questions inserted by users in the search bar.

This way, the audience can find exactly what they are looking for in the SERP itself without clicking any further. This type of activity was introduced in March 2020, and the tendency is that it does not stop growing.

If you are already an expert in Digital Marketing, you can notice this resource’s similarity with the already famous featured snippets.

It is not by chance. The mechanism works similarly, with the difference that Google can now identify individual passages on a webpage to surface relevant content in the search results.

As a Digital Marketer, you must optimize your content in order to make this new feature easier to operate. Use structured-data to facilitate the algorithm’s understanding, improve your organic CTAs, and focus your efforts on answering possible buyer persona’s questions.

 

  1. Website security

It’s nothing new that Google considers your website’s security status when analyzing its relevance and, of course, its ranking.

So if you want your SEO strategy to be successful, it is important to add security features such as specialized plugins and SSL certificates.

In 2021, in front of an audience increasingly aware of the threats present in non-secure Internet environments, the trend is that website security becomes even more important.

After all, if people do not feel safe when accessing your pages, your access rate will drop, as well as your ranking in the SERPS.

  1. Search Intent

User-focused optimization has been a top priority at Google for a long time. The goal is to always deliver content that meets the user’s intentions.

For this, Google has launched Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers, the BERT algorithm.

This technology aims to optimize the understanding of what search terms represent in a particular context.

In other words, the algorithm makes it possible for Google to interpret the intention of a specific search, even if it includes long conversational language.

In this way, it becomes even more important to produce content that directly matches users’ intentions, always using natural language.

With the introduction of the BERT algorithm, Google is improving its effectiveness in delivering the most appropriate content, which increases the demand for quality.

 

  1. Long-form content

Expertise, Authority, and Trust. These are the words that form the acronym E.A.T, which is becoming more relevant in the world of Content Marketing.

The idea is to assure users that the content they are consuming is offered by someone real, who has the credibility to talk about it.

One of the most important things to do is invest in the production of long-form content to adapt to this new system.

The State of Content Report brings data that confirm the relevance of longer content.

According to the study, long reads of 3000+ words get 3 times more traffic, 4 times more shares, and 3.5 times more backlinks than average length articles (901-1200 words).

This contributes to the expansion of your brand’s organic reach and to the development of your digital authority, resulting in better SERPS rankings.

 

  1. Local SEO

The Covid-19 pandemic was the major event of 2020. In addition to the consequences that the period of social isolation caused in health and social security, consumers also had their habits changed. During the pandemic period, there was a greater appreciation of local commerce.

This occurred due to several factors. First, the economic crisis led local populations to focus on supporting the local market to keep the economy functioning.

Similarly, transportation limitations led more people to search for establishments near their homes.

This is where Local Seo comes in. This resource has existed for some time and has Google My Business as one of its main tools.

However, the specificities of the year 2020 made it even more relevant. It was from GMB, for example, that local businesses were able to keep their customers up to date with changes in schedules, special deals, delivery options, etc.

In 2021, if you don’t actively use Google My Business, you will simply fall behind the competition.

Appearing in the local SEO ranking means establishing a positive link with the neighborhood and also attracting customers who are just visiting or passing through the city.

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