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5 Facts Every CMO Should Know About SEO in 2018

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Multiple changes have taken place in the digital world since our generation is developing with the trending technologies. Some were successful, but others were utterly confusing, to say the least. However, during this process, some subtle SEO trends came into the picture. For instance, Google’s decision to completely put a…

Multiple changes have taken place in the digital world since our generation is developing with the trending technologies. Some were successful, but others were utterly confusing, to say the least. However, during this process, some subtle SEO trends came into the picture. For instance, Google’s decision to completely put a full stop on Google Authorship was clear. The changes which took place made one thing very evident; this decision affected all the industries. Know more about the Top 6 SEO Trends that will Dominate 2018.

Let’s take a sneak look at five facts every professional CMO needs to know about SEO in 2018.

#1. Google Penalizes Paid Links

Purchasing links from link networks used to be the quickest and easiest way to get your site listed high in organic search rankings. Now, buying links will get you penalized and your search traffic will all but disappear. Google’s statistics will be updated more frequently and on a daily basis which actually means that sites buying links will be identified much more quickly than in the past. The updates will be sent out over longer periods of time, making it more difficult to identify what is causing your rankings to fall – that is, if you do in fact see your traffic falling.

#2. Mobile responsive website

If your site is difficult to view and/or read on a smartphone or tablet, there is no chance that the visitor will stay on your site for very long. More and more buyers of professional services are going online to find and search firms before they engage in a conversation with you. As more and more of these same buyers are using mobiles in their daily lives, it’s inevitable that a higher proportion of website traffic will come from these instruments.

#3. SEO no longer a single entity

Nowadays, SEO comprises of content marketing, social media, email marketing, copywriting, research, and various other elements. The times of going to the back end of a site and impending hidden keywords are over. There was a time when you could hire someone with some technical SEO knowledge and see an improvement. Put lots of keyword-rich anchor text here, buy some links there, and voila! – you would see some instant results. If you can avoid using URL links, it would be good. If you have more than two URL links, it's probably worth making a serious investment to rewrite them as still, readable, text.

#4. More investment in exceptional SEO

More investment of time and resources is a given if we focus a lot of time in SEO. The stepping stones of your campaign need to include content which should be both useful and shareable. This content should be portrayed in different formats. Blog posts, videos, reports, and e-books are few examples. In order to structure this content, you will need authors, marketing strategists, and subject experts – all working together. There are exceptions like those Google enables for developers seeking to use the hashbang format for dynamic AJAX applications. However, even these aren't nearly as clean, visitor-friendly, or simply from an SEO perspective as statically rewritten URLs. Sites from Amazon all the way to Twitter have found tremendous benefit in simplifying their previously complex and hash/hashbang-employing URLs. If you can, please avoid it.

#5. Prospects of every stratum should be given importance

Some diverse techniques are used for tracking clicks (like those inserted by popular social sharing apps such as Buffer). In general, these don't cause a huge problem, but they may make for some awkwardly long URLs. Use your own sensibility whether the tracking technique benefits or outweigh the negatives. A study from a 2014 RadiumOne suggests that social sharing (which has positive, but usually indirect impacts on SEO) with shorter URLs that clearly communicate the site and content perform better than non-branded short or long, unclear URL strings. Let us discuss a quick example. An owner of a management consulting firm only cares about the people that are engaging with his firm’s content that could possibly be business prospects. If business prospects are engaging with your content, that is great. We should always make it a point that our content is engaging and it is written in the prospect’s language. The language will make a huge difference because it’s not always what you say, but how you say it. Being on top of the search page is every business’ need today, but since organic positions cannot be bought in this day and age, we need to build up the framework strategically. For consultation and strategically building your business chart, please contact us.

Key Takeaways:

  • Love it or hate it, SEO isn't dead.
  • Marketers are spending more on SEO, which means more competition.
  • Content marketing and social media combined is the best, holistic approach to SEO.
  • More traffic and higher conversions come from mobile.
  • Organic search leads convert higher than social and outbound leads

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If search engine optimization (SEO) is something that you are interested in but don't know how to get started, contact us today to schedule your marketing analysis.

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