In today’s world, the importance of SEO cannot be stressed enough and this entire process of optimizing your website for search engines is evolving day by day to meet the standards of the online landscape. If SEO is constantly evolving, why should your website remain static or incorporate the same SEO strategies that it was using back in 2020 or 2021? So, don’t live in the past but move with time and in the year 2022 pave the way for all the new SEO trends into your website and give your business that big push. That being said, let’s have a look at the top 6 SEO trends to follow in 2022.
1. Prioritize mobile-friendliness
In 2021, mobile searches accounted for 54.4% of worldwide web traffic. What this number suggests is that people are more likely to visit your website using their smartphones and, therefore, this increasing focus on creating mobile-friendly responsive websites. While SEO prioritized mobile-friendliness since 2015 when Google recognized it as an important ranking factor, in 2022 this focus will be even greater. This trend can be credited to the global growth of the smartphone market and studies that show that in the next few years the number of mobile searches would form 75% of the total web searches. So, if your aim is to build a search engine optimized website, make sure that you opt for a responsive web design that works well across all the diverse mobile devices.
SEO tips for a mobile-friendly website
- Reduce your site’s loading time to the minimum.
- Invest in a responsive web design.
- Include CTA’s that stand out and are easy to find.
- Focus on local SEO as “near me” and a location-based search is a popular option when it comes to mobile searches.
- The website should be easy to navigate.
- Give more significance to the user experience.
2. A fallback to long-form content
The debate surrounding whether to use short-form content or long-form content for websites has been there for years now. While SEO demanded the inclusion of a lot of words, readability always demanded one to cut short this said word count. But nowadays, long-form content is definitely back in the picture, and the blog sections that every website seems to have today stand as a testimony of this comeback. And in 2022, this shift will be more strongly felt.
But that being said it will also be important to ensure that this created long-form content is readable and is able to capture the attention of the readers. For this, the content should be relevant, informative, and have a clear format that can be easily skimmed through. So, instead of using long paragraphs, divide the content into small readable sections using small paragraphs, headings, sub-headings, and bullet points.
3. Featured snippets
Every search that you make on the web is returned with a “people also ask” section, a definition box, a table, or a list that appears at the top of the web page, and they are meant to give you immediate, crisp answers to your questions. And as they give direct answers to your queries and rank higher on the web pages, more people are likely to visit these links and therefore the corresponding websites. And ultimately contributing to the visibility of your business. Knowing the significance of this, SEO in 2022 will focus on the creation of the kind of content that Google will pick up as its featured snippets.
How to appear in Google’s featured snippets?
- Find questions that are frequently being asked relevant to your website, include them in your website, and answer them properly.
- Always create high-quality, informative content that will be of some value to your customers.
- When providing an answer, never go with a general one but go with a well-researched one that google will index as relevant.
- Use an FAQ section on your website. Keep the answers between 40-60 words.
4. AI focussed SEO
In the modern world, slowly but steadily, Artificial Intelligence is influencing every aspect of our behavior on the web, including the way we interact and then engage with online content. And therefore in 2022, you will see AI influencing the SEO landscape too. In 2015 google confirmed the use of RankBrain, Google’s ranking algorithm, and it’s said that in 2022 it will become one of the top three factors that determine the ranking of your website on search engines.
The ranking of RankBrain is based on user satisfaction, which is measured by various factors like bounce rate, dwell time, organic click, etc. And if the content of your website meets its criteria for user satisfaction then there are more chances of your website ranking higher when a relevant search is made. So, in the coming years, the focus will be on search engine optimization adhering to the standards of AI algorithms like RankBrain.
5. Voice search optimization
According to statistical data collected in recent years, 58% of people use voice searches to find a local business, and in 2022 this number is expected to rise even more considering the popularity of voice assistants like Google Assistant, Siri, and Alexa. And therefore in 2022 search engine optimization will be closely linked to voice search optimization. So, an SEO trend that you have to follow in 2020 to be on par with the modern world is the creation of a voice search optimized website.
Tips to optimize a website for voice search
- Use long-tailed conversational keywords.
- Incorporate questions into the content of your website. Adding an FAQ section could be quite helpful on this front.
- Create a mobile-friendly website as voice assistants are a key feature of smartphones.
- Instead of using jargon, go for a more conversational tone.
- Focus on local SEO as a huge fraction of immediate Google searches made by mobile users are location-specific.
- If you are targeting a global audience, then to capture the global audience a multilingual website might come in handy. Simply because Google assistant supports and therefore allows search in over 40 languages and this number is said to rise in the near future.
6. Proper adherence to Google’s EAT principle
| E | Expertise |
| A | Authoritativeness |
| T | Trustworthiness |
Google’s EAT principle first came into the picture in 2014 but with time it has grown in significance and in 2022 it will have a tremendous influence on Google rankings. EAT basically symbolizes the three values that Google looks for in online content of any kind and they are expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness. Google determines the quality of any webpage according to this criteria and accordingly ranks them on the search engine. So, creating search engine optimized content is about creating the kind of content that meets the EAT criteria and therefore is an SEO trend that you would have to closely follow in 2022.
Today, how well your business does is determined by how well your website is doing in the online space. In short, today a website is both what breaks and makes a business. So, to make sure that you have a website that works in favour of your business, make sure to strictly follow all these SEO trends in 2022 and take your business to the next level.