The techniques of SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, are always evolving. The constant flow of search engine updates can be overwhelming even for mature Marketing teams and online content editors who struggle to keep up with the latest ways to attract consumers to their organization website. But with organic traffic making up as much as 75% of a website’s total traffic, implementing and updating an SEO strategy is now more important than ever.
Key takeaways
With several updates per year to Google’s search algorithm, it is vital for businesses to continuously monitor these changes and adapt their SEO strategies accordingly.
AI integration, voice search, and user intent optimization are leading the changes in SEO. These advancements may require substantial adjustments in how brands approach their SEO efforts.
Expertise, high-quality content, and thorough keyword research are likely to remain crucial components of effective SEO strategies for years to come.
What is SEO and why it matters?
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the practice of optimizing a website to improve its visibility and ranking on search engine results pages (SERPs). This involves a combination of on-page elements, such as keyword-rich content, meta tags, and high-quality images, as well as off-page factors like backlinks and social media engagement. The goal of SEO is to make a website more attractive to search engines, thereby increasing organic (non-paid) traffic from users searching for relevant terms.
“Organic traffic makes up 75% of a website’s total traffic”
SEO matters because it directly impacts the amount of traffic a website receives, which in turn influences brand visibility, customer engagement, and ultimately sales. High-ranking websites are more likely to be clicked on by users, making SEO a critical component of any digital marketing strategy. By ensuring that a website is easily discoverable and providing valuable content that meets user intent, businesses can attract more qualified leads, enhance their online presence, and achieve long-term growth.
To learn more, find about what SEO is, how it differs from off-page SEO and the vital-few SEO related mistakes organizations tend to make when implement such strategies.
What has been going on at Google behind the scenes
Google dominates the search engine market, handling over 90% of all search queries worldwide. With billions of searches conducted daily, Google's search algorithm plays a crucial role in determining which websites are visible to users.
Consequently, understanding and adapting to Google's algorithm updates is essential for businesses and website owners to maintain and improve their search rankings, drive traffic, and increase conversions.
These are just some recent major Google Algorithm Updates, reflecting patterns in how Google continues to refine search results to enhance user experience by emphasizing quality, originality, and user-centric content.
Expertise and curbing AI written content. Released in March, 2024, this update focused on improving the overall quality and relevance of search results by refining multiple core systems simultaneously. It targeted outdated, error-filled content and emphasized Google's E-E-A-T principles (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness). Websites with low-quality, repetitive, or AI-generated content saw significant ranking declines.
Prioritizing customer reviews. Another major update was Google’s efforts to prioritize reviews of services, businesses, and other content types beyond just products. This update aimed to prioritize in-depth, user-centric reviews across all review-related content.
Highlighting quality created for humans. In 2023, Google issued another major update targeting low-quality content created primarily for search engines rather than for users. It affected sites with superficial content lacking originality and depth. The update emphasized content that offers real value and insights to users, aiming to demote unhelpful content from search results.
Banning spam. Designed to clean up various types of spam, Google issued another major update targeting sites engaging in cloaking, hacked content, auto-generated spam, and scraped content aiming to improve the quality and reliability of search results.
User experience metrics. Going further back, this update introduced Core Web Vitals as ranking signals. Core Web Vitals include metrics for loading performance (Largest Contentful Paint), interactivity (First Input Delay), and visual stability (Cumulative Layout Shift). This update aimed to prioritize sites that offer a better overall user experience by focusing on these key metrics.
These updates reflect Google's continuous efforts to enhance user experience by promoting high-quality, relevant, and original content while demoting spammy, low-quality, and untrustworthy content.
Top SEO trends right now
Today, 64% of marketers worldwide invest at least part of their time to better understand the SEO world. With so many recipes and fast-tracks to SEO success available, this is no small feat. Keeping up with SEO best practices and aligning content strategies with Google's evolving standards will help sustain and improve search rankings, driving traffic and boosting conversions.
1. Semantic SEO
Search engines are becoming better at understanding the context and intent behind search queries. Optimizing content semantically, rather than just focusing on keywords, will become increasingly important.
The 4 types of user intent
This means focusing on natural language that accurately reflects the intent behind user queries. Think about how people speak and the questions they ask when searching for information online. By aligning your content with natural language patterns (user intent), you'll improve its relevance and visibility in search results.
“Focus on natural language that accurately reflects user intent, rather than keywords”
Also, consider the context in which your target keywords are used and create content that provides comprehensive answers to users' queries. By doing so, you'll increase the likelihood of your content ranking for related searches.
Optimizing the SEO of a business with semantically similar keywords and phrases is one of the trends companies should learn soon.
What to do:
Write with people in mind, and not to search engines
Develop content that answers the questions of the target market
Implement external contextual links on the website
Introduce structured data (e.g. products, questions, articles, ratings) that help search engines find the company's websites and understand what it is about.
2. Zero Click Search Results
Zero click search results refer to the content that appear at the top of the SERP, without the user having to make more clicks to find what they are looking for. This type of search is becoming popular, along with organic clicks to non-google sites, representing already 65% of Google searches searches last year.
This is an SEO trend that is growing mainly on mobile and voice search, as it corresponds to short and practical searches about a service or product. There are three types of Zero Click Search Results:
Feature snippets are selected results that provide the most relevant answers to the term searched by a user. This can appear in form of a paragraph, list, charts and videos.
Instant answers are simple tools that provide the answer to the searched term. Simple examples are calculators with a mathematical result, weather diagrams or automatic word definitions.
Knowledge graphs show additional information about the keyword searched, coming as box text on the right side of the SERP.
What to do:
Structure your content to directly answer common user questions with concise, clear res onses using bullet points, lists, and headers. This increases your chances of being selected as a featured snippet, enhancing visibility and authority in search results.
