SEO Best Practices in 2021

21
Feb 2021

magnifying-glass-on-a-computer-laptop-wooden-offic-SEO Best Practices 2021

SEO best practices have rapidly evolved over the last 10 years. Are you up to date with which SEO strategies are most important to help your business succeed? Keep reading to make sure you’re putting effort into what matters most.

 

Backlinks: Quality Over Quantity

As Google’s algorithm has evolved, the integrity of backlinks has had more influence on SEO ranking. Acquiring backlinks from reputable websites with desirable ranking can help your website get indexed faster, get recognized as valuable content, and can improve your ranking and searchability. This kind of quality backlinking can be achieved through partnerships and collaborations. However, it’s best-achieved organically through producing high-quality sharable content. 

 

A Secure Website

A website with an SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) certificate ensures visitors that hackers can’t intercept any of their data. According to a survey from HubSpot Research, 85% of people stated that they will not continue browsing if a site is not secure. Furthermore, unsecured websites will not rank as high in search results.

 

Outbound Links

Linking to another website can sometimes be seen as a bad practice, however there is nothing wrong when this is done to enhance the user experience and add value to your content. 

 

Meta Descriptions

The short page descriptions that appear under the title in search are a major influence on whether someone clicks on your website. Meta descriptions can also be transferred to social media when your content is shared, so keep them under 160 characters and include key phrases.

 

Quality Pop-ups 

It’s all about the user experience. Google doesn’t penalize all pop-ups, just the ones that get in the way of a user’s ability to easily access content on a page, especially when they’re using a mobile device. 

 

Local Search

If you’re a local business, optimizing for local search will help you get found by people who are more likely to buy from you.

 

Webpages: Quality Over Quantity

Great content is the number one thing that helps a website be discoverable. However, search engines may omit your webpages from search results if they seem too similar to content that is already indexed.

 

User Experience

It’s important to focus on improving things like page load time, bounce rate, time on page, page views per visit, and how far a person scrolls down the page. Helping customers navigate your site easily and ensuring a positive user experience will appease search algorithms and improve your ranking.

 

Optimized Images 

Google uses both URLs and file names to understand images, making optimization an essential part of the discovery process. Since Google rewards pages with faster load speed, it’s important to ensure that oversized images aren’t contributing to a slow page-load time.

 

Mobile Strategy

Starting July 1, 2019, Google began rolling out mobile-first indexing by default for new websites. With the influx of mobile users on search in addition to these algorithm updates, neglecting mobile strategy could be detrimental to your website’s ability to be found online.

 

93% of online experiences begin with a search engine.

 

Are you interested in making your website more searchable to potential customers? Do you need help optimizing your SEO and finding a strategy that works for your business?

 

CLICK HERE for a complimentary 30-minute digital marketing audit.

 

 

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