SEO Trends for 2019 – Part 1

Search engine optimisation (SEO) drives the place of your website when it comes to searches by people using the web to find a product, service or company they are looking for.

Algorithms determine your place in the page rankings by using an equation to understand how well your website meets search criteria. But the problem is, algorithms are secret, we can only guess at what search engines look for.

But we can still hazard a guess at what SEO markers are hits. We take a look at what SEO trends could be for 2019.

#1 SEO will be about responsive web design

And by this, we mean your website must be mobile ready or, better still, responsive so that it can ‘fit’ with the screen of the device being used to view it. The number of searches carried out on devices such as smartphones and tablets is increasing and its clear that the big search engines feel that this won’t stop any time soon.

This doesn’t mean a new website but it does mean a website audit that looks at the ‘back end’ of the website and how it copes with responding to different access routes.

#2 Think like your customer

When people search for something, they tend to ask the search engine they are using, e.g. Google, a question.

Google and all the others want to give the searcher the answer as quick as possible. Continually sending out crawlers to index info across the web. Is the information on your website clear?

As well as updating website content and maybe adding extra pages with more information about your product or services, make sure the basics are in place. The ‘About us’ page, for example – does it say what you do? Are your giving this information in answer to a question?

#3 Consider the power of video

Web design went ‘flat’ for a time, using understated graphics and colours. Slowly, we are seeing colours flood back onto pages but there seems to be something else that search engines are looking for, Google in particular.

Movement and interaction are now thought to be part of Google’s secret algorithm for ranking websites, although this is not confirmed by anyone. Consider adding a video or photo carousel to your website IF this works for your products, services or brand.

#4 SEO & brand reputation…

… and that means getting social but also being proactive in how your brand is seen online. This doesn’t mean you have to join every single social media platform – choose one or two that sit well with your brand and where your customers are at – and neither does it mean spending hours across forums every day either.

What it does mean is controlling your brand reputation online by determining what information is given out and where. There is some suggestion that using Google My Business could be the way forward for brands who rely on their geographical location, for example, a handy ‘extra’ bump up for when it comes to ranking on page 1.

#5 Quality content will be an SEO must in 2019

At one time, content means blogs. Today, the term content arguably has a wide definition. It means ALL the information you give out on the web.

This means quality captions for your Instagram posts and stories, as well as fantastic high-quality blog content on your own blog. It also means ‘guest posts’, the posts that get put onto third-party sites by you or an agency acting on your behalf.

Effectively, quality content will hit SEO – keywords and phrases – but will primarily be written for people. It will inform and educate, as well as be written in a format people can access. All this adds up to authority and that you can be trusted in your field.

In summary

As 2019 rolls in, you need to spend time assessing your website, its content and its performance. You need to look wider across the web to determine how authoritative your website looks in the eyes of others. And we have also seen the first hint at making the most of your geographical location. In part 2, we’ll take a look at another five SEO trends 2019.