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According to some SEO experts, Google changes its search algorithm 600+ times yearly, including Core updates and minor unannounced changes.
That means today’s SEO gold standard could be forgotten or less effective tomorrow. This is why staying on top of the latest white-hat SEO techniques is crucial for any search marketer who wants to dominate the SERPs.
You must improve your SEO knowledge, adapt marketing tactics, explore new tools, and research new SEO perspectives.
As AI continues to become prominent and integrate into most digital marketing tools, the way you do SEO is bound to change. However, some SEO tactics will forever remain evergreen, regardless of new tools and emerging trends.
So, in today’s post, I discussed 5 SEO strategies that remain valid and that you should know about.
5 SEO Techniques in 2024
These five SEO techniques can help you achieve a higher ranking, drive organic traffic, generate more leads, and increase sales.
1. Search Intent
Digging into keyword research tools to find profitable niche keywords is insufficient data to advance today’s SEO and content marketing strategy.
You have to get into the minds of your customers and think like them.
For instance, your approach to “how to satisfy a woman in bed” should vary depending on who is asking the question.
Your tone and approach to the subject would likely be different when a 65-year-old asks this question compared to when you talked about it with a 20-year-old male adult.
Understanding search intent is the beginning of a well-SEO-optimized page if you can read your customers’ minds based on their keywords input into search boxes.
What exactly do they want to discover from searching for such queries?
If you can uncover the Intent behind search queries, you will develop content that solves the problems, needs or wants.
2. Mobile Not an Option
With the steady rise in mobile technology and different screen resolutions, 56% of all website traffic to the leading US websites came from mobile devices.
It is now glaring more than ever how vital mobile-friendly web pages are to your website users.
On February 26th, 2015, Google announced it would update its search algorithm to rank web pages according to mobile friendliness.
“Starting April 21, we will be expanding our use of mobile-friendliness as a ranking signal. This change will affect mobile searches in all languages worldwide and will have a significant impact on our search results.
Consequently, users will find it easier to get relevant, high-quality search results that are optimized for their devices.”
For now, it is uncertain whether a page that is not mobile-friendly will also lose its ranking among its desktop users. But I think this should be far from coming to reality.
A non-mobile-friendly page shouldn’t affect its desktop ranking. It should only affect its mobile organic traffic.
And one more thing about this mobile algorithm update – it is said to be on a page-by-page basis.
This means even if your homepage is mobile-friendly”, you need to test the inner pages to ensure they are mobile-friendly, too.
Installing a mobile-responsive theme is a good way to ensure your web pages are mobile-friendly. An ideal theme is one that easily adapts to any device your blog is viewed on.
This way, you don’t have to worry about whether your pages are mobile-friendly.
3. User Behavior – CTR
This shouldn’t be new to you, except you’re just getting started in search engine optimization.
User behavior has been one of the 200 ranking signals used by Google to determine the relevancy and quality of a page to the user’s queries.
But as of recently, Bing has followed in that direction too.
This means your pages should provide all the necessary answers to the subject you’re talking about. Otherwise, lower CTR and bounce rate might affect your search visibility.
When a user clicks through to your web page from SERP and immediately hits the back button on her browser to click on another link from the search listings, it sends a negative signal to search engines that your information does not meet the user’s expectations.
If you find yourself unable to get traffic from Google – despite ranking well – it might be worth experimenting with Google Ads to supplement your SEO.
4. Create SEO Optimized Content
When Google Panda rolled out in February of 2011, its primary targets were low-quality content sites offering users no meaningful benefits or value.
Google cracked down on tiny, low-content blogs and gave higher priority to sites that produce highly in-depth, useful content for its users.
However, this action pushes many content marketers to ignore the technical side of content optimization, and to give it the exposure it deserves in search engines.
Great SEO Techniques and quality content must work together to give the content the maximum results and exposure it deserves. Effective white hat SEO techniques are only as good as the value you’re providing your blog readers.
Write for humans, but never ignore the technical side of creative content. This will provide the important SEO elements needed to reach a broader and more targeted audience.
5. Target Users at Different Stages
This is where thinking like you’re the user comes into play. Users want to achieve one specific task when they enter search queries into a search engine.
They want to discover something, learn more about it, or decide what to do with it. You must ensure your copy meets one of these users’ intents.
Consider what they expect to meet on the page when they arrive at your website. Once you understand this, you can engage your visitors with useful information.
When a user types into the search box “best link-building SEO tool”, at this stage, he does not know what he’s looking for. He is on the search for which tool to choose.
But when a search query like this is typed into the search box. “Pros and cons of link-assistant SEO tool” or “link-assistant SEO tool review“, “review of link-assistant SEO tool”.
Then, such a user expects not just the pros and cons of the SEO tool but also case studies and the author’s personal experience.
Based on the information he gathered, he could learn more about the SEO tool or search for other link-building SEO products.
When a query like this is typed into the search box, “Link-assistant promo code,” “get link-assistant SEO tool,” a user has decided to buy.
He is looking for a means to afford it at a cheaper rate.
But when a search query like this is typed into the search engine, “how to use link-assistant to build quality links”. Your vast experience as an SEO link-building guru must be called into action here.
You must demonstrate to the users how to get around things technically. Your content should contain helpful materials like graphs, videos, case studies, images, data, facts, figures, etc…
All these will help communicate your message better to the user.
To produce better content, you must understand the user’s Intent at different stages of the buying circle.
Conclusion
SEO is an ever-evolving field. Constantly updating your knowledge and skills will help you remain on top. If you’re not keeping up, your competitors will always beat you to the top of the SERP.
You need to regularly learn about your industry’s latest trends, join the SEO community, listen to SEO news, and experiment with live websites.
There is no better way to learn SEO than trying to rank your own pages. The SEO techniques, experience, and knowledge you will gain are invaluable.
You will gain more confidence and insights into how search engine algorithms work and develop your own SEO processes.