Some recent changes in search I’ve noticed recently include:
- Shorter content is ranking again – so those really really really really really long content marketer-y pieces aren’t necessarily filling all the results pages.
- Age matters – older (high quality) sites got a bump of late.
- High quality inbound links still matter – but they aren’t everything
- You can rank a site with mainly traffic and social signals – but you need to have your in-page SEO really well down
- Mobile matters. I’ll repeat this. Mobile matters. Design for mobile first. AMP. Fast. Don’t get mobile errors in Search Console.
- Speed is everything. Make your content look okay, write it sorta well too, but make that site blazing fast.
- Lead – don’t follow. There is no magic trick. There is no silver bullet. Write your content for a specific audience. Connect with that audience. Give the people what they want. Your ranking should follow. If it doesn’t… well, you connected already, and delivered what they wanted: you don’t need search 🙂
Leave a comment below with your August 2018 onwards thoughts about recent changes in SEO and search engine rankings. I am not the mesiah. I am just someone who has worked on a few thousand sites, and notices a few trends. I don’t see them all, and sometimes, I’m incorrect too. I’m human.
