The world of SEO is witnessing dramatic changes all over. The coming year too promises major changes and upgrades in the techniques used to rank a web page better in search engine results. In fact, new trends emerge out every year and are constantly striving to be better and more refined. The year 2018 also holds some crucial trends that are an upgrade over the currently adopted strategies of SEO.
Several important changes have taken place this year such as Google’s AMP, the importance of HTTPS, rich snippets reconfiguration, etc. Most of these new changes will continue into the next year, but would be in a more evolved form. The latest changes to the algorithms of Google means that such improvements in SEO strategies are downright important. Below are a few trends that will shape SEO in 2018.
Structuring of Rich Snippets
Snippets are of two types: rich and regular, and they consist of a URL, Meta description, and a clickable title. Rich snippets are different as it consists of titles that are more condensed with review and an accompanying image. Structuring this snippet formats the HTML that enables search engines to interpret it properly and display it in the SERPs. Such snippets have more likelihood of increasing the click-through rate.
Preference for Voice Search
Voice search is something that was prominent in 2017 and it will continue to dominate in the coming year. More users are using vocal commands and this has led search engines to come up with strategies that give relevance to voice search on par with the typed search. This means that for SEO, the keywords and other aspects should focus more on the terms, phrases, and commands that users commonly use for carrying out a search.
Linkless Backlinks
Yet another dominating trend expected in SEO for the next year is linkless backlinks. Backlinking using links was the key criteria used in SEO up to recent times. However, Google’s Penguin update changed all that and the practice of simply providing backlinks was disapproved. Linkless backlinks mean that the search engines can distinguish between the key search items without the need for linking it to a specific website.
Priority for Faster Pages
The major trend and ranking factor for 2018 will clearly be speed. This is based entirely on the users who demand web pages with faster loading speeds. Google has clearly set the guidelines for a faster site as one that loads up in exactly three seconds or less. By using Google’s PageSpeed Insights, a webmaster can make the page loading much faster, thus earning better rankings among the search results.
Increase in SERP Features
The search engine result pages (SERPs) are getting more advanced compared to the blue hyperlinks and marked ads. Now the SERPs are filled with rich snippets, images, social media listings, ads, widgets, videos, and so on. This will result in an entire restructuring of the SEO strategy, as there are many other offsite elements to consider.