Tag: SEO

SEO isn’t dead: How AI and SGE are shaping the future

Post author By Laura Isaacs
Post date October 9, 2023

The artificial intelligence revolution has rocked our world in a few short months. OpenAI launched ChatGPT. Bing released a chat feature. Google opened access to Bard and the experimental Search Generative Experience. As these new tools emerge, almost everything about how we seek, access, and interact with online information changes. And it begs the question…

Could all these AI-enabled changes mean SEO is dead? The answer is a hard no; it’s just different. The days of optimizing websites exclusively for crawlers and bots are far behind us. We, as SEOs and marketers, must embrace the shift toward optimizing websites, content, and online experiences for humans and their information needs. As such, search engine optimization is alive, and will become even more important in your web strategy as AI tools advance in this new era.

Living in the moment: Understanding SEO, AI, and SGE

SEO, AI, and SGE are three of the most important technologies today, and they’re all becoming inseparably linked. AI is already used in a number of ways to improve SEO, from generating high-quality content to identifying and targeting the right keywords.

As AI develops, it will likely play an even more significant role in SEO, helping businesses reach their target audiences more effectively. By staying ahead of the curve with these technologies and strategies, companies can position themselves for success in the future of search. Before we dive into the details of what comes next for SEO, let’s look at broader definitions and how these technologies and strategies impact each other today.

What is SEO?

SEO (search engine optimization) is nothing new. In fact, both the concept and the term have been part of the web-based world since 1997 — before Google existed. At this time, search engines functioned as directories or virtual yellow pages. And as more consumers adopted the Internet, more businesses became invested in making themselves visible on the Internet.

SEO is a complex and ever-changing field, but it is essential to any online marketing strategy. Your web presence depends on organic SEO. Traditionally, SEO depends on fundamental factors that increase website traffic and search engine placement, which include:

Creating relevant, keyword-optimized content.
Optimizing the website’s title tags, meta descriptions, and header tags.
Building backlinks from high-quality websites.
Ensuring that the website is mobile-friendly.
Improving the website’s loading speed.

What is AI?

AI, short for artificial intelligence, is a technology that mimics or simulates human intelligence. There are a variety of applications for AI, from self-driving cars to automated manufacturing processes. Machine learning, deep learning, and cognitive computing all influence how AI works.

Conversational and generative AI tools like ChatGPT, Bard, and Bing are natural language processing tools and can communicate in a human-like way. They provide information quickly and can generate new text, code, images, and other kinds of creative content.

What is SGE?

SGE stands for Search Generative Experience. It is a new set of search and interface capabilities that integrates generative AI-powered results into Google search engine query responses.

SGE is still under development, but it’s designed to make searching for information online even more helpful, instructive, and insightful. By nature, SGE hinges on providing users with a more personalized and conversational experience. It is intended to do this by:

Generating concise and informative answers to complex questions.
Providing relevant visual content, such as images, charts, and graphs.
Suggesting follow-up questions to help users explore their topic of interest further.
Translating search results into different languages.

Here are some examples of how SGE can be used:

If you search “how to change a tire,” SGE might generate a step-by-step guide with images and videos.
If you search for “best restaurants in Phoenix,” SGE might generate a list of restaurants with user reviews and links to their menus.
If you search for “what does life even mean?” SGE might generate a summary of different philosophical perspectives on the topic.

SGE is revolutionizing the way we search for information. Using generative AI to produce more personalized and informative results, SGE can help searchers (consumers) find the information they need more quickly and easily.

The current state of SEO: ‘It depends’

We can’t ignore the fact that AI’s emergence and proliferation are rattling to SEO as we traditionally know it.

According to Search Engine Journal’s 2024 State of SEO report, today’s digital marketers and SEOs expect disruptions from three major trends:

Generative AI
Google’s E-E-A-T ranking criteria
Automation tools

For many SEO experts, these new and rapidly evolving advances challenge how we think about what it means to optimize for search.

These concerns check out, too. Google’s recent Helpful Content core algorithm update, which began rolling out in August and has extended into September 2023, is making one fact glaringly obvious: SEO no longer means optimizing content and website experiences for search engine crawlers and the only way to win top-ranking spots, boost CTR, gain qualified organic traffic (and lift conversions) is to optimize for the human experience.

While AI, generative tools, and even search algorithms gain a better understanding of what kind of content is helpful and informative to people, the notion of keyword-stuffed web copy created just for search engines is on its way out, and helpful content written by people, for people, has gained momentum as what it takes to win in the competitive SEO space.

