Grow Your Online Visibility this Year
Since the pandemic, the world has changed a lot.
The old ways of doing business are on their way out and we're in a state of transition where so much of business is now done online.
Employees are working from home much more, the work/life balance has shifted.
Because of the increased focus on remote work, more people than ever are online searching for products and services.
The time to capitalize on search demand has never been higher.
Improving your Google rankings in 2022 requires some adjustments in strategy this year.
As SEO levels the playing field for businesses small and large, it also comes with changes and challenges.
Google’s algorithms change and techniques that once worked well, become obsolete.
You need to be up-to-date and aware of these changes, to avoid incurring penalties that could hurt your rankings and visibility.
There are many different aspects to SEO and the sheer amount of options and information available can be overwhelming.
To help make sense of all these different aspects, we’ve included a detailed SEO infographic from our friends at SEO Tribunal.
This infographic breaks down all the main strategies, components and statistics of SEO into a very-large and clear picture.
Interesting SEO Facts
- 67 thousand searches are performed on Google every second
- 39% of all global e-commerce traffic comes from search engines
- 93% of all online interactions begin at a search engine
- 80% of users ignore paid ads in the search results
- 50% of all searches will be voice searches by 2020
- 58% of searches come from mobile devices
- 97% of page one results have at least one image on the page
- 46% of all Google searches are local
Who Controls the Search Market?
In the western world, Google is the dominant player in search.
Check out these stats:
- Mobile searches - 94.26% on Google
- Desktop searches - 89.63% on Google
- Google also owns YouTube, the world's largest video hosting platform.
- Organic search rankings (rankings held by pages via SEO and not paid placement) aren’t the only areas dominated by Google.
- Google also holds the lion’s share of the pay-per-click (PPC) ads market, accounting for a massive $32.4 billion worth of ads!
So How Do I Improve My Rankings?
Searcher Intent - The Key to Satisfying Customers and Search Engines
- Creating content for searches your target audience is performing is key.
- Google is in the business of providing the best results possible to it’s audience. Your website should do the same.
- It's important to understand how different keywords carry different intent.
- Are the searches informational? Is the searcher looking for answers to a question?
- Are the searches transactional? Is your searcher looking to buy?
- The correct content will keep your audience on your page and result in a positive user experience.
- The wrong content will make them bounce immediately and be time wasted clicking on your link.
Educational, Informative Content is Better than the Hard Sell
We all do a ton of research online today before we make any decisions. Think about how many times a day you pop questions into Google looking for answers.
You want your site to be available to potential customers asking questions related to your industry. Create videos, blog posts, infographics, podcasts and other content to help solve problems.
Building trust online with your audience is done the same way you would do offline. You wouldn’t walk up to a stranger on the street and yell “buy my stuff!” would you?
You shouldn’t be doing this on your website and social media channels either.
By delivering value first, through education, free resources and help, you build up trust, authority and good will in your market. Once you’ve helped and done a lot for your market, only then should you ask for the sale.
Build your relationships online, the same as you do offline for business and it will turn your online marketing around.
Focus on Quality Search Terms Over Quantity
A lot of people make the mistake of being greedy. They want to eat the entire cookie instead of being happy picking up some crumbs from a bunch of cookies.
Don’t let sheer search volume numbers dictate your focus.
These high-volume terms are often a lot more competitive and don’t convert as well as their long-tail versions. You want to rank for specific keywords at every stage of your funnel, but also want to keep an eye on search volumes and keyword difficulty scores.
Don’t bite off more than you can chew.
Go for lower volume, more specific search terms until your website has enough domain authority (DA) to tackle more competitive ones.
Remember: Long-tail search queries of at least four words or more make up 50% of search queries!
Our keyword research guide dives deep into this important topic further.
Get Some Videos into Your Content
We all know YouTube and how massive it is. Some people love video. Some people love reading an article.
Give them the choice.
Record a video of your article topic, upload it to YouTube and embed it into your website.
Your dwell time (amount of time spent on your site) will increase as your audience will be engaged, watching your video.
Dwell time is a ranking signal, so you want to please your audience and keep them on your site for as long as necessary to solve their issue.
Optimize Your Page
On-page optimization is one of the most important and necessary pieces of SEO.
Optimization must be done in many areas including:
- URL
- Title
- Meta description
- Headings (H1, H2, H3)
- Image alt text
- Video alt text
- Body copy
Make Sure Your Site is Mobile Friendly
I’m not sure if I have to say this in 2022, but your site has to be mobile friendly. It needs to adapt and work well on any device, not only a desktop or laptop.
With over 50% of search volumes coming from mobile devices today, if your site sucks on mobile you’ve already lost.
Give Your Site a Performance Tune-Up
Your website needs to load in 3 seconds on less when it gets that click, or your audience is gone.
Time is money on the internet.
There are a zillion choices and if your site is a tortoise, you’ve lost a potential customer. Your audience will not wait for your website to load, so make sure it’s the hare or you’re in big trouble.
How Important is it to Show Up on Google Searches?
We know that selling is ok if it’s at the right time and place. We also know that getting cold-called, or sold to when we haven’t asked for it (interrupted) is annoying and usually results in a big “no”.
Search Engine Optimization flips all this on it’s head.
When your audience is searching for what you provide they are already sold.
They are searching for a product or service already with cash in hand.
That cash goes to the first websites that pop up for their search query.
The first result on a Google search gets about 21% of the clicks.
How much would that change your business having pre-qualified buyers coming to your website?
SEO For Local Businesses
Google’s 3-pack of local listings add huge online visibility to companies based on a local geographical area.
Because 3-pack listings are location specific, listings will change depending on where the search is occurring.
Getting into a 3-pack local listing is huge for getting traffic and warm prospects to your website.
Local searches also convert at a much higher percentage than non-mobile searches in a geographical area.
46% of all Google searches are local, this is a massive opportunity to do some local business right within your city.
Local Ranking Factors
Google My Business - Business profile completed 100% and updated with posts, hours, reviews etc.
Link Signals - anchor text, domain authority, page authority
Citations - Name, Address, Phone Number consistency in directories, local publications, other sites linking back to you
Reviews - Quantity, quality, velocity and diversity of your review profile on your Google My Business (GMB) and social pages.
Social Signals - Engagement, likes, comments, shares etc.
