How to Adapt With New SEO Trends 2021

SEO is continually evolving with frequent changes in search engine algorithm. So, you need to refine your strategy to adapt to the trending factors.

SEO trends in 2020 and the trend of 2019 were not the same. Don't expect the trend will remain the same in 2021 and the subsequent years. So, you need to adjust your SEO strategy for optimizing with the latest trending search factors.

As a blogger and content marketer, uncovering the latest SEO trend and modifying the digital marketing strategies would be the best strategy. The history of Kodak Camera taught us, ''either adapt or die''.

To rank higher on SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages), it is essential to get immense organic traffic to your blog. Search Engine Optimization is one of the powerful ways to rank higher.

You know that Google dominates the Search Engine Markets. That's why when we talk about search engines, the name of Google comes in the first place.

As of July 2019, Google holds a 92.18% market share, with 3.5 billion searches each day. If you convert the search queries per second, it will come around 40000.

Source: Oberlo

The days of ranking by loading or stuffing the keywords across an article are long gone.

So, understand the new trends of essential SEO factors in 2021 and modify the strategy accordingly.

A lot more SEO factors are to be considered in the days to come. This article will help to discover the smartest way of finding the latest trending SEO elements.

Here is the list of upcoming essential SEO factors that are likely to trend.

Long-Form Content
E-A-T
Voice Search
Audio Visual Effect
Page Loading Speed
Long-tail keywords and semantically related keywords
FAQ page
Local Listing.

1.Create Long-Form Content Consistently to get Ranking Benefits in 2021

Long-form content has been gaining popularity because of its innumerable benefits. To create a long piece of content, you have to spend more time. Yes, give more to get more.

More organic traffic, more internal and external links, more engagement, more sharing, more Lead generation, more conversion, and many more benefits. Here are a few statistics of long-form content.

What is long-form content?

There is no hard rule for specific words. So, I can share what I understood. Long-form content means the average length of articles that ranks on search pages.

The following stats may help you understand the ideal length of your post.

Backlinko found Long-form content gets an average of 77.2% links compared to the short ones. According to their study, the average word count of Google's first-page result is 1447.

According to Buffer, the optimal length of a blog post should be1600 words, but the blog post with 2500 words is the best.

Articles with a word count of 2250-2500 earn the most organic traffic, and articles with a word count of 2500+ earn the most links and more shares in social media-Hubspot.

The Average Word Count of Top-Ranked Searches is 2416 Words- Coppypress.

Long-form content with over 3000 words gets 3x more traffic, 4x more shares, and 3.5x more backlinks than short content with 901-1200 words- Semrush.

To achieve higher search rankings, their recommendation is to focus on long-form content.

Content length over 1200 words is essential, and 3000 plus words are the best. If you want to stay at mid-point, it becomes (1200+3000)/2= 2100 words.

An article by Buzzsumo, based on the study of over 52000 blog content, helped me recognize the long, short, and other forms of blog posts. They categorized the content as-

Short- below 1000 words

Medium- 1000-2000 words

Long -2000- 3000 words

Extra-long -above 3000 words.

So, what you observed? The long-form article means above 2000 words.

An analysis of Curata found that Long-form content can generate 7x more leads than short articles.

Long-form content can generate 7x more leads than short piece

Long-form content does not mean merely inserting the words. It means better to provide better information, explanation, and quality.

So the exact phrase I'd like to use Excellent Quality Long-Form Content.

How to Create Long-Form Articles?

As a modern blogger, you should know the simple techniques of doing small things to make a big difference.

Creating a long article doesn't mean writing a novel. Not at all!

If you follow some tips that I am providing here, you'll become the super expert of writing long-tail blog posts.

Unbeatable Tips on Creating a long article

Create a content brief
Increase H2 and H3 headings
Explain the subheadings and sub-sub headings with illustrations
Insert relevant pictures and screenshots
Use relevant statistics
Insert relevant links and explain the purpose of linking.

