media update’s Adam Wakefield spoke to Gavin Coetzee, Digital Researcher from brand tracking service Newsclip, about SEO, how it evolves, and how to best deal with that evolution.

What is SEO and why is it so important to the web?

Search engine optimisation constitutes the strategies, techniques, and technologies used to improve, rank, and qualify your site and content within the search engine results pages.

Often, the easiest and cheapest method to improve your site performance is by focusing on the SEO process and improving your rankings.

Ranking well becomes vital for your site and content when it comes to performing competitively within search engine results. SEO improvements can directly translate into improved performance rates for your site and content and can also create even leads.

How do search engines score websites? Why do these algorithms change so often?

Search engines use a range of ranking factors that build upon each other to serve as algorithmic indicators of relevant quality content and sites.

Common SEO ranking factors may include:

On Page SEO
  • Content – Quality of content, keyword density, freshness of content, language use, and SEO practices; 
  • Architecture – Crawlability, duplicate content, mobile experience, site speed, URL structure, and Security; and
  • HTML – Titles, descriptions, and headers.
Off-page SEO
  • Trust – Authority, engagement, and site history;
  • Links – Quality, substance, and count;
  • Personal – Location, history and social signals;
  • Social – Reputation and shares. 
The periodic table of SEO success factors has more information on the weighting of these and other factors. Read more here. 

The factors then break down further into about 200 specific ranking factors. These factors influence on the search algorithm, which is revised, over time, by search engine providers. These revisions are carried out to improve the quality and relevance of search results, as well as depreciating those low-value results trying to exploit their algorithms.

This results in Google constantly changing their ranking algorithm, making 500 to 600 minor adjustments a year, as well as releasing major updates a few times a year.

SEO is an evolving process that requires an up-to-date knowledge of how these ranking changes affect your site and content over time.

What benefits and advantages can a well-designed SEO plan and structure offer journalists and marketers?
  • Results and improvements are low cost in comparisons to PPC/SEM/SMM;
  • Improved traffic to your site and content;
  • Greater ROI;
  • Builds site authority and trust; and
  • Improved site usability and visitor behaviour.
What factors have recently changed when it comes to SEO and ranking pages?

The major changes of late have taken place within the Google Penguin update.

Penguin 4.0 was updated in October 2016 and is now a real-time filter designed to limit spammy sites ranking, focusing on the depreciation of bad links and spam sites. These assessments are now carried out in real time as the site is re-crawled and indexed.

This had the effect of penalising spam sites and content, while allowing quality sites to address potential issues and have their improvements filter through in real time.

Most recently, Google has rolled out a change, with unconfirmed reports calling it “Fred”, in March 2017 with the primary goal of filtering out low-quality search results that are designed to generate ad and affiliate revenue.

Fred does this by filtering out low-value, ad-centred content, as well as thin and affiliate-heavy content, penalising those publishers whose content fails to meet the criteria.

What are some common SEO strategies/techniques the average user can employ to improve SEO performance?

Most SEO professionals will agree to start your SEO plan by focusing on the following areas.

Keywords: Researching the keywords users use to find your brand is the first step in any successful SEO strategy. Understanding how people search for and find you allows for the targeting of those keywords sets that will provide the greatest ROI.

Meta Data: Meta tags and data continue to play an important role in SEO. Consistent metadata is used as an indicator of quality and can affect your position in search engine results. 

Content: Content is still the engine that drives the internet, a developed content plan using quality content helps you rank not just for keywords but provides a positive user experience.

Backlinks: Backlinks serve as an indicator of quality content, the more sites willing to link back to you and your content, the more likely you’ll be an authority or newsworthy source.

Social media: Social Media has emerged as an indicator of quality content for search algorithms. A strong social media presence signals a greater level of influence and authority. 

Images: Search algorithms can’t “see” images just yet. As such, it’s important to apply your keywords/naming convention to the image’s metadata, alt text, and file names. By including this info, you give search algorithms additional indicators of relevance and a way to ‘see’ the image.

Mobile experience: As greater levels of Internet traffic originate from mobile devices, search algorithms have begun to prioritise the mobile user experience in their ranking algorithms. Sites that don’t scale or cater for a mobile viewer will find themselves penalised for this lack of functionality.

For more information on Newsclip’s brand tracking and analysis services, visit www.newsclip.co.za.

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