Top Search Engine optimization Trends For 2017

2017 is fast approaching and it’s time to compile the SEO trends set to rule search marketing next year.

2016 brought to the fore more in the realm of business access via the web than ever before. Today’s modern-day discerning consumers are ever connected to the internet and essentially demand easy accessibility from their favorite brands. Companies that aren’t able to provide customers with a pleasing experience on the internet are losing out as today’s consumers demand more from the World Wide Web every day. No wonder, it has become important for business to be creative than ever in their SEO endeavors.

The watchdogs of search optimization keep on predicting changes and it is better to keep up than be left in the dust. So, if you’re curious about what 2017 has in store for SEO to stay ahead in the game, here are 10 SEO trends that businesses can expect to see in 2017.

1) PAGE TAGGING

Yep, we saw a number of brands going mobile-friendly in 2016. And we’re going to see more of the same this year. Given that mobile usage is set to outpace desktop usage in the next few years, it could mean that, soon, writing heading tags will be a norm, rather than the exception.

Cellular data networks are much slower than WIFI to high-speed wired network connections. So, it’s important to maintain consistency in the structure down to H5 tags in order to make it easy for different devices and browsers to load pages effectively. In addition, it’s smart to pre-load most searched information so that your users do not need to wait for the network.

2) CONVERSION RATE OPTIMIZATION (CRO)

This was a winner last year and it’s still here, Conversion Rate Optimization. Though marketers were able to drive traffic and engage their visitors, conversion still remained a distant dream for many. And this realization pushed many marketers to embrace CRO in 2016. In fact, according to a Venture Beat survey report, conversion rate optimization is a vital part of marketing technology. 

Experts believe that the use of conversion rate optimization will become more advanced in 2017. More and more marketers are expected to use CRO to increase conversion across different stages of the sales funnel and cope up with the ever-changing dynamics of the market. In addition, web tracking and event tracking in Google Analytics is likely to become popular amongst those looking to convert users quickly and effectively.

3) APP STORE OPTIMIZATION (ASO)

In 2016, mobile apps accounted for 52% of all user time spent online. Quite obviously, app store optimization (ASO) has become important than ever. Increasing number of businesses are expected to run In-app A/B testing to test their idea and push the envelope. Furthermore, deep linking will become all the more important in order to improve the overall visibility and relevancy of an app page dramatically. Measuring in-app analytics will become essential. Success and failure of apps will be largely dependent on app open rates, click through rates, conversions, and more.

4) LOCAL AND VOCAL SEARCH

Local SEO was a major win for us last year and is likely to be continue as a trend for 2017 too. Accepted more prevalently, local SEO is expected to make marketers concentrate on local strategies. To stay ahead in the game, local businesses must clean up their NAP – Name, Address and Phone directory and add local terms in website content. In addition, it makes sense to put schema tagging and local listings to ensure increased visibility in 2017.

Google’s Hummingbird algorithm is already working hard to make search more conversational and Voice based searches including Google Now, Windows Cortana and Apple Siri pushing voice search into everyday usage. In fact, an ever-increasing number of people rely on voice based searches to get results quickly. Presumably, these voice based searches are going to change the dynamics of the search eco system. Quite naturally, 2017 will also see businesses working on their social SEO techniques to get rank higher and increase their visibility in the voice search engine result pages.

5) DIFFERENT PHASES OF SEO (RESEARCH AND BUYING)

The world of SEO is set to take a giant leap in the year 2017. Marketers and businesses are likely to construct different techniques and strategies to categorize SEO into different categories depending upon buyer’s journey. It will include figuring out separate sets of keywords to target visitors in different stages of their buyer’s journey. It will also take into account user behavior attributed to site use and conversion.

6) MICRO-MOMENTS AND THE FRACTURED USER JOURNEY

Given the rise of mobile devices, the way people consume media has changed dramatically. Predictable, daily online sessions have now been replaced by many fragmented online sessions spread throughout the day. But then there are high-intent moments when people turn to their mobile device to buy something, browse or watch videos. These moments are called ‘micro-moments’, a concept recently introduced by Google. Micro-moments are decision-oriented.

Marketers looking to stay ahead in the game must devise strategies to identify the micro-moments that matter the most to your business. Once, you identify the micro-moment, reach out to consumers and provide them with information they want and how they want it.

7) REAL TIME PENGUIN UPDATES

Recently, Google’s George Illyes indicated a real-time Google Penguin update could be launched in 2017. Penguin analyzes the value of a site and penalizes sites that are not in line with Google’s quality guidelines. A real-time algorithm upgrade is sure to make the competition in the world of SEO even fiercer. So, if you wish to spearhead the market in 2017, do well to start working on high quality content and White Hat SEO tactics.