2. Focus on E-A-T to Improve Search Ranks

E-A-T stands for Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness. Google uses these to evaluate your website and pages.

For layman's term, you can say it Page Quality. The concept of E-A-T is based on the Google Quality Rater Guideline. So, you shouldn't neglect it. So, you should prove your authority by fulfilling the principle of E-A-T.

Is E-A-T a ranking factor?

The answer is No, then Yes.

According to Ahref, E-A-T is not a direct ranking factor but it is important.

If it's not a ranking factor, there is a strong reason to say, non-compliance of E-A-T is a de-ranking factor. It is believed that page rank may drop because of lack of E-A-T.

Google will not display the content from untrusted sites for some query-sensitive topics, as risk factors are associated there.

Examples of such topics are- advice on health, finance, happiness, etc.

Pages containing this type of topic are known as YMYL (Your Money Your Life) pages. This kind of page is related to the safety and security of people.

Inaccurate/deceptive information on YMYL pages may affect users' health, happiness, safety, and financial stability.

So, Google maintains the principle of E-A-T to protect the users.

That's why for sites with YTML pages, E-A-T is considered more important than the ranking factors.

Tips on improving E-A-T

The purpose of creating every piece of content/page must be accomplished to benefit the user.
Link to renowned websites and obtain backlinks from authoritative sites
Enrich your articles with statistics, facts, and evidence with proper citations
Keep your content evergreen via content updating.

Read Search Quality Rating Guidelines, a 164 pages pdf documents published by Google.

3. Voice Search will Impact SEO

The use of voice technology is continuously growing worldwide. The rising trend is not limited to any age. The use of voice assistance is increasing in all age groups.

So, it is essential to optimize your pieces of content and blog for voice search.

Search by voice, aka voice search, is a Google product born in Google Labs. Google voice search is a unique tool that allows users to search by voice.

In voice search, the users use their voice command while searching their queries instead of typing.

Voice search is a hand-free technology, so no need to engage your hand in searching for queries. No keyboard or screen touch is necessary for voice search.

Imagine you're driving a car on a highway, you need to know the location/distance of a petrol pump on your way.

Which one is convenient for you- typing or speaking? It is the voice search.

What about the accuracy of Google's voice recognition?

You may be wondering to know about the accuracy of the voice recognition software/algorithm.

Since its inception, Google has improved the features of voice recognition algorithms on many occasions to competent in understanding human language.

Google's voice recognition has improved so fast and so much that it can understand the human language with 95% accuracy. These tremendous improvements help both the users and the artificial intelligence, known as Google Assistant.

The days when Captain Kirk was talking to the Ster Trek Computer were fiction. Now, Google made it a reality with the help of the evolution of technology.

Google voice search has been becoming popular among internet users over the last few years. You can use Google voice search from desktop and mobile devices.

One of the reasons for increasing popularity is speaking is more convenient than typing to search for their queries.

Furthermore, typing on a tiny mobile screen is boring. The speed of speaking is faster than the speed of typing.

There might be several other reasons for the increasing popularity of voice search.

Whatever may be the reason for voice search, its popularity is growing day by day- that's the reality.

You can understand by keeping an eye on the following facts and statistics:

Have you heard about Siri, Echo, Alexa, and Cortana? These all are voice-based smart speakers. People use them for voice searches on different platforms.

The use of smart devices like smart Tv, home appliances, and smartphones are rising at a faster rate. The growing trends of voice assistance are remarkable in the US.

The global smart speaker market surpasses $30 billion by 2024. Smart speakers will soon be among the top-selling consumer electronic products.

75% of smart speakers search for local businesses at least once a week, and 53% search every day.

People use smart voice speakers in the bedrooms, kitchens, even in the toilets. No, No! This is not a joke.

Look at the following statistics, the reality will come in front of you.

According to Review42-

52% of people use search assistance while driving, and 2.3% of people already started using Google search by voice search in their Bathroom. Amazon and Google account for 94% of the smart speakers use.