Ensure your business information on Google My Business is accurate and complete. Encourage customer reviews and engage with them to improve local rankings.
Use schema markup to provide detailed information about your content to search engines, focusing on products, reviews, and FAQs.
3. Interactive content
the importance of click-through rates (CTR) and the time spent on each page of a website is growing. To adapt, producing consistent, useful, and well-organized content with good keywords and semantic expressions is crucial.
This approach helps search engines understand your content better and match it to user queries more effectively.
What to do:
Improve your website's user experience by ensuring fast loading times, mobile-friendliness, and intuitive navigation. Use engaging visuals and interactive elements to keep users on your page longer.
Use clear headings, bullet points, short paragraphs, and simple language to make your content easily readable and scannable.
Add relevant images, videos, infographics, and interactive elements to your content to make it more engaging and informative.
4. Voice Search
Voice search already accounts for half of all searches. To optimize a company's content for voice search, identify the specific keywords and longer semantic expressions that the target audience uses in everyday conversations.
Voice searches as share of all searches
Voice search optimization should focus on more natural, conversational language rather than the more formal style typically used in typed searches. This means using phrases and question-based keywords that reflect how people speak.
What to do:
Identify and incorporate keywords and phrases that your target market uses in everyday conversations. Focus on long-tail keywords and natural language queries.
Structure content to answer common questions directly and succinctly. Use headings and subheadings formatted as questions that users are likely to ask via voice search.
Develop comprehensive FAQ pages that address common queries related to your products or services. Ensure the answers are clear, concise, and written in a conversational tone.
5. AI-Driven SEO
Artificial intelligence is increasingly integrated into SEO tools and strategies. Already 40% of SEO professionals are turning to AI for support in updating their content.
So, expect AI to play a more significant role in keyword research, content optimization, and user experience analysis – analysing data, spotting trends, and making recommendations to boost your website's visibility and traffic.
However, it is important not to over-rely on AI, as Google penalizes content that appears to be heavily automated or lacks a human touch. Over-reliance on AI can lead to content that lacks originality and depth, which can negatively impact your site's ranking.
What to do:
Use AI tools to gather insights and make recommendations but ensure that final content creation and optimization are reviewed and refined by human experts to maintain quality and authenticity.
Regularly audit AI-generated content to ensure it aligns with Google's quality guidelines and provides genuine value to users. Adjust and improve content based on feedback and performance metrics.
Monitor updates to Google’s algorithms and guidelines regarding AI usage in SEO to ensure compliance and avoid potential penalties.
6. Video SEO
Video content can increase your organic traffic by 157%, boost your conversion rate by 80%, and improve your brand recall by 95%. No wonder that optimizing videos for search engines has become crucial for businesses looking to stand out.
This includes optimizing video titles, descriptions, and tags, as well as improving video engagement metrics like watch time and retention rate. This helps search engines understand what your video is about and match it with relevant searches.
What to do:
Make sure your video is engaging from start to finish - the longer people watch, the better it looks in the eyes of search engines.
Fill out all the relevant fields, including the video's title, description, and tags. Be descriptive and accurate, but also think about what will catch the eye of potential viewers as they scroll through search results.
7. E-A-T and Content Quality
Google's E-A-T (Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness) guidelines are likely to continue influencing search rankings. Although is not technically a ranking factor, it is used by search engines like Google to evaluate the quality and relevance of content.
What to do:
Showcase your expertise through thought leadership pieces, case studies, and in-depth analyses.
Share your credentials, certifications, and professional affiliations to build credibility and trust with your audience.
Become the go-to source for reliable information in your niche. Consistently produce high-quality content that adds value to your audience's lives.
Back up your claims with data, statistics, and references from reputable sources.
Cultivate a strong online presence by guest blogging, participating in industry forums, and engaging with influencers in your field.
8. Mobile-First Indexing
More than half of the internet's traffic comes from mobile devices. In fact, over half of users stumble upon something new while searching on their mobile phones. And Google is keeping up with this trend, since it moved towards a mobile-first index, prioritizing the mobile version of websites for indexing and ranking. Websites that aren't optimized for mobile may see their rankings suffer.
But there’s more than just making it responsive. It is also imperative that the website is optimized by minimizing HTTP requests, compressing images, leveraging browser caching, and reducing server response times. Mobile users are notoriously impatient, so every second counts when it comes to page load times.
Also, monitor your website's performance in Google's Search Console, paying particular attention to the Mobile Usability report. This will alert you to any issues Google encounters when crawling and indexing your mobile site, allowing you to address them promptly.
What to do:
Compress images, leverage browser caching, and reduce server response times to ensure fast loading times for mobile users.
Regularly monitor the Mobile Usability report in Google's Search Console to identify and resolve any issues that may affect your site's mobile performance.
Implement a responsive design that adapts seamlessly to different screen sizes and devices to provide an optimal user experience across all mobile devices.
Stay on top of SEO trends
Staying on top of SEO trends is crucial for maintaining and improving your website's visibility and traffic. As SEO continues to evolve with advances in AI, the rise of mobile-first indexing, and the increasing importance of voice search, it is essential to adapt your strategies accordingly. By balancing AI with human input, optimizing for mobile performance, and regularly monitoring your site's performance, you can ensure that your content remains relevant and competitive.
At Articulate, we specialize in helping businesses navigate the ever-changing landscape of SEO. Our team of experts stays up-to-date with the latest trends and best practices, providing tailored solutions to optimize your website for search engines. Whether it's enhancing your mobile usability, integrating AI strategically, or optimizing your content for voice search, we have the expertise to boost your website's visibility, drive more traffic, and achieve your SEO goals.