If you have been writing content for a long time then you need to ask yourself – have there been any changes in the SEO strategy this year? Are you still following the old rules without seeing the latest SEO trends? Then wake up and smell the change SEO in 2016.
You have to adapt to the new generation as search engines get smarter with each passing day. Now let’s look at the various SEO tips for this year
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Don’t Research Keywords by “Most Used”
Google has grown on its own and it’s not just about the most commonly used keywords. They analyze the content in which they are used. Hence, when you do keyword research, you need to find relevant topics that cover what you want to publish about. You need to know what your audience wants to read from you. Don’t just look at what common keywords are and incorporate them into your content even if they don’t apply, search engines and audiences are smarter now and because of this, you need to change the way you do keyword research.
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Don’t be computer specific
With the advent and use of Smartphones, anything and everything is being read on mobile phones. It is therefore important to understand that your page must be mobile compatible in order for users to read your posts effectively. You cannot turn a blind eye to new technologies and so you need to work on your content and website to ensure that they are compatible with new technologies that are constantly evolving.
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Don’t Copy Images
Try and create your own unique and exclusive images for your website. It’s fairly common and easy to select images relevant to your content from Google’s images section, but images that are purely your own generate a lot of user interest. Make sure that the images and content complement each other.
Bonus: You can get Free Stock images from Freepik, Pixabay, Flaticon.
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Don’t Underestimate the Power of Social Media
If you search any topic you will see that links from social media like Facebook, Twitter rank better than direct links. It is now common practice to ensure that your new content is also advertised on social media via your personal profile or company profile. This is the place where maximum time is spent by internet crazies and hence, higher chances of landing on your page.
Bonus Tips: Strengthen Your Social Media Marketing
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Don’t ignore Visuals
Your mind registers instructions or content better when you see a visual than when you read it. Many bloggers for food, mobile reviews, games reviews and many other related content are now creating videos for the same. So you can now listen to their content or read it completely up to the user. There are many video bloggers who have their own private channel on YouTube. 2016 will be a year of visuals with written content.
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Don’t suppress your voice, this is the era of voice search
Smartphones are getting smarter and so are search engines. You’re on a trip and can’t type what you want. Don’t worry, just use the voice search option to fetch listings on any search engine. What do you need to do to make your content visible in this case? Make sure you use long tail keywords that are easy and searchable for content.
SEO Tips : On-page SEO for Higher Ranking in Search
How can we now implement a strategy based on SEO? We now need to structure our content to rank higher. Let’s take a look at the ways in which we can implement an on-page SEO strategy
1). Number of words
When you choose your topic, make sure you have enough research material that will help you write a minimum of 1000 words. Google recognizes long and comprehensive content and hence it is advised to write in detail about the subject you are taking instead of writing short paragraphs that don’t fit the 1000 word limit.
2). Use keywords throughout your content
Make sure your keywords are used extensively throughout the content you write. You can insert it in your header, title, introduction, body center content and conclusion. It should be relevant to the topic you’re writing about and not sound out of place. You can see that there is an increase in the number of keywords used since many years and hence, it is a good practice to have at least three keywords.
3). Increased number of internal links.
There has been a considerable increase in the use of internal links since 2014. You can have as many internal links as you want in your content, but it is equally important to optimize your link structure. You want search engines as well as users to stay on your website as much as possible and so it needs to be easily accessible for everyone.
4). Headers and meta-tags
You can see that the top ranking pages have headers and metatags attached to their content. You must ensure that the description is unique and accurately describes your main topic. It doesn’t have to be long but to the point that it helps search engines to show when your link appears in their search listing view.
Final Word
This is the world of Smartphones and voice search. Simple keywords that are relevant to your content will no longer work. You need to make sure that search engines can find your content on your phone, tablet or laptop. It is very important that your website is compatible with these three devices for readers to read well. It’s 2016 and there are changes in the Google algorithm and how the search engine works.
They are becoming more local which ensures that the results you see are relevant to you in terms of location. You need to work on the quality of the content and make sure it is fresh and fresh for the search engines to rank it higher.
Make sure your content is socially active hence, increase your numbers to the higher end. The more social you are, the more popular your posts will be.SEO trends will continue to change with time, but at the top SEO tips should more or less dominate this year.