Google frequently updates its search algorithms. As a result, the search engine optimization (SEO) industry is highly volatile. That means that your highly effective SEO strategy may not be as effective next month. The specialists handling your website’s SEO should always be on their toes in order to stay abreast of the constantly evolving algorithms.

Now that we’re well into the second half of 2017, it is increasingly essential that your SEO specialists keep an eye out for trends that may have an impact on your ranking for the rest of the year. Below are two important ones.

Rich answers and other featured content

Targeting top rankings on Google search is without doubt still an important SEO target. All the same, your specialists need to optimize your website design for rich answers. Rich answers are the unique results that are featured atop organic results on the search engine result pages (SERPs).

The portion of search queries that trigger rich answers continue to increase even though at the moment, a majority of rich answers are triggered by searches for song lyrics. Google has made it clear that it plans increase the value of the results it offers its users, which means that rich answers are aimed at generating the most relevant information based on users’ queries.

To optimize your website design for rich answers, your target keywords need to be properly optimized as well. Simply put, having your page featured on page one of SERPs greatly improves its chances of being featured in the rich answers box.

Besides rich answers, Google SERPs also has another type of featured content referred to as related questions. Together with a top SEO team, such as High Tech Sky, think about how your content can address these other questions. Images and videos are also featured content that appears prominently on the result pages so strategically incorporating them in your website design could greatly improve your rankings.

User engagement

SEO experts agree that user engagement has a significant effect on your search rankings. They are however not agreed on how significant it is. As an online business owner, you’d rather err on the side of excess.

User engagement refers to how users interact with your content. It therefore takes into account the average time visitors spend on your site, the number click links on your site, bounce rates, etc. To achieve your target conversion rates, your SEO specialists need to tweak your website design in a way that all the page elements work together to persuade visitors to respond to your CTAs.

However, user engagement is not always easy to measure because search engines typically don’t have the analytics to support it. Be that as it may, it is imperative that your SEO team optimizes your site to maximize engagement in order for you to get the most of the time and effort you invest into it.

In modern SEO, user engagement is as important as any other element of website design, if not more. The benefits of providing your visitors with a great experience on your website are invaluable.