At SEO National, we are often asked for our opinion on the evolution of search engine optimization. As the year ends, many wonder what 2014 will hold for SEO. Below are our thoughts on three of the most frequently asked SEO questions for the new year.
Are we moving into a post-SEO era?
No. While content marketing has always been an important part of online exposure and branding, and will continue to be, SEO will never go away. At least, as long as there are always non-paid results in search engines.
Will SEO in 2014 be radically different from SEO in 2013?
While it will be different, it will not be radically different. SEO will still be made up of the same core elements.
- efficient site structure
- quality content and value propositions
- co-citation and backlinks
- social interaction
We suspect that everything will mostly stay the same other than quality will be tightened even more. With Google collecting a crowd sourced portfolio of bad backlinks via their disavow tool, it’s only a matter of time before they use that data to narrow down good vs bad domains even more.
Social value will increase a bit more too, but nothing dramatic. Unless social outlets like Facebook, LinkedIn, etc. make all profile content, posts, etc. public (or sell the data to search engines) than it will never all be fully readable or able to be weighed.
Best SEO advice for 2014
Slow and steady wins the race. Keep consistent with clean efforts. It may take longer to gain rankings and get exposure, but at least they will last. Would you rather go on a “traffic run” for 6 months, but then get hammered with a Google penalty that puts you behind for years? Or, take longer to gain traction properly but it lasts into the foreseeable future once you acquire your top ranking status?