8) GOOGLE’S CONTENT ALGORITHM UPDATE

This is a pretty audacious bit of 2017 SEO predictions. In 2016, Google declared that it would penalize Scraper sites that offer content copies from other sites. So, if you are looking to improve your ranking, do not even think of scraping content from different sources and use them into content sections of your site. Make sure your content is unique and well written to win the rat race of ranking in 2017.

9) GOOGLE KNOWLEDGE GRAPH GROWTH AND TRAFFIC DROP

No matter, how much money you’re spending to source a creative website design by launching a crowd sourcing contest at a popular site such as Design-hill, all your efforts will go down the drain if your user isn’t able to find much information about for your brand name when searching online. This is where Google’s Knowledge Graph comes to your rescue.

Search engine titan, Google is all set to maximize the information on its search results pages. This will make things much easier for users. You can now find a host of information when you run a search for local listings and reviews. Although it is a good news for users, it threatens the volume of organic search traffic to sites. However, you do not need to worry, you may optimize Knowledge Graph in order to get more search traffic by using entity keywords, using schema markup everywhere possible, optimizing your Google+ pages and inviting user reviews.

10) THE RISE OF INTERACTIVE CONTENT

Here’s another 2016 trend on the list and it looks it will take the center stage in 2017 too. Interactive content has been the talk of the town amongst marketers and consumers alike. Online quizzes, micro sites, interactive info-graphics and interactive white papers are known to encourage user engagement and interaction with a brand. 2017 is likely to see an increasing number of marketers and businesses embracing Interactive content to drive traffic, engage visitors, generate leads and boost conversion.

So there it is our 2017 SEO predictions. It is difficult to say which of these trends will become a major hit and which of them will die a fast death. However, one things is sure. More awesomeness will come in the world of SEO. So, cheers to more exciting SEO strategies and techniques!

11) Google's AMP- just another fad or the future of mobile?

Accelerated Mobile Pages project (AMP for short) is a new Google initiative to build a better, more user friendly mobile Web by introducing a new "standard" for building web content for mobile devices. This new standard is a set of rules that form a simple, lighter version of HTML. In addition, pages built in compliance with AMP are sure to load super-quick on all mobile devices.

Ever since its launch in search results in February 2016, AMP has been in the SEO news. However, despite the entire buzz around the project, SEOs and webmasters keep treating it quite warily. Is AMP yet another Google fad to come and go within a few months like those that many of them did before? Alternatively, is the project here to stay and form the future of mobile?

12) 301 redirects can prevent your pages from passing topical relevance

If you are in SEO for quite some time, you definitely remember the golden rule: do not overdo with redirects — they are a PageRank leak.

However, two months ago Google turned the SEO world upside down, announcing that redirects no longer result in losing PageRank and you are free to use any type of 3xx redirection without the fear to lose your rankings.

13) HTTPS is eating up your referral data. Any ways to fix that?

It has been two years since Google started its active campaign for Web security and announced HTTP to be a ranking factor in its algorithm. The Web blew up with the idea of switching to HTTPS to improve rankings.

Could we still hope to see a ranking boost thanks to the switch? Nope. Truth be told, it is highly unlikely that HTTPS can help you up with Google rankings. On the contrary, there are countless.

So, if not for rankings and security, why would you run through this tedious process? Quite likely your marketing team already has a good reason for switching to HTTPS - your referral traffic.

14) Still building citations for your local business? It might be just the time to stop!

It turns out citation building might be the most overestimated factor for local SEO. A new study from Andrew Shotland & Dan Leibson of Local SEO Guide showed that the strength and volume of local citations do not seem to matter much for local rankings.

Looking at ~3000 local searches, the Local SEO Guide team analyzed what factors correlate with higher rankings in Google's local packs. In addition, the surprising finding of the study was that citations showed much less correlation than other factors, while the absolute leaders.

15) Optimizing for voice search — your chase for featured answers

A featured extract also known as a "rich answer" or "direct answer" which is the summary answer to a searcher's question that Google shows in a special block at the top of its Search Engine Results Page (SERP). Could you possibly need any other reason to target featured snippets in your campaign?

In other words, every time a searcher makes a voice search for a keyword where your website ranks in a featured snippet. Google specifically references your brand, giving you a huge extra branding opportunity.

In addition, given the fact that voice search keeps growing at a supersonic speed (over half of US teens & 41% of US adults use voice search on a daily basis), this extra branding opportunity might be just the right push you needed to add to your 2017 SEO plan.