SEO 2023 Update: What's Next?

There is no doubt that SEO is a complex and ever-changing field. Regardless of the difficulties, the effort is always worthwhile. You'll be able to achieve great results for your business if you can stay ahead of the trends and optimise your content accordingly. Predicting the future of SEO is difficult because search engine algorithms are constantly changing and evolving. However, by taking a closer look at some of the industry's most recent trends and changes, we can get a better idea of what to expect soon. We'll look at some of the top SEO trends that are expected to take hold in the next year or two in this blog post. So, what SEO trends can we expect to see in 2023? Continue reading to learn more, and begin developing your SEO strategy right away! Let's begin with some statistics to demonstrate why it's critical to keep up with SEO developments and adjust to Google's algorithms as soon as possible.

You can't afford to ignore those numbers as a marketer, and you should keep them in mind as you plan, implement, and evaluate your SEO strategy. Let's take a look at some recent developments that will have a big impact on how we do SEO soon!

The first of our latest SEO trends is a focus on user search intent. This trend has been popular for many years and will continue to be so in 2023. Creating pages that focus on user search intent is critical to SEO success in 2023.

User search intent, or the reason someone searches, is critical for helping you rank in search results. People conduct searches to find specific information. You will not rank well in search results if your page does not provide the required information. Look at what's already ranking for your pages' key terms if you want to meet the user's search intent. If you're trying to rank for "how to organize your closet," you'd look at the search results to see what's ranking.

Mobile-first indexing, first introduced by Google in 2019, is possibly the most game-changing development in SEO. This means that Google will now prioritize mobile-friendly websites over non-mobile-friendly websites. This is a significant shift, and you must be prepared for it if you want your website to rank well in the coming years. With mobile devices accounting for more than half of all web traffic, it's no surprise that Google emphasizes mobile-friendliness in its search algorithm. Since 73% of internet users are expected to access the web solely through their smartphones by 2025, making high-level analytical projections isn't necessary to determine that your website needs to be optimized for smaller screens.

This includes ensuring that your site is responsive, loads quickly, and is simple to navigate on a mobile device. Check that the meta-tags on your mobile and desktop devices are the same. If your website isn't mobile-friendly, you can expect to see a drop in rankings very soon. Not sure how your website ranks in terms of mobile-friendliness? To determine whether your website is mobile-friendly, use Google's free mobile-friendly test.

Website speed is both the present and the future of SEO.

As more people access the Internet on the go, whether via laptop or smartphone, it's becoming increasingly important for businesses to provide fast website experiences. As a result, Google introduced Core Web Vitals, one of its newest ranking factors.

Google Core Web Vitals examines:

Google is essentially interested in how long it takes for people to begin interacting with your content. How quickly can users access the information they need to answer their question, whether it's how to tie a tie or where to buy a tie, after landing on your site?

Page speed will continue to be an important ranking factor, so audit it quarterly. This way, you can find and implement updates regularly, avoiding becoming overwhelmed with what needs to be fixed. If you don't have the resources to monitor and improve your page speed in-house, you can always hire someone to do it for you.

People are increasingly using voice assistants such as Siri, Alexa, and Google Assistant to conduct web searches. By 2022, it is expected that 55% of households will have a smart speaker, increasing to 75% by 2025. And as voice search improves at understanding natural language, that number will only rise. The rise of voice search will have a significant impact on how we do SEO, so it's critical to consider how voice search will affect your website.

Here are a few things you can do to ensure your site is voice-search-ready: Ensure that your website is mobile-friendly. Voice searchers frequently use smartphones or other mobile devices to conduct searches, so it's critical that your site can accommodate them. Next, concentrate on long-tail keywords to mimic how people speak. People who search aloud use natural language rather than abbreviated keywords that they might type into a search engine.

The introduction of RankBrain in 2015 was one of the most significant changes in recent years. RankBrain is a hybrid AI/machine learning algorithm that assists Google in interpreting search queries and providing more relevant results based on user intent. The exact workings of this algorithm are unknown, but the logic is nicely illustrated by Hubspot's example: When you search for "the scary hotel movie with the maze," the RankBrain algorithm returns results for The Shining. It does this by guessing what you want to do, which in this case is probably to find the name of a certain movie.

SEO strategy? This change has had a significant impact on SEO and how Google interprets ranking signals. RankBrain is the third most important core algorithm after backlinks and content. We will see a shift away from keywords and toward user intent. Although keyword stuffing is still an effective way to game the system and get your website to rank higher, search engines are becoming much more sophisticated and are better at understanding user intent. As a result, keywords will become increasingly irrelevant.

Final Thoughts

SEO's future is more integrated. The emphasis will be on long-term growth rather than short-term gains, and smart technology that assists you in identifying and monitoring organic search opportunities will become even more important. However, the fundamental SEO practices will remain the same: content is still king, and brands are still queening. Both are required to establish an organic search presence.