Welcome to the future: Embracing content strategy with SEO, SGE, and AI in mind

As more web users turn to AI and SGE tools to do research and make informed decisions, it is increasingly important to be visible to searchers no matter the medium they’re using and aware of how your business is perceived by both artificial and human intelligence in this new virtual realm.

The only way to achieve this goal and prepare for future advancements is to embrace a website content strategy intricately interwoven with forward-focused SEO. This is evident with each Google core algorithm update as they increasingly move toward rewarding sites that relay information in an easy-to-understand, conversational, and unbiased tone.

Next steps for content strategy, SEO and SGE success

It might sound counter-intuitive, but embracing an organic content strategy with a human element is vital to success in today’s AI-driven landscape as SGE emerges. This especially rings true when your business and website tie into YMYL (your money or your life) topics like health, medicine, finance, and current events.

Google’s algorithms are designed to reward websites that provide high-quality content that is informative, comprehensive, and relevant to users. To appeal to Google’s E-E-A-T criteria, comply with Google’s Helpful Content updates, and succeed in SGE, businesses need to focus on creating content that is genuinely helpful to humans with UX and CX in mind. There are a few ways to accomplish this:

Understand your customers’ journey. Linguistic profiling and search journey analysis can help you define your target audience’s journey. Where are they in their conversion journey? Understanding their needs and offering solutions improves their experience on-site and with your brand.
Write for your target audience. Before you start writing, take some time to think about your target audience. What are their needs and interests? What kind of content would they find helpful? What are the values that drive their decision-making?
Do your research. Make sure that your content is accurate and up-to-date. Cite your sources and link to other relevant content.
Be clear and concise. Get to the point quickly and avoid using jargon.
Write in a conversational tone. Imagine that you’re talking to a friend or colleague.
Break up your text with images, videos, and headings. This will make your content easier to read and scan.

Does this sound familiar? We’ve touched on the factors you see above before and it’s helped drive success landing at “position zero” in the SERPs. Learn more about featured snippets in SEO strategy.

Take the next steps in SEO and SGE now

AI is poised to revolutionize SEO, empowering businesses to reach their target audiences with unprecedented precision. Businesses must ethically embrace AI and other innovative technologies and position themselves as leaders in this rapidly evolving field. This requires an online strategy inextricably linked to forward-thinking SEO created by humans for humans.

Offering SEO solutions and website and content strategy is just part of how Tallwave wants to drive your success. As a leader in providing integrated marketing solutions and more to both established and up-and-coming brands, Tallwave is ready to deploy our customer-centric and cohesive approach in a way that is unique to your vision and creates exceptional experiences for consumers of all kinds.

From conversion rate optimization to paid media services to product design and beyond, we’re ready to partner up and strategically future-proof your digital strategies.

Tags AI, brand strategy, business strategy, Data & Analytics, SEO, SEO Strategy, SGE

SEO Uncategorized

Is SEO for Social Media the Secret to Success?

Post author By Laura Isaacs
Post date June 12, 2023

Social media platforms have evolved from online hangouts to significant touchpoints on your customers’ conversion journeys. Establishing your brand’s social media footprint and visibility is crucial; it forges meaningful consumer connections and enhances digital experiences.

However, the painful reality for marketers is that curated social content alone won’t get you to For You Pages and newsfeeds. But reaching into your SEO strategy toolkit just might. Many factors in establishing a solid social media presence seriously overlap with the search engine optimization strategies you’re already using to drive growth on your website.

With complex algorithms and user behavior playing a crucial role in content visibility, leveraging the power of SEO for social media is vital to improving reach, engaging the right users, and converting customers.

What is the relationship between social media and SEO?

When it comes to creating online experiences and driving strategic growth, social media matters. Surveys show that working-age adults spend an average of 2.5 hours daily scrolling social media. These consumers rely on Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok for product research, reviews, brand engagement, and even for making purchases as integrated e-commerce solutions become the norm.

SEO matters, too. An effective organic SEO strategy elevates your brand by boosting page rankings and increasing visibility, clicks, and conversions. Investing in SEO builds long-term equity for your business and establishes authority in your market. And while AI might change how algorithms work, SEO strategy will always need human-lead creativity and expertise to resonate with human users. Learn more about the benefits of implementing a proven SEO strategy.

And although social media and SEO may seem like distinct digital strategies, they are closely intertwined. Social media platforms aim to engage and satisfy users by showcasing relevant, high-quality content. At the same time, SEO seeks to achieve the same by delivering valuable web content to answer their search queries.

