Top SEO Trends to Watch in 2024

Is SEO still relevant in 2024?

Amid the rise of other digital marketing channels and strategies, is search engine optimisation still relevant?

The answer is a resounding yes!

It will continue to evolve with newer SEO tactics that are in line with current trends and user behaviour changes in the vast digital landscape.

SEO remains kicking and essentially not dead in 2024.

Top 10 SEO Trends in 2024 to Watch & Prioritise

From the meteoric rise of AI and machine learning to the surge of high-intent keywords, here are top 10 trends to watch out for in SEO in 2024.

Surge in AI-generated content

Since the launch of ChatGPT in November 2022 and other AI writing tools that followed suit, millions of users have taken advantage of their groundbreaking convenience.

These tools tremendously speed up content creation and make employing human writers almost needless.

But as you may already know, there’s a big catch here.

With more and more businesses and marketers relying on AI for content creation, that also means human users are being fed the same type of generic, unoriginal content that provides no real or additional value.

Not to mention AI writing assistants make mistakes.

Still, there’s no denying what AI tools can do for businesses and human writers alike.

So instead of altogether avoiding AI use or completely relying on it for generating SEO content, the trick is to leverage tools like ChatGPT with a human touch.

That is, use highly specific prompts to train the AI into crafting content that’s not overly generic. You can start by asking your AI assistant to create a detailed outline for your blog.

As the human specialist, your role is to key in a clear prompt that the AI will base its response from. For instance:

High-Quality Content Creation to Counter AI

The only way to counter and beat AI content is to create high-quality content written by a human expert.

Flesh-and-blood writers remain irreplaceable even in the threat of AI takeover.

The latter does not have intuition and cannot provide real-life experiences of which only humans are capable.

Create content that ticks all the boxes of what constitutes ‘high-quality’:

• Original – unique perspectives and fresh insights, no fluff.
• User-Friendly – easy to read, plain language, short sentences and paragraphs.
• Authoritative and Accurate – trustworthy, error-free, and well-researched content.
• Relevant and Useful – directly addresses user needs and satisfies search intent.

Greater Priority on Topical Authority

What makes a website stand out as a reliable source of information in its industry? Topical authority is key.

It’s a killer combo of Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness, or Google’s E-E-A-T framework for content quality assessment.

The goal of search engines has always been to provide users with the most relevant and reliable information. This makes it critical for businesses with a web presence to consistently produce high-quality, accurate, comprehensive, and authoritative content.

This 2024, there’s no room for low-quality content in any search engine results pages.

Here’s how you can establish your topical authority:

Keyword Research: More than search terms, look for topics to write about, with the main topic being the industry or niche you belong to.

Topic Clusters: Also called content clusters, these organise content into a main topic (pillar page) with related subtopics (cluster pages).

For example, for your pillar page ‘home renovation,’ some of your cluster topics would be:

• ‘How to Remodel Your Kitchen’
• ‘DIY Bathroom Renovation Tips’
• ‘Budget-Friendly Living Room Makeovers’
• ‘Choosing the Right Paint Colours for Your Home’

Comprehensive Writing: Create in-depth pieces of content that cover all relevant subtopics your target audience will be interested in reading as well.

Prioritise main pages and subcategories that are equally relevant, and which you wish to establish solid authority and expertise on.

Link Building: While creating authoritative content already suffices, you can still give your off-page SEO efforts a boost by acquiring backlinks.

PRO TIP: Internal linking is a best on-page SEO practice that’s worth prioritising. It helps guide both users and bots toward related and relevant pages, further establishing your topical authority.

Voice & Visual Search Gaining Even More Traction

When users are preoccupied and can’t use their hands to type, the Voice Search feature with Google assistants like Siri and Alexa does the job well.

If you’re wondering how to secure top positions for voice search, you simply need to rank for traditional SEO search.

Visual Search through Google Lens is another SEO trend for 2024 to keep an eye on.

With it, users can upload an image of an object or animal they’re unfamiliar with. Google will then do its magic and provide more information about it.

In order to rank high for visual SEO, first and foremost, your website needs to be mobile-friendly. It’s for the simple fact that visual searches are done via mobile.

Google ranks websites that are mobile-friendly and prioritise having great user experience. Increase your SEO ranking potential by optimising image file names alongside their alt text descriptions.

Video SEO on the Rise

The convincing power of a well-made video for businesses selling a product or service cannot be denied.

Billions of people watch videos every year, and Wyzowl’s 2024 marketing report shows that 82% of people said they were convinced to buy a product after watching a video.

Rightfully so, digital marketers are prompted to include video content in their SEO strategy to rank in search results.

So should you start leveraging video marketing if you haven’t yet? Definitely, but not without a solid strategy in place.

