What are the SEO trends in 2020? The Google search engine has evolved over the years. It is normal that you do not always know how to position your website on the web since trends are changing! In order to offer an optimized service to its customers and to fully understand the new expectations of Google, our SEO agency is continuously trained. This is why we decided to share with you ten good practices to set up for an optimized SEO in 2020.
1. Optimize your website from design
First of all, it is imperative that you focus on the technical functioning of your site. A site whose design has been sloppy is unlikely to be in the first pages of results. In addition, the user experience will also be impacted. However, the slower and more poorly structured a page, the more the desire to stay or to buy on your site is challenged by the user. The abandonment will, therefore, be the consequence of a poorly designed site.
Here are some simple tips:
- Each website has what is called hosting, that is to say, a server on which its content is stored. For a site well designed from the start, it must be hosted by a reliable company and close to the area you want to target.
- Your site code should be as precise and simple as possible so that Google’s algorithms can read it easily.
- Also, pay attention to the weight of your images: the heavier they are, the more they will slow down the loading of your pages.
It is very important that these parameters, among many others, are directly implemented on your site. Thinking and creating your website in order to optimize the user experience is really essential, indeed
2. Optimize the internal mesh
Internal networking is the organization of internal links on your website. These hypertext links make it possible to guide the visitor from one page to another. It should not, however, be abused: 5 links maximum per page will suffice. They must also be logical and not be placed randomly. Use them only when necessary!
The advantage of internal networking is that it allows search engines to better understand the links between each page of your site. It also helps to make Google algorithms understand the importance of certain pages that you want to highlight. To do this, there are several internal networking strategies. For example, there is a clustering strategy. It consists of defining a mother page that you wish to highlight. When you have defined it, add links that redirect to the content of the same theme on different pages of your site.
3. Create quality and engaging content
Creating good content cannot be improvised! It is very important that through your website or blog, you disseminate quality content in the eyes of Google but especially of your community.
Here are some tips for quality content:
- The content of your site should answer the questions that your readers are asking. Information, in fact, must be relevant and of high added value. You must master your theme on your fingertips to share your expertise with your visitors.
- Remember to structure this information carefully, so that readers and search engines can quickly understand your content. Consider in particular the <HTML /> markup which must be flawless (title 1, title 2, bold, italics, etc.).
- Work on the semantic field of your content. Before, Google only took into account the number of keywords and the number of times they appeared on a web page. Today, the semantic field around your keyword counts enormously and allows Google to judge but especially to understand the relevance and the context of your content.
4. Detect and process your zombie pages
It is very likely that your website has zombie pages, that is, pages that generate little or no traffic and that finds it difficult to rank on search engines.
So what to do with them? Deleting them is not the best solution because they contribute to your SEO. We recommend that you treat these pages by rethinking a new content strategy. Optimize them from a technical point of view by reworking the design of your site in general. You can review, for example, the internal network, the backlinks … Do not forget to do editorial optimization by choosing a lexical field suited to your keywords.
How to deal with zombie pages on your site?
- Check the page load time
- Redefine a user experience using internal mesh
- Add quality backlinks to these pages
- Check the keywords of the defined lexical field
- Group pages that deal with the same subject
- Write unique and different content from one page to another
Deleting a zombie page should be used ed as a last resort. If you have no other choice, always check that internal and external links do not point to this page in question and create 301 redirects if necessary.
5. Think “Google EAT”
Google EAT is a new process that Google algorithms carry out to interpret web pages. It is on the basis of three criteria that Google will determine the relevance of a site and its content.
- “E” for Expertise (Expertise)
Google believes that you should be an expert in your field. The content that you highlight must be relevant and illustrate all of your expertise on your topic.
- “A” for Authoritativeness
In addition to your expertise in your field, you need to develop your authority. But how should you do it? Make appearances on other online platforms as well as on social networks, while redirecting the public to your website. Also, make sure you receive backlinks from influential authority sites in your field.
- “T” for Trust (Credibility)
Your website and the image you want to convey must be credible in the eyes of your audience. Check that certain parameter are properly implemented such as browsing in HTTPS, a secure payment method, legal notices, a Google My Business page, authority site links, quality images, a real physical address, the speed of your site.
Google EAT therefore a major change in the assessment of the relevance and quality of the pages referenced e s. Thanks to the EAT algorithm, Google no longer permanently indexes poor-quality pages in its search results. When creating new pages on your site, be sure to respect these three main parameters to optimize your chances of being better referenced.