SEO and social media: Symbiotic sisters

Think about it: SEO focuses on improving website reach by considering algorithms and ranking factors for better visibility on search engine result pages like Google or Bing. These factors hinge on authority, expertise, and trust established through technical performance, keywords, latent semantic indexing, and user behavior (bounce rate, time on site, pages visited, etc.).

Social media platforms also rely on algorithms that determine how content is displayed to users. These algorithms analyze similar factors, such as bio and caption keywords, viewer intent, creator authority, user behavior, and engagement.

Relevance, engagement, and authority influence how content is shown to users on the SERPs, home pages, feeds, and For You Pages. Noting the many intersections, it’s easy to interpret that applying SEO techniques to social media strategies will likely increase the chances of your target audience finding your content, engaging with it, and ultimately converting into customers.

SEO strategies to adopt for social media success

Experience is everything. The shared objective between SEO and social media is to provide users with the best possible experience by delivering the best possible content related to their needs and intents.

You can implement SEO techniques in your social strategy to push your brand toward customer acquisition and growth. With increased social media visibility, you’ll be there for critical make-or-break moments on the conversion journey.

Experience is everything. The shared objective between SEO and social media is to provide users with the best possible experience by delivering the best possible content related to their needs and intents.

Let’s look at a few tips social media managers can borrow from the SEOs.

Know what’s now

Social media evolves rapidly. Just look at all the recent changes with Instagram. Part of finding success with your audience is understanding what’s current and popular in their world. Google Trends offers an easy way to tap into today’s interests so that your content is timely and relevant.

Speak their language

Like traditional SEO, linguistic profiling and keyword research are crucial in social media optimization. Identify keywords and phrases relevant to your industry, target audience, and specific social media platforms. Use those phrases in your content and captions. Tools like SEMrush, Moz, and free browser extensions like Keyword Surfer can help you discover relevant terms based on how people search for products or content.

Flex your authority

Optimize your social media profiles by incorporating relevant keywords in your bio, descriptions, and headers. This helps social algorithms understand the nature of your business and improves the chances of being discovered by users searching for those keywords. Mention titles or credentials relevant to your content to display subject matter authority.

Create connections

Actively engage with your audience by responding to comments, messages, and mentions. This fosters a sense of community and encourages further engagement. And engagement shows the algorithm that your content is valuable and relevant.

Analyze and optimize

Regularly analyze your social media performance using built-in analytics tools or third-party platforms. Monitor engagement metrics, reach, click-through rates, and conversions to understand what resonates with your audience. Adjust your strategy accordingly to optimize results.

Let integrated solutions lead to intertwined success

You can unlock social media’s full potential and drive meaningful results by understanding the relationship between SEO and social media, implementing effective strategies, and staying informed about the latest trends and algorithm updates.

Explore Tallwave’s Integrated Digital Marketing services.

Social media and SEO aren’t siloed strategies. An integrated growth enablement partner like Tallwave can assist in combining SEO and social media strategies as part of a comprehensive conversion rate optimization program. We are eager to deploy our customer-centric and cohesive approach in a unique way to your vision and create exceptional experiences for consumers of all kinds.

Ready to learn more about Tallwave and how we can help with SEO and social media? Let’s discuss how combined forces equal outstanding experiences and ongoing success. Here’s to the start of a great partnership.

Tags customer experience, SEO, SEO and Social Media, social media

Strategy

Uncover the benefits of featured snippets in your SEO strategy

Post author By Laura Isaacs
Post date January 17, 2023
2 Comments on Uncover the benefits of featured snippets in your SEO strategy

Google’s organic search experience is designed to put users first. New search features and refined results connect users with what they need to make educated decisions about everything from what products to purchase to what site presents the most authoritative information needed to solve a problem. Google rolled out featured snippets to the search engine results pages (SERPs) in 2018 and has since transformed the way information is accessed and user questions are answered.

Even five years after launch, featured snippets and the strategy behind them come with many benefits. From increased click-through rates to enhanced user trust, winning a snippet puts you at a major advantage over competitors vying for the same keyword.

As of today, nearly 20% of all searches deliver results that include a featured snippet. This makes featured snippet strategy essential to organic search rankings, customer experience, and even conversion rates. Focusing on an organic web strategy and winning featured snippets is more important to SEO now than ever, as this can help combat the increasing costs and stagnating results many businesses are seeing with paid search placements.

What are featured snippets?