Before posting it on YouTube and/or as visual media accompaniment to your written content, first conduct keyword research targeting popular YouTube search terms.

You can target them in your title, main description, and tags for optimal results.

Author and Publisher Credibility More Crucial for Demonstrating Expertise

In the May 2024 Google leak, it’s found that the world’s biggest search engine does store data about publisher and author entities.

This may very well mean that Google is giving more importance to and are more likely to rank websites with credible authors. Meaning those with proven knowledge and expertise in a specific field.

Remember that authoritativeness, or a website’s credibility when it comes to providing information, is one of the influencing factors Google uses to gauge content quality and relevancy.

In order to enhance your site credibility, you can:

• Create dedicated author pages on your website. Highlight their background, field(s) of expertise, and even links to their social media like LinkedIn.
• Engage in guest blogging to maximise your SME’s online presence and reach. This tells Google and users that your authors are real and legit experts.
• Collab with industry experts to contribute to your site. By having a recognised professional publish content on your site, it adds to your overall credibility and trustworthiness.
• If hiring content writers, thoroughly check every candidate’s experience and topical expertise to ensure you’re employing only proficient content creators.

Refreshing and Updating Content is a Must

Search engines like Google DON’T like outdated content.

Rightfully, they favour articles that are up-to-date and provide real value for users reading about them.

This makes it highly necessary to update your content to maintain your search engine rankings and content relevancy.

For example, immigration policies or visa regulations in Australia constantly update.

Your migration law firm may have written a piece about a visa that is now permanently closed for new applications.

Failing to refresh your content based on this recent development may give your website a bad impression, as users rely on updated information to guide their decision-making.

However, content refreshing goes beyond simply adding updated info on an old piece or blog.

Aim to continuously satisfy user intent and other off-page and on-page SEO best practices.

Mobile Responsiveness Remains a Huge SEO Ranking Factor

Since 2016, Google has implemented a mobile-first indexing approach to gauge every website’s technical SEO performance.

Because while websites have been programmed for desktop use/users, statistics show that nearly 96% of people browse the internet through a mobile device.

As such, it’s more important than ever to prioritise your mobile pages and check for technical errors, pagespeed, and content issues.

Making your site both mobile-friendly and -responsive has always been the way to go.

Use Google Search Console to run audits on Core Web Vitals and see whether you’re satisfying Google’s key guidelines on best practices for mobile responsiveness.

PRO TIP: Use Rank Math’s meta tag analyzer to write your page title and meta description. Here you’ll know that the standard 150-160 character limit for meta descriptions is not ideal for mobile due to smaller screen size. The tool measures pixels rather than characters to ensure your meta tags will fit on both devices without being cut short.

Focus on Commercial- and Transactional-Intent Keywords

Search intent is the reason behind every user query. There are four main search intent categories, namely:

• Informational: if they’re wanting to find more information about a certain topic (‘benefits of yoga’);
• Navigational: if users are looking for a particular website to log on to (‘facebook login’).
• Commercial: if they’re exploring or comparing brands before buying (‘smartphones with the best camera’).
• Transactional: if they’re ready to buy a product or hire a professional (‘hire personal injury lawyer sydney’).

According to a study, the commercial and transactional keyword groups are increasing. Their informational and navigational counterparts meanwhile are experiencing a downward trend.

This means Google is balancing the SERP with more focus on high-intent keywords, essentially diverting from purely informational search results.

With this SEO trend of 2024, you need to adjust your current content strategy.

For one, optimise your existing website pages targeting these high-converting and hyper relevant keywords.

Google Search Generative Experience (SGE) is Transforming Search

Finally, SGE is Google’s AI-powered conversational assistant.

When you enter a query, it will provide an answer generated by AI with accompanying visuals.

Its human-like answers derive from existing content on the web and provide links to these sources.

Now you’re probably wondering that with its advent, it’s going to take away traffic from actual websites investing lots of time and money for content creation.

But SGE only provides featured snippets, additional prompts, and visuals to search queries. It still encourages users to click on the sources it is linking to for more information.

Think: actual product reviews, in-depth guides, expert roundups, etc. These and more are the types of content that generate click-throughs. Besides, Google still displays traditional results in the SERP.

So worry not and shift your focus on maintaining relevancy and authority in your content, as well as following onsite SEO elements.

Future-Proof Your SEO Marketing Campaign with Domain Bird

Trends come and go. To keep pace with these frequent fluctuations in the digital marketing space, partner with an experienced search advertising agency that can help you stay ahead with complex algorithm changes and the future of SEO.

SEO only works with the right approach. Entrust your business growth goals only with a team of SEO professionals who deliver real results.

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