How your business can get the most out of SEO in 2018
The top link on a Google page gets around 32% of all organic traffic from Google. Your likelihood of receiving visitors goes down dramatically with every step down the first page you go. In fact, it decreases so much that if you are at the bottom of the page, you’re likely to only get about 1.5% of all search traffic.
As SEO is so important in getting people to your website, you should know how it works and also what you need to do in 2018 to improve your SEO. This will make sure you appear at the top of the ranking page!
How SEO works in 2018
RankBrain was only announced last year, but Google says it’s now going to be the third most important factor in where links appear on Google searches.
Another key factor that Google considers in 2018 is your backlink profile. Your profile is the links from other websites that go from and, most importantly, point to your website and web pages.
Keywords are still highly important for SEO in 2018 but, with updates to Google’s algorithm and the introduction of RankBrain, keywords have to be used intelligently within content and must be relevant.
The design of a page is also highly important – specifically that a site is mobile friendly. If your site doesn’t adapt to different screen sizes, Google’s algorithm will punish it.
– RankBrain
– Backlink Profiles
– Content and Keywords
– Design
– Mobile Friendliness
How to get the most out of SEO in 2018
- Keyword Research
- Content
- Design
- Links and Relationships
- HTTPS
I’ve included some more information on actions you can take for each of these points below.
1. Keyword Research
Keyword research is a long-standing practice for SEO and it is still relevant in 2018. Today, however, instead of finding keywords to include in your articles – you find keywords to base your articles around.
To help you find the right keywords I find it useful to use online resources like Keyword Tool. This is particularly useful for searching your businesses’ key terms and then finding the words that will be most relevant but currently underserved. AdWords is also useful, but Google is making it much harder to access their Keyword Planner.
Once you have decided on your main keywords, it’s also a good idea to find some secondary keywords and use these in your text. This makes sure that what you produce ends up ranking on as many SERPs as possible.
- Use a resource like Keyword Tool to find relevant search terms for your business
- Use these keywords intelligently in your content
- Consider secondary keywords to increase your chances of ranking on Google
2. Create Meaningful Content
Content is absolutely key in 2018. It fulfils the criteria required by basic SEO such as providing headings, links, keywords and character lists and also influences the new machine learning aspects of SEO like RankBrain.
One of the key things that recognised by this machine learning technology is how people interact with content. If what’s on your page is interesting then visitors will stay around for longer, interact with the page and stay on your site.
Google’s algorithm now also recognises the quality and readability of writing by analysing your sentence length, use of conjunctions and whether you break up text with bullet points.
With every piece of written content you put online, make sure to fulfil these five criteria:
- The content is relevant to my visitors
- The content is up to date
- The content is well structured
- The content is well written
- The content contains key terms that my visitors will be searching for
3. Design
Like content, web design is now increasingly important as internet users have come to expect good design as standard. This doesn’t necessarily mean exciting colours or animations – it means web design that compliments what’s on the page and provides a pleasant experience for the reader.
Bad or confusing web design can lead to people leaving your website quickly. This raises your bounce rate – a factor recognised by Google in ranking you on their pages.
Good design means people are more likely to stay on your website for longer.
Mobile friendliness is now also a must, and Google can recognise sites that haven’t been created with different devices in mind. Make sure your site is mobile friendly and consider upgrading if not.
- Make sure your website has functional design
- Make sure your website has modern design
- Make sure your website is mobile friendly
4. Links and Relationships
Links to (and from) your website are viewed as highly positive by Google. Generally, the more important the site linking to your website, the more credit this gives your SEO. Also, the views provided by the flow of traffic from these links are important.
In 2018, building relationships with business and media partners to share links is essential and it’s a practice that’s often overlooked. Sharing articles with links on partner sites, having a mutually-beneficial link to each other’s site and making sure all your press releases have a link are all good ways of building this profile.
- Share links with business partners
- Share links with media partners
5. HTTPS
Having HTTPS instead of HTTP before your site is an essential part of optimising your SEO in 2018. Google has been ranking secure HTTPS sites more highly since 2014 and this has now become the standard for all sites.
HTTPS provides a padlock symbol to highlight the security of your website in the browser and, in Chrome, non-HTTPS sites now carry a warning. As this is a symbol of trustworthiness, having HTTPS on your site can also lower your bounce rate and thus make your site seem more appealing to RankBrain.
Getting HTTPS can carry a fee, depending on your hosting provider, but many providers now supply a free SSL certificate through their own service or Let’s Encrypt.
- Get an SSL Certificate and enable HTTPS for your website
Conclusion
I would highly recommend putting these five SEO practices into place as soon as possible. This will ensure that you’re making the most of your website’s potential for organic traffic. There are also ways to make sure you appear on a local search – which I’ll discuss in a later article!
Here at Pict, we’d love to have a look at your website and have a chat about your SEO. We can discuss where you are now and what the best strategy for enhancing your site would be.
We offer services that can assist with all of the above but can also give you suggestions on how to do any of this yourself. We hope to hear from you soon!