The field of search engine optimization (SEO) is always evolving, and the year 2022 is already shaping up to be an interesting one for the business. The Core Web Vitals Update and the Page Experience Update were two major Google algorithm adjustments in 2021, and there will be more in 2022.
Digital marketing requires a thorough understanding of SEO trends. In 2022, the top search engine optimization trends will be accessibility, mobile friendliness, machine learning, and overall fantastic Google Search experiences.
SEO Trends of 2022
Here are seven SEO recommendations and trends for 2022:
1. Site usability metrics will matter more
As indicated by their 2021 Page Experience upgrade, Google is prioritising site speed that provides the greatest user experience. They’ve demonstrated that they’re not afraid to penalise sites that don’t satisfy specified performance and UI/UX criteria (Core Web Vitals), as well as those that aren’t accessible.
Almost everything that has to do with on-page search engine optimization incorporates UX and UI in some form. It doesn’t matter if you have the finest content in the world if consumers can’t consume it due to a terrible online experience.
For a better user experience in 2022, what site characteristics should you focus for SEO?
- Site Speed: If your site takes more than 5 seconds to load, you risk losing 40% of your visitors. Site speed is a vital aspect of any successful web experience, and with the correct UI design components and technical SEO, it can be kept fast.
- Accessibility: The W3C (World Wide Web Consortium) manages the WCAG (Web Content Accessibility Principles), an internationally recognised set of guidelines for digital accessibility. Your site’s organisation and usage must be accessible to all users, as measured by perceivability, operability, understandability, and resilience.
- Mobile readiness: The majority of Google search users access the service via a mobile device. As a result, when indexing and ranking a website, Google now applies mobile-first indexing. This means it’s critical to make sure your site runs properly on mobile and is simple to read and navigate for mobile consumers. Many of these SEO trends for 2022 include mobile friendliness.
- Interstitial Experience: Interstitials (such as pop-ups and advertisements) must not obstruct the page’s accessibility or look intrusively. This is particularly true while utilising mobile devices. I’ve noticed that Google is progressively penalising these popups.
2. Content generation with AI machine learning algorithms
Artificial intelligence is transforming nearly every business, and SEO is no exception. Machine learning allows AI technology to process large amounts of data at a faster rate than humans, interpret the data, and then utilise it to automate a range of marketing operations. Using AI (like GPT-3) in marketing will be one of the top SEO techniques in 2022 and beyond, from chatbots to data analysis to content development.
In 2021, content producers like GrowthBar and Copy AI exploded. Both tools are based on OpenAI’s GPT-3, a natural language model that generates human-like written material from inputs and algorithms, such as a blog post, article title, brief description, social media caption, and more.
AI-assisted content generators are altering the SEO game by saving time and money, as well as overcoming writer’s block and giving new ideas.
These technologies will be extremely beneficial to all digital marketers. In 2022, data-driven software solutions for content development and SEO will continue to grow in popularity.
3. The continued importance of backlinks
The 2020 presidential election and Covid-19 have permanently altered how we absorb information – and even falsehoods. Google will continue to prioritise backlink equity for SEO rankings as a way to earn the confidence of searchers. The value a site contributes by connecting to yours, as determined by domain authority, current Google rankings, and other factors, is known as link equity.
As a result, every decent SEO plan must include the creation of (useful) backlinks. They’re one of the most effective ways for Google to determine whether or not your website is reliable enough to refer searchers to via better ranks.
Backlinks have long been one of the most important SEO ranking variables. A link linking to your site from another site may have a significant influence on where that page or your site ranks in the search results, with the best links coming from sites with a higher DA that are in the same space or niche as you. When a site like that links to a piece of your material, it’s telling Google that your content is valuable enough to be suggested.
Strong backlinks to your site is a 2022 SEO trend you’ll want to follow, even if the relevance of backlinks has been contested over the years.
4. Semantic search opportunities
This term is frequently used but rarely fully explained. Semantic search is a type of machine learning-assisted intent and contextual meaning-based search. It improves the search experience by using historical data and trial and error to make it easier for customers to locate what they’re looking for.
Google is a business, and its mission is to make getting answers to searches as simple as possible so that users keep coming back to Google. On your end, you want it to be as easy to locate and utilise your site as possible so that customers return.
