The name of the game for Search Engine Optimization in 2022 is CONTENT. Now, if you know anything about SEO + Google’s algorithms, you know that content has been king since people have been using ‘SEO’ in their vocabulary. While the landscape has changed, and they might look slightly different, the major challenge facing marketers & business owners is getting their content to rise to the top of the rankings. It seems straightforward, but let us look a little closer with a test case.
You’re a small-town hardware store looking to expand your E-commerce offerings coming off the pandemic. Your cornerstone keyword is, of course, ‘hardware store.’ You jump onto your Google Analytics account to do some keyword research. Your Findings aren’t all that surprising. Average Monthly Searches stand at about 1.5 million for such a broad keyword. Competition is low, so you figure – great, you’d be riding the algorithm to the bank with some strong content. Unfortunately, you’d be very, very wrong.
You pop over to Google yourself to get an idea of what ‘low competition’ means, typing ‘hardware store’ into the search bar, you’d end up with something like this:
Yes, you read that correctly; that’s 3.2 billion (with a B) relevant search results. Each of those 1.5 million hardware store searchers has over three billion different pieces of content that Google considers appropriate. Some quick napkin math means over 2,000 content pieces/user. Google thinks this is ‘low competition. This ocean of content brings us to our first significant SEO challenge in 2022:
WAY more content than searches
You could hire the best content writer in the world, give them a keyword, and they could craft a masterful piece that nails the keywords—and get placed on your already high-authority domain—and STILL be one drop in a vast ocean. Competition in the SEO space is higher than ever (and that’s only going to get worse). The best thing you can do is have a set content strategy in place, backed by incredible, deep, and most importantly – unique—content.
Omni-channel Strategy is a MUST
Magnificent written content on a company blog to boost your Google rankings will only get you so far. Today’s younger generations, as an example, are consuming more video content than any generation prior. The rise of TikTok, YouTube Shorts, Instagram Stories, and Snapchat allows for quick, accessible, and digestible video content that actively engages the customer. Social media can also host those same types of content, in addition to allowing your customers to engage with your business. You also have advertising options like pay-per-click ads, which can beef up your organic search results.
Going Mobile
Your content & website need to be a mobile-friendly – full stop. According to Statista, approximately 4.66 billion active internet users worldwide – 4.32 billion use their mobile devices to access the internet. Optimization for mobile can be a relatively straightforward procedure (compared to generating content) that can have an immediate impact on your bottom line.
Intent behind search
A rising trend in recent years, with Google implementing various machine learning and AI technologies to help make search more conversational with greater insight into the intent behind a search. Ask Google a question around your keyword, say, “what is the best hardware store near me?” and use those searches to deduce WHY your users may be seeking you out.
Sweat the semantics
While we may want to fall back into writing our content for the search engines, the better method is to concentrate on semantic search. Semantics is the branch of linguistics and logic concerned with the meaning (or intent) behind words. Easy ways of doing this are to create your content around the users – answer their questions before they ask them & provide static stats to do so. If you’ve got the authority—you’ll rise right to the top, and Google will even pick out your answers to display for you.
Those are just our top 5 tips. We could go on. Prophase Marketing looks to be your business’ Marketing Department – specifically designing our products and offerings around small-to-medium sized companies. Search Engine Optimization can be a full-time job, with analysis & content generation, each potentially their full-time position. Prophase’s marketing experts can remove the guesswork, help you develop your strategy, and day-to-day ensure your brand or business is optimized. Visit our Services Page to learn more.