15.8 billion people will use smart speakers by 2023, going to hit $35.5 billion by 2025, more than double in just 2 years.

Wordstream found-

52% of people keep their voice speaker in the living room, 25% in the bedrooms, and 22% in their kitchens.

72 % of the owners of voice speakers use the devices as part of their daily routine.

According to eMarketer-

The estimated number of voice assistant users in the US in 2020 was 128 million, which is more than 11% from the previous year (115.2 million in 2019). This is 38.5% of the US population and 44.2% of the total internet users.

According to their forecasts, the figure may reach 135.6 million (40.2% of the US population) in 2022.

51% of online shoppers in the US use voice assistants to help them research products.

According to DBS

27% of the internet user is performing voice search on mobile.
20% of total mobile searches (google app plus android) comes from voice search.
Google voice search on mobile supports 100+ languages.

How to search by voice on the desktop?

I've found very little difference between the text and voice search.

If you are a desktop user, you need to install the Google Chrome browser. It has a built-in voice search facility.

Just click on the small-sized microphone icon on the Google search box and ask your queries. It's amazing!

What they search for using Voice Search?

A survey conducted by Adobe Analytics, on 1,000 U.S. consumers shows-

the most common voice search via smart speakers is about music (70%) followed by the weather forecast (64%). Other searches include the following-

asking fun questions 53%
online searching 47%
queries related to news 46%
queries on research 35%
asking for directions 34%
using voice to make a call 31%
for shopping/ordering products/services 30%
for food delivery/takeout 17%
for flight/hotel search 16%.

According to the Mobile Voice Study,

55% of teens and 41% of adults use voice search more than once a day. You'll find more surprising facts and stats here.

The screenshot suggests that you'll get the answers to what, why, and when about the use of ''Google voice search''.

Which words or phrases they use most while voice search?

The first set of words that used for voice search most are-

What, Where, How, When, Why, Which, Is, Are, Should, Would, Could, Do, Does, etc.

The 2nd set of words that also used for voice searches are- Best, Top, Most, Highest, Brightest, Greatest .........

How to Optimize Voice Search for SEO?

If you're a regular reader of Techazu, you need to do a little work, meaning you know the answer. If not, start reading the articles published on this site.

The purpose of this article is to teach you how to modify the overall SEO strategy so that you can adapt to all the upcoming trending factors in 2021. Voice search is a part of them. So, continue reading slowly and digest all the stuff.

According to an analysis of 10000 Google results by Backlinko-

75% of content that ranks in desktop search likely to rank in the top 3 of voice search results.

This means, if your blog posts are well optimized as per the SEO Guide, you have already achieved 75% of your SEO goal.

For the remaining 25%, you have to focus on the voice search dominating factors. According to their findings, the following factors play significant roles in voice search results:

Page speed/ page load time (4.6 seconds)
HTTPS website (security)
Short and concise answer within 29 words
Long-form content (average 2312 words)
Easy to read content (9th Grade Level)
Domain Authority
Sharable content-social sharing
Featured snippet (40.7% of voice search results came from featured snippets)

These are a few out of 200 plus Google ranking factors. I'd like to remind you, the factors mentioned above can also help improve the overall SEO.

You're familiar with all of those factors if you read the earlier posts published on this site.

My comment box is open for you to tell me what more you want. Blog commenting also helps build relations between you and me.

Now, I'm going to tell you something about the featured snippets.

What are Featured Snippets?

Featured Snippets are specific search results that Google display on the top of SERPs inside the special type of blocks or boxes. It is also known as the ''Answer boxes'', ''Rich Answer'' ''one box''.

According to Google, ''We display featured snippets when our systems determine this format will help people more easily discover what they’re seeking ...''

Where do these featured snippets come from?

Google clarified that these snippets come from web search listings. In other words, the content inside a snippet comes automatically from the web page indexed by Google.