Let’s pretend you’ve finished the last three books in the Dune trilogy. Maybe you bought them online, wrote a review, or searched up information about them. Now you’re browsing for “vacation excellent book ideas.” Now, a good book to you may be very different from a good book to someone else, but utilising semantic search, you shouldn’t be shocked to see the next Dune book, as well as several other popular science fiction novels, appear top on that list.
Every website that appears should be selling Dune novels, and ordering and sending these books to the searcher should be as simple as feasible. The goal of semantic search is to offload the effort from the searcher to the backend.
The growth of semantic search has two implications for SEO professionals:
- Secondary keywords are quite important. Because Google can deduce the intent of queries and publications, the keywords you use to surround your main keyword are crucial. Instead of focusing just on one or two key phrases, be sure to address the different ways in which searchers think and write about a subject. Consider it in the context of voice search. As more people become mobile-first, more people are turning to voice search. So, what are people saying into their phones for this post: “Biggest SEO Trends for the Year 2022,” “How is SEO evolving in 2022,” “What do I need to know about SEO in 2022,” and so on.
- Of course, you must submit accurate information in response to all of these inquiries. Your article should address the Googler’s main inquiry as well as any other questions they might have concerning the subject. This not only helps with #1, but it also gives searchers a better experience and keeps them on your website longer. Longer content have historically ranked higher on Google, and this is one of the reasons. If you can’t think of an organic method to integrate crucial topic questions, try including FAQs in your postings.
By keeping these two in mind, you’ll be able to provide a detailed response to the search query while also producing high-quality material.
5. Google will expand SERP features and the Knowledge Graph
Many times, you don’t even need to click on a search result to find the information you need. Lyrics, airline information, local companies, and a slew of other searches begin and conclude with Google’s highlighted snippets on the Google search engine results page (Google SERP).
Google’s Knowledge Graph and Passage Ranking algorithms leverage user data to offer you with relevant information. Google’s objective is to assist searchers discover the information they need with the least amount of content possible, while still giving them the option to “dig deeper and broader” in their searches.
While this is beneficial to searchers, businesses that rely on lead generation may be disappointed by the lower amount of visitors to their websites.
What are your options for dealing with this? When searchers can locate what they’re searching for without having to click at all, titles, headers, URLs, and quality content will all play a big role in improving CTR. If you don’t think your full content will rank, strive to get a section of it to rank towards the top of the SERP.
6. YouTube & Video Optimization
Last year, the number of channels earning $10,000 or more per year increased by 50%. Video is taking over the Google search engine results page (SERP), and I’m sure you’ve seen firms leveraging YouTube, TikTok, Instagram videos, and other video platforms to increase consumer engagement and attract new consumers.
So, if optimising video content isn’t already part of your SEO strategy, you should start doing so in 2022. There are a few of new techniques to add rich information to YouTube videos and boost their worth, in addition to employing keywords in the title, URL, and description. These three are my favourites:
- Clip markup: Clip markup allows you to highlight important areas of your video so that viewers may jump right to them. In essence, you can tell Google exactly what timestamp and label you want to use for your featured moments, and they will appear in Google search to assist offer an overview of your topic. You may accomplish this using code or by using YouTube, which will do it for you automatically.
- Seek markup: Seek markup informs Google about the structure of your URLs. This information is crucial since it allows Google to automatically display the essential portions of your movie rather of having to do so manually, as with Clip markup.
- Closed captioning: Closed captioning for YouTube videos allows you to make videos more accessible to persons who speak other languages or have hearing impairments.
7. EAT Always
EAT is essential to all aspects of search engine optimization, even if this 2022 SEO trend isn’t really new.
Your content must have EAT: expertise, authority, and trust in order to provide a pleasant user experience, develop amazing SEO content, build up your backlinks to match the ranking criteria, and finish up on the Google SERP. The more knowledgeable you are about a subject, the more authority you have, and the more Google and searchers will trust you. The more trusted you are, the more backlinks you’ll acquire, the higher you’ll rank, the more authority you’ll have, and so on. It’s critical to prioritise all three factors since they produce a feedback loop of higher- or lower-rankings.
According to the Quality Rater Guidelines, Google has placed a greater emphasis on E-A-T as a ranking criterion, and this will continue in 2022.
Conclusion
It’s critical to remain current with the newest SEO trends and methods because Google’s algorithm changes every year.
Though these changes and tips and techniques may appear sophisticated, SEO actually boils down to something that all businesses should prioritise in the first place: offering useful, accurate, and entertaining information to those who are seeking for it. And this is a pattern that will continue indefinitely.