SEO has never been more important to your company’s success than it is today.
If you have put off investing time and money into your company’s SEO strategy, it’s time to act. And if you are still using keywords and SEO tactics from 10 years ago, it’s time to update them.
You may show up on the front page of Google right now, but you could very well be bumped off after the next Google update. You could also drop if your competitors start taking SEO more seriously and boost their own rankings.
Today, we will go over what is at stake in the war for SEO domination, and why you need to make 2021 the year you go all-in on an SEO strategy.
A Record Number of Online Shoppers
The COVID-19 crisis has sent a record number of people online to buy everything. No matter what you’re selling, you can bet that people are looking for it online right now. This is the time to grow your SEO rankings and make sure that they can find you.
A recent survey revealed that:
- 66% of consumers shopped more online because of the coronavirus
- Only 28% feel comfortable returning to stores
- A quarter of those surveyed said they’re now doing 90% of their shopping online
If you’re running a small business, you probably don’t need to compete with major retailers. You can probably succeed by simply owning the keywords in your own geographic area.
Competition Has Never Been Higher
Online shopping is more popular than ever. This means that the battle for SEO (particularly local SEO) is more competitive than ever.
If you’re doing nothing to optimize for SEO and your competition is doing the minimum, they are probably going to outrank you. This is basically gift-wrapping all of the clicks, sales and leads for them.
You don’t need to outspend your competition to out-rank them. But you do have to out-optimize them and out-strategize them.
As we said before, you may be doing “Ok” right now, but a new competitor can come from out of nowhere and leapfrog you in the rankings. You’re suddenly left wondering where they came from and scrambling to catch up.
Out-dated Tactics Aren’t Just Ineffective, They Can Hurt You
Maybe you know a “little bit” about SEO. In an age where SEO changes so frequently, only knowing a little bit can get you into a lot of trouble. Obsolete SEO tactics from 2010 aren’t just bad—they’re dangerous.
If you’re doing things like stuffing keywords and exact match links into your text, you’re actually doing quite a bit of damage to your site and doing a big favour for your competition.
SEO Takes Time and You Should Start Now
If you’re launching a new website, you can’t expect overnight success. And you can’t trust anyone that promises it. In fact, recent data from Ahrefs revealed that only 1% of pages that ranked in the top organic spot on Google were less than a year old.
Doing SEO the right way takes time and effort. It takes time to earn Google’s attention and respect, while it takes effort to properly optimize and create the content to do it.
There are no shortcuts, tricks, or hacks in SEO anymore. There may have been 10 years ago, but Google’s search algorithm is too sophisticated today.
A Major Google Update is Coming in 2021
As we said earlier, a Google update could knock you down the rankings at any time, and the next Google update is going to be a major one.
Google’s Core Web Vitals update is scheduled to roll out in mid-2021. Any time Google does something major like this, they give webmasters, marketers, and business owners as much warning as possible to prepare.
This update will focus on things like site speed, security, and mobile-friendliness. You can’t assume that you’re doing “well enough” in any of those categories. If there are issues, they need to be found and fixed right now.
Nothing we’ve covered today was intended to scare you into hiring an SEO firm. The intention is to simply give you an idea of what the SEO landscape looks like right now, and what it’s poised to look like in 2021.
If you haven’t invested in your company’s SEO strategy yet, you still have time. Act now so you don’t find yourself playing catch-up in 2022.