Who decides whether a page would make a featured snippet to highlight in response to a specific search? It is determined by the automated system of Google's algorithm.

Three categories of snippets are there- paragraph snippets, list snippets, and table snippets. The most common is the paragraph snippet that occupies nearly 82% of the total featured snippets.

What are the Benefits of Obtaining Featured Snippets?

Featured Snippets can increase-

Authority,

Ranking,

Organic traffic,

CTR, and

Revenue

You've learned that featured snippets can improve Voice Search Optimization.
If you obtain featured snippets, the probability of rank on the first page of Google is 99.58%
Featured snippets boost CTR, Organic traffic(up to 30%), and revenue from organic traffic(677%).

And, Featured Snippets can decrease- Competition. Yes, you can beat competitors via featured snippets.

How to get a featured snippet?

Modify the SEO strategy. Yes, that's the simple answer in a single sentence.

If you want a descriptive article on Featured Snippets, please do write to the comment box. I'll publish that on this site.

I've discussed enough the voice search, let me move towards the next trending SEO factors for 2021.

4. Create Visual Content or incorporate visuals into your text to get more Traffic

Image, Video, and Infographic are 3 important trending formats. So you need to incorporate them into your blog posts.

Image

I've covered every crucial aspect of Image SEO- image collection, filename, formats, size, alt text, and more. Read here the Master Guide to image optimization.

Video

From the inception of techazu, I've been recommending opening a youtube channel and upload a video. Youtube is the second most search engine after Google with over 2 billion users.

The journey started with a single video, ''Me at the zoo'' uploaded on 23rd April 2005 by Jawed Karim, one of the co-founders of Youtube.

'Me at the zoo'' uploaded by Javwed Karim, co-founder of youtube

'Me at the zoo'', The first video uploaded on youtube by Jawed Karim-
Image source-youtube

You can't miss grabbing the opportunity to reach an insane amount of audience.

Read here how to make your video go viral.

Infographic

Recently I've published a king-sized article on How to Create the Best Visual Content. That covers infographics and other visuals.

5. Speed Optimization is Super Essential (Core Web Vital)

The users want to get the answers to their queries fast.

In the last core update of its algorithm, Google announced three new metrics related to page-load to be considered to measure the users' experience.

To deliver a great UX, It is essential to fulfilling the quality guidelines provided by Google known as Core web Vitals.

It focuses on the 3 aspects of user experience relating to page speed-loading, interactivity, and visual stability.

Three metrics used to measure the performance are-

1. LCP-Largest Contentful Pain (2.5 Seconds)

2. FID-First Input Delay (100 milliseconds)

3. CLS- Cumulative Layout Shift (0.1)

6. Research on Long-Tail Keywords and LSI keywords- Use Wisely

Long-tail keywords and semantically related keywords are becoming more significant. Here, you'll learn about how to play with long-tail keywords for sure success.

But, before jumping to elaborate, I'd try to eliminate the confusion which might have in your mind about the importance of a keyword for SEO.

Are keywords still relevant to SEO in 2021?

Keywords are now a controversial topic among bloggers. Some say it's no longer relevant others say it's still essential.

After the 2020 core update of Google, many started saying that "the game of keywords is over" meaning, it has lost its importance in SEO. Wrong, Wrong, and again Wrong!

The truth is, keywords are still relevant for SEO. The method of using keywords is not as simple as before. So, the adjustment in the strategy is essential.

The keyword is still relevant today. But the method of use and placement of keywords from now onward should be different. I've published an article on keyword research to guide you.

A decade ago, SEO was meant for keyword maximization but not now. Today, it means content optimization with 100% user satisfaction. So you should create content to satisfy your audience and optimize it to help the search engines.

Remember, the keyword is not the only factor you should focus on. But it doesn't mean that you should avoid or neglect it. Instead, you should play with keywords more intelligently than before.

What are Long Tail Keywords?

