- [Neil] Google has over 3000 algorithm changes
that they release each and every single year.
That's a lot of algorithm changes.
You already know SEO changes so frequently
because of the number of algorithm changes
that Google releases.
Now sure, most of them are small
but these large ones can have a massive shift
in your rankings.
So how do you prepare for it in 2021?
What else is going to change in 2021?
Hey, everyone.
I'm Neil Patel and today I'm going to break down
how SEO will change in 2021
and what you need to do about it.
(pleasant music)
Now, before we get started
make sure you subscribe to this channel.
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See I've been doing SEO for a very, very long time.
When I first started doing SEO,
it was literally just as simple as adding keywords
to your title tag or within the text of your content.
And you could rank on page one.
Seriously. That's how easy it was.
And it was that way for a few years.
And then eventually you would need to do things like
on page SEO, and then eventually you would need to do things
like build links, but it was really simple.
These days, there really isn't a Holy grail of SEO.
And although some people are claiming SEO is dead.
It isn't, I'm living proof that it still works.
All our customers are as well
but that doesn't mean SEO is not changing.
And there's a few things that you need to know
and be prepared for in 2021.
The first thing you need to get used to
and this is the first trend is
that your rankings are going to Seesaw.
Even though Google releases a lot of ranking changes
each and every single year,
the thing you need to know is when they release
the major changes, your rankings will either go up or down.
Sometimes they stay the same, but a lot of times
you're just seeing them go up or down.
If you do the right things, it doesn't mean
that your rankings are always going to go up into the right.
Sometimes they still go down.
But if you do the right things and you continually
put the user first and you're doing all the right SEO stuff,
typically, if you fast forward a year from that day,
your rankings will be up.
Your traffic should be up as well,
but you need to get used to them seesawing
and be okay with that.
That is going to be the new normal.
Trend number two, positioning will be
more important than ever and that first spot
is going to be the Holy Grail in which
that's what you need to shoot for and aim for.
It's going to be really hard to get there.
It's not going to be that if you build more links
in your competitor that it's going to shoot you up
to number one.
Things like user metrics are going to matter.
But the reason I say position one
will be more valuable than ever
and this is what we all are trying to aim for
is because, with Google constantly making new changes,
such as being able to get mortgage rates
whenever you search or the weather,
all these types of changes or even potentially
being able to purchase tickets when you search,
right, for travel, all these things can affect your revenue.
So if you rank lower and lower on page one,
what you'll find is you'll get less clicks.
And most people say, "Hey, I want to be in the top 10 spots
because if I'm in the top 10 spots, I'm on page one."
For a lot of queries out there,
there's not 10 spots on page one.
There's no such thing as every page one listing
of Google has 10 organic listings.
That has changed.
For some queries we're seeing it, only seven or eight
or nine queries or listings, right?
So you want to take that top spot
because they're putting in other stuff
that decreases traffic.
Now it doesn't mean SEO is dead.
There's still more and more people coming online,
more people using Google, more people searching,
so you can still do well if you're in position two
or three or even on page one.
But number one has a massive, huge difference
from being on number two or number three or number four
even if it's still on page one.
Trend number three, user experience is now SEO.
Google has something called pay to have experience
which you know, they're rolling out on mobile devices
and more people are using these mobile devices
that my cartoon hand is holding up then desktop computers.
So if you want to do really well,
you need to optimize for mobile.
And I'm not just talking about paid speed or your links
or can people read your site on mobile
or is it loading fast?
I'm talking about the overall experience.
How's your mobile experience compared to other users?
Are they finding what they're looking for
right away versus the competition?
Are they able to scroll quickly and understand the product
that you're selling or consume your blog content
on a mobile device versus having to go to a desktop computer
to consume your content?
Heck I don't even care if you're in B2B,
your content needs to be consumable on a mobile device.
And that's super, super important.
If you don't optimize for experience,
you're going to lose in the long run.
Trend number four, the riches are going to be
in the niches more than ever, especially with SEO.
