Business

SEO Trends in 2022 That Will Impact Online Marketing for Businesses

Search Engine Optimization has always been about change, and in 2022 it’s no different. As Google continues to update its algorithm by fusing in different technologies and data, there’s no surprise that this year will be an important one for both webmasters and businesses alike.

But given that there are 200 ranking factors Google uses to rank websites, what trends should you focus on to strengthen your online marketing goals?

As someone leading a global digital marketing company that has leveraged SEO strategies, I believe there are key trends everyone must look for and integrate to ensure their online marketing success. Here are some SEO trends I feel will pave the way for 2022.

Optimizing Core Web Vitals to Become a Priority

Speaking of SEO updates, The Page Experience update is one of Google’s major updates that aims to enhance the user experience by focusing on robust page performance. Taking it even further are the Core Web Vitals. These are a new set of metrics that measure aspects of your web page like web usability, load times, stability, and interactivity of content at load times.

Given that Core Web Vitals are themselves a ranking factor strengthening them is likely to impact your SEO performance and thus become a key practice for years to come.

Though this may require immense on-page SEO efforts, harnessing the Core Web Vitals will notably help you determine where your website needs improvements and fortify your SEO strategy.

Multitask United Model (MUM) to Impact Rankings

Ever since the introduction of Rank Brain and then BERT, Google has been leveraging artificial intelligence to improve search results. With the introduction of Multitask United Model (MUM), Google is looking to revolutionize further how it handles search queries.

As per Google, MUM is said to be 1000 times mightier than BERT and will be able to multitask between videos, images and text across 75 languages. It’s designed to understand several aspects of the query being searched, such as context, sentiments and other entities. This will help users get relevant information to even more complex queries.

As MUM is yet to roll out completely, its integration and overall saturation shouldn’t take long. This would mean getting ready and optimizing content across different formats, not only for web pages but also for pictures and video metadata.

The Need for High-Quality Content Will Rise

High-quality content has always been a key differentiator in driving traffic and leads, thus making it an integral part of SEO. However, what has [RRMB1] also become important is the length of the overall content.

While content length doesn’t directly contribute as a ranking factor, lengthier content corresponds to higher rankings in SERPs. In fact, it’s worth noting that long-form content also fulfils Google’s E-A-T or Expertise Authoritativeness and Trustworthiness guidelines which are, again, essential for ranking.

As neural language processing becomes more and more advanced, its ability to recognize high-quality content will strengthen over time. If you haven’t already, make sure you increase the length of your content on your targeted keywords for better results.

Knowledge Graph and Brand SERP Optimization to Gain Prominence

If there are one important thing brands and businesses need to focus on in 2022 for SEO, it is optimizing for the knowledge graph and other brand SERP entities.

Gone are the days when optimizing for a single webpage was considered a thing. Today, SEO is all about personalization and what Google knows about your business as a whole.

Since Google has plenty of information about us (via search history, location data, social listings, etc.), it’s not surprising to see it curate everything in a personalized knowledge graph right in the search results.

So how can you optimize your own profiles and entities for knowledge graphs? I recommend polishing your whole digital presence across all marketing channels, from social media profiles to websites, business listings, location information, Discover feed, and more. This will help Google feature all the relevant information it wants to show to your target audience should they search for you in SERPs.

Structured Data and On-Page SEO is Here to Stay

Another integral aspect of SEO that’s not going away anytime soon is on-page structured micro data. As one of the foundations of SEO, schema mark-ups give Google crucial inputs about your page. They help crawlers extract information and show them to relevant users in the form of output.

With the introduction of even more schema mark-ups like that for video, local business, and reviews, enhancing off-page SEO will remain just as relevant in 2022 as it was in the past. Those who’ll take advantage of the schema mark-ups and upgrade other vital on-page components can expect an edge over their competitors.

Final Thoughts

As search engines become more advanced and sophisticated, SEO will continue to see a dynamic shift in practices and trends. Nonetheless, staying on top of the ones that matter to your business will give you an edge and help you enhance your online marketing to a great extent.

That being said, there’s no better time to start rethinking your digital strategy than now. A right approach and plan will promise greater success for your efforts in the long run.

Article by: Mr. Zuber Sheikh, MD, Rank My Business