My Top 5 SEO Strategies For 2021
Search engine optimization (SEO) is a great way to drive traffic to your website.
It’s purely an organic method of marketing, as opposed to PPC which is a paid method.
In 2021, if someone still has doubts about the importance of SEO, they are living under a rock.
Look at these statistics:
- Around 70% to 80% of people focus on organic results and ignore paid results.
- 28% of those people end up purchasing something.
- Improving SEO and growing organic presence is the top inbound marketing priority of 61% of marketers.
Aren’t these stats staggering? So if you are like the other readers of the Blue Waves blog who like to progress, this article is for you.
Today, I’m going to talk about my top 5 SEO strategies for 2021. Not only will these strategies help you in your inbound marketing efforts, but they will also take you one step closer to a strong online presence.
So without further delay, let’s explore the strategies.
Top 5 SEO strategies for 2021
Focus On Core Web Vitals
Core Web Vitals include three metrics: Loading, Interactivity, and Visual Stability. These metrics are used for measuring user experience and are related to one thing only: page speed, only.
From May 2021, these will be among Google’s ranking factors. So if you are planning to land on the first page of Google’s search results, you need to work on them. You need to look at things from a user’s perspective, not just from a search engine crawler’s perspective. Take a user-centric approach and look at how your website makes them feel.
Not only will it make your SEO stronger, but it can also help you with UX and conversions.
Don’t Ignore Voice Search
It’s one of the best SEO strategies for 2021.
I wrote an article about voice search last year. In that article, I talked about its importance and strategies relating to voice search.
In 2021, voice search will have an impact on search queries. Google Assistant, Apple’s Siri, Amazon’s Alexa, and tools like these are helping voice search grow. As this technology is improving, more people are adapting to it, instead of typing each time they have a query. Here are a couple of statistics:
- 55 % of households will own a smart speaker by 2022.
- More than 50% of mobile users use voice search in the entire world.
When optimizing for voice search, use longer phrases that we use in conversations. Stick to natural-sounding phrases instead of phrases that a robot would say.
What phrase you are more likely to say to a voice assistant?
“What are the best restaurants near Pittsburgh?” or “best restaurants near Pittsburgh.”
I bet it’s the former.
People are specific when they use voice search. They are at the consideration stage of the funnel. So chances of them converting are higher.
Voice search is big. Incorporate it into your SEO strategy.
Get Started With Video Marketing
YouTube is one of the biggest websites in the world. It’s also the second most popular search engine after Google. if you haven’t been doing video marketing before, now is the time to get into it. Still not convinced? According to a Cisco study, the video will dominate any other type of content in terms of consumption.
Ask yourself, how many brands have you discovered using YouTube. You had a little query. But you didn’t want to search on Google and read a 2000-word blog post. Instead, you searched on YouTube and found a useful video. And since then, you have been a fan of that YouTube channel.
That leads us to the question of how can you get to the top YouTube search results? That’s because putting dozens of videos might not do much good if you don’t optimize them.
First, optimize your video channel name and description. In the description, you don’t want to stuff keywords. Rather, tell about yourself and what your channel is all about.
After that, you need to perform keyword research for every video you put. One way of doing this is to use YouTube’s autocomplete feature. Just type in any relevant topic on the YouTube search bar, and you’ll get a few suggestions. You can use these suggestions to reach the right set of audience.
Remember: an effective SEO strategy will need to include video.
Start Putting Long-Form Content
This type of content generally performs well for SEO. You want to regularly put longer-form content that appeals to Google’s E-A-T guidelines.
You’ll find tons of examples on the web in which blog posts over 2000 words outperformed blog posts of shorter length. Keep in mind that this trend is here to stay, and as more websites follow this trend, the length will get larger.
According to a SEMRush report, posts over 3000 words get three times more traffic and four times more shares. Now don’t mistake it for just quantity. You still want to focus on quality, but I’m reminding you that longer-form content is very important. At the end of the day, you want to inform people and keep them engaged.
Keep Mobile Users in Mind
I have repeatedly emphasized the importance of mobile SEO on my blog. A majority of searches are done on mobile, so you want to focus on mobile.
Ask yourself; do your visitors get a seamless experience when they search from a mobile device? If not, then work on it. Here are a couple of resources from my blog for you:
Mobile-First Web Design and Why It Matters
Mobile Website — How to Build one for 2021
Wrap Up
There you have it; my top 5 SEO strategies for 2021. I’ll list them out for you here:
- Focus on Core Web Vitals
- Don’t ignore voice search
- Get started with video marketing
- Start putting long-form content
- Keep mobile users in mind
If you have any questions or suggestions about SEO Strategies for 2021, let me know in the comments below.