And here's why.
If you look at about.com, big company big brand,
but yet that business was floundering.
They weren't doing well.
And then eventually they ended up breaking into
a handful of sites and then
they even broke it into more sites.
The reason they broke it into a handful of sites is
they started focusing on niches.
They deleted the majority of their content.
I'm talking about hundreds and hundreds
and thousands of pages of content.
When they focus on niche-related sites,
not only did their traffic go up,
their revenue also went up.
You need to focus on building niche sites.
It's not about building a Wikipedia type site.
If you want to do that, that's great
but because there's over a billion blogs and a ton of sites
and a ton of competition, they want to rank
authority sites more than ever and it typically,
from what we're seeing is people who focus on one niche
tend to be better, well versed around that niche,
not always the case, but in many cases.
And they tend to be more of a quote unquote authority.
So in the long run, they end up ranking better
Because they go more in depth on each
and every single one of those topics.
Trend number five, content length won't matter as much.
I've given in this example so many times.
If you see the chart below, you'll see
that everyone talks about oh, if you want to rank,
you need over 2000 words and I get that.
Yes, content can help you and for many queries,
the pages that rank at the top have over 2000 words,
but it doesn't mean you need to create 2000 word articles.
If you want to rank for how to tie a tie,
do you really think someone
wants to read a 2000 word article
versus seeing an animated gif teaching them
how to tie a tie or a video.
Get to the point with your content.
And when Google started releasing things
around user experience within their algorithm,
things like content length became less important
because they know if a user just bounces away,
even if you have 2,500 words, they know
it's not that valuable and your rankings are going to go down.
So don't obsess about word count or keyword density,
obsess about the quality of your content
and are you getting the user what they're looking for
as quick as possible.
Trend number six, you won't have to build as many backings.
With things like user metrics
that are really kicking into high gear,
we're seeing it that if you build too many links too fast,
it actually takes you longer to rank
and can hurt your rankings.
So it's better off just releasing your content,
not building links and letting it happen organically.
And then over time, sure do the manual outreach,
but let your content sit there for three to four months
before you even start that manual outreach.
And when you do that, we're seeing
that the rankings are climbing up faster and higher
than if you were building tons and tons of links
from day one.
It's just not as organic.
And I'm not saying you're buying links.
You should never buy links.
You should never try to break their policies
or at least Google's policies.
More so, what you need to do is just be slow and patient.
Taking that slow and patient route, funny enough,
is getting people rankings faster
than if they're taking impatient quick route
of building links right away.
Trend number seven, branding won't be enough.
Remember about.com?
Everyone knows about about.com, popular site,
but yet when they had that big brand,
they weren't ranking for everything.
Why?
Because Google really wants people to be an authority
within the space.
So building a brand and following the rule of seven
where people interact and see with your brand seven times,
yes that can help boost your rankings, but it's not enough.
You need to be a authority within your niche.
So make sure you go and focus on being the end all,
be all expert within whatever niche you're in.
Now here's a bonus trend for you.
We're seeing that businesses are going to have to start
thinking about global SEO from day one.
SEO is no longer a hey I'm in the United States
or I'm in the UK or I'm in Brazil or India
and I'm doing business.
It's hey, I'm doing business and I want
anyone in the world to purchase from me.
So from day one, you need to start thinking about global SEO
as your strategy instead of just SEO within your region.
And you're going to have to look at things like translations
and especially updating and repurposing your content
in all of these regions as well.
And as you can see from the survey data
that we did with all our customers,
translations is causing the biggest boost in traffic.
And as you can see from my own stats here,
I'm getting a lot of traffic
from a lot of different countries.
United States makes up roughly 20%.
The rest of the world makes up 80 plus percent
of my traffic.
Now, if you have any questions about the future of SEO
or what's happening, leave a comment below.
I'll answer it.
If you enjoy this video, like it, share it,
subscribe to the channel, tell people about it.
Thank you for watching.