6. Think SXO (Search eXperience Optimization)
The SXO is the perfect marriage between natural referencing and the user experience. Right now, it’s important that you think about incorporating the user journey into your SEO strategy.
Every detail counts! You should know, for example, that on your page, each additional second of loading represents a conversion rate which decreases. It is therefore important not to waste your user time.
Define your persona, ie your typical client. The persona will contribute to a better understanding of the needs and expectations of your users in relation to your content. You will be able to use this better understanding of your audience to adapt your SEO strategy in relation to the user experience. SXO is one of the keys that will guarantee your site to create a real positioning with much more added value.
7. Bet on external links (Backlinks)
To increase your visibility, it is important that you are recommended in your field in order to improve your notoriety. Having backlinks (external links) from other quality sites and from the same field of activity as yours is now one of the most important criteria for SEO. Indeed, Google analyzes the most qualitative content and the most appreciated by other users on the web. These external links will therefore greatly help you in terms of natural referencing and this, in a sustainable manner.
External links are useful because they are recommendations placed inside the content of external sites redirecting to a page on your site and vice versa. These backlinks must be relevant and mainly from the same theme (the global theme of your activity) as your content. The positioning of Google with regard to backlinks is strong because it requires to be coherent in its strategy of external links and to obtain them as naturally as possible. It is possible to buy backlinks, but this solution is to be avoided. Some sites sell backlinks in large quantities but in a non-targeted and irrelevant way: your pages will be recommended by sites that do not have the same theme as yours! Google will then understand that your backlinks are not relevant and will penalize you on the search engines. However, the purchase of relevant and quality backlinks is still possible provided you go through a specialized agency.
How to get relevant backlinks?
- Exchange links
- Write an article on a partner
- List sites that discuss similar topics and establish a partnership
- Offer your product for free to influential players
- Put a link of your site on Google My Business as well as on other local directories
The last tip, respect the structure of your business. It is much more difficult to publicize the site of an SME internationally because it is much too vast and it requires colossal means. It is therefore preferable, at first, to increase its notoriety locally.
8. Consider voice search
This is undoubtedly one of the very big advances in terms of SEO trends in 2020: do a voice search! Who has never used Siri, Alexa or Google assistant for information? These applications are based on voice recognition technology to allow users to make a request orally and receive, in return, a response dictated by a voice assistant. In the near future, the number of devices benefiting from this technology will literally explode.
Sundar Pichai, the Google CEO recently confirmed that 20% of mobile queries to the current time the were vocal. For the moment, it is a question of using this technology for small basic and local researches. In the near future, voice search will be used more and more by the general public. It is therefore important that you adapt your content to this type of request! Try to create clear content that can answer a question. At present, it is no longer just a question of creating quality content but it is imperative to optimize it by taking into account conversational language.
9. Adapt your site to mobiles
According to Google, mobile website consultation represents 60% of global searches. This figure makes you realize that it is essential that you adapt your site to this type of navigation. The “mobile-first” index is an index created by Google which uses mobile content to analyze and classify content for search results. The index is not the same for queries made from other devices, for example on a computer.
Several parameters that influence SEO on mobile:
- The crawling budget, that is to say, the maximum number of pages that Google is able to analyze on your website.
- The contents
- Speed: Google PageSpeed or lighthouse insights will help you easily access the loading speed of your pages and advise you on ways to improve it.
- Inbound and outbound links (internal mesh and backlinks)
- User experience (Site adaptable and adapted on mobile)
- Geolocation (for local referencing)
- Pop-ups (to avoid)
These different factors are the main influencers that will increase your visibility on the “mobile-first” index. It is important that your site is adapted on mobile to benefit from better referencing on search engines.
10. Meet Google BERT
Who is this BERT? It is Google’s brand new algorithm and arguably one of the most important updates in the past 5 years. What will change? The results will be even more relevant. According to Google, 10% of queries will be affected. In order to respond more precisely to user research, the American giant wants to improve its capacities to understand natural language. BERT also allows Google to better understand the content it lists in its results. If your content is not of good quality, you will see your chances of being at the top of the ranking decrease. This content must also respond to the questions and expectations of Internet users.
In conclusion
It is hoped that these SEO trends for 2020 will help you improve your positioning in the search engines. The technological advance of Google’s new algorithms processes the most relevant information in order to respond as precisely as possible to the intention of the user’s request. So remember that producing quality content means building good relationships in order to increase your notoriety. Thus, the relevance of your content plays a primordial role, it is undoubtedly one of the great keys to improving your natural referencing on the web.