Long-tail keywords for success of a blog

Blogging success with long-tail keywords

Long-tail keywords are the search terms longer than 2 words with low volume. The aim of this article is to guide the new blogger on how to play with them. Every professional blogger starts content writing with keyword research.

Consider the following search phrases to understand better-

Bloggers
Indian Bloggers
Indian Female Bloggers
Indian Top Female Bloggers
Indian Top Female Bloggers Under 30.

So, long-tail keywords are longer than 2 words, more specific, lower search volumes, lower competition but a higher conversion rate.

Semantically related keywords (LSI)

Semantically related keywords, aka LSI (Latent Semantic Index), are the keywords that are conceptually related to your main keywords.

If Blog is the main keyword, it has a relation or link to other words like domain, hosting, URL, content/post, SEO, and many.

Search engines can understand better your topics and articles. In other words, a semantic Keyword helps Google to understand the contextual aspect of your content.

Where should I get semantically related keywords?

Here they are. Yup!

On the search field of LSIgraph, I typed the headline of this content which is a longtail keyword. I got a bunch of related keywords with volume, CPC, and competition. The good news is, It's a free tool.

Screenshot of latent semantic index keyword displays by LSIGraph.

Why long-tail keywords are important for new bloggers?

It helps to the optimization of voice search. The users speak more than type as it is convenient.

Competition is low that increases the further chance of higher ranking.

Rank higher with long-tail is easy as completion is lower for a long-tail than a single-word keyword.

Describing to multiple long-tail keywords automatically turns your article into a log-form.

As the search queries are specific, users likely to click on the URL.

How to find tons of long-tail keywords?

This is not the era of doing keyword stuffing and rank. So, find the pain point of the audience and show the solution. You have to refine your strategy.

7. Create FAQ Page to Rank Higher

Create an FAQ Page to meet the maximum relevant queries of the audience.

Besides, create content with the question-answer style. For the old blog post, create an FAQ section for each content.

Why FAQ is essential for SEO?

FAQ section provides multiple benefits- these are

increases further useful information
increases the length of content
covers the optimization voice search queries
Increases the probability of getting featured snippets
more space to insert the long tail-key words.

How to create FAQ-style content?

This article is self-explanatory. Read the from beginning to end. You'll find a lot of questions with answers.

8. Local Listing may Impact Page Ranking

Local listings, like Google my business, Bing, Yahoo will play a vital role in the ranking of voice search.

The purpose of local listing is to create an online profile to enhance online visibility. Local listing helps the search engine to know the name of your brand name, business activities, address, contact number, and more.

Here are some stats on local search that may help you understand why the local listing is crucial.

97% of consumers search online for a local business meaning, you are missing them if not listed
46% of all Google searches are related to local information
67% of consumers prefer businesses that customize their ads and content to their location
78% of mobile searches for local businesses result in an offline purchase.

According to Chatmeter,

76% of people, after conducting a mobile-based local search visit a business within 24 hours.
The has been a 900% growth of search phrases ''near me tonight/today'' just in 2 years.
88% of customers prefer online reviews as much as personal recommendations.
28% of mobile-based local searches result in the same-day purchase.

Customers are mostly used voice search to find the restaurant, hotels, food delivery, grocery stores, medicine stores, doctors near their locations.

58% of internet users use voice search to find local business information.

[source: Search Engine Land].

The growing trend of local and hyper-local searches encourages business owners to list their businesses locally.

Apart from Google My Business, you can list your brand on the yellow page, Yahoo, Bing, and other local search platforms. Local listing on multiple platforms increases the chances of local customers finding you.

9. Bonus Point- Go Mobile Friendly to double the benefits of Search rankings.

Conclusion

Search engine optimization has become complicated now. It is not the job of doing and forget. Instead, continuous research, monitoring, and upgrading will help to rank higher.

Through refining the SEO and digital marketing strategies, you can grow fast. So, optimize the uncovered SEO elements and Redesign the life of your content.

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