Featured snippets are extended blocks of information intended to give users a quick answer to their questions or search queries. Users might see a list, chart, or fact at the top of the page that provides instant access to the information they seek. Paragraph snippets are the most common type of featured snippet, accounting for 82% of all snippets and providing rich information to answer search queries.

You might consider featured snippet location on the SERP as “position 0,” the coveted spot between paid results and the rest of the organic results. This position is quite desirable—you can’t pay for this placement and landing here proves that Google has determined your content to be of exceptional value to the reader.

Featured snippets can mean different things to users and to content marketers.

To users, a featured snippet means their question is immediately answered and they can instantly access a web page with helpful content and authoritative information about their query.

To content marketers and SEO and UX/CX experts, featured snippets are SERP spotlights that give their quality content and web strategy an edge over the competition and should be an essential part of their digital marketing strategies.

Why are featured snippets important in SEO?

Featured snippets are more than just an important part of organic web strategy, they’re essential. There are at least four ways SEO and featured snippets can benefit your business:

Increase Web Traffic and Improve CTR: Our numbers show that owning a featured snippet can increase CTR by more than 850%, driving even more traffic to your website and consumers into your sales funnel.
Boost Brand Awareness: Landing at the top of the SERP with extra real estate increases visibility for your brand or business. It demands consumer attention.
Grow Website Authority: Featured snippets are a serious factor in building domain and page authority as they lead to better and more qualified traffic to your website.
Optimize Conversion Rates: Featured snippets can usher in users who are likely to become customers by answering their questions and providing need-to-know-now information.

Another unique benefit of including featured snippets in your web strategy is related to the increasing prevalence of voice search. Voice assistants and tools like Amazon’s Echo, Apple’s Siri, and Google Home are increasingly common in many homes and vehicles. According to December 2022 reports from Statista, 35% of all households in the United States own smart speakers. Voice search queries are among the most common way users interact with these devices. And in many cases, voice search devices answer questions by citing a featured snippet.

There’s still much more to the snippet equation and Tallwave’s proprietary research proves it. Let’s look at some of Tallwave’s unique specifics and statistics about the benefits of featured snippets for your business and web strategy.

How Tallwave clients win with snippet strategy

In-depth analysis and data-fueled strategy are essential parts of Tallwave’s approach.

We put that approach to work within the organic search strategy for a large regional healthcare client to help them win featured snippets with SEO, gaining prime visibility ahead of other organic search results and enhancing the authority of their brand.

Here’s how we did it and what we learned along the way.

How can featured snippets drive growth?

Tallwave wanted to better understand what kind of content Google found “snippet-worthy” and how to apply these features to drive growth. To do this, we looked for trends and commonalities among snippet-winning content to determine what Google evaluates as high-value and the impact snippets have on website engagement.

As such, Tallwave analyzed more than 1,000 featured snippets owned by a client’s (a major healthcare provider) website in 2022. Of these 1,000 featured snippets, 98% belonged to approximately 50 posts on the website’s blog.

Tallwave started by comparing the click-through rate (CTR) for keywords that owned featured snippets to all other ranking keywords on the site. When it comes to organic searches, CTR refers to the number of impressions seen in the SERPs divided by the number of users who clicked through to the site.

For this client, the average click-through rate for a snippet-owning keyword in position one on the site was 25.9%. The average CTR across the entire website was 2.7%. Owning a featured snippet for a search term helped us boost the client’s site clicks by an impressive 859%.

Not only does a high CTR drive traffic to the site, but Google has consistently hinted its algorithm considers CTR as a ranking factor.

Snippets Have Serious Imapct on CTR

The kind of keyword that won a featured snippet was also an important consideration in Tallwave’s analysis. Out of the client’s 1,000 snippet-owning keywords, 91% represented searches with “informational” intent, implying the searcher was looking for information needed to solve a problem. Presenting the information the searcher needs when they need it establishes your business as an expert or solution, sending the searcher down the sales funnel toward converting.

While a featured snippet from Google for an informational term might not win an immediate conversion, it certainly adds to visibility and helps establish your website’s authority and business credibility. Data from HubSpot suggests it takes around eight touches to lead a customer toward conversion. A featured snippet with rich, relevant results that directly answer a consumer’s need is a high-value touchpoint and will likely help keep your brand top of mind when they are ready to take action.

What SEO factors help content win featured snippets?

In addition to analyzing the CTR and type of keywords winning snippets, Tallwave also examined factors that make a blog post or web page “snippet-worthy” in Google’s eyes. This gives us unique, specific, and proprietary information that can be applied across clients to help create content that drives awareness and promotes high-value engagement.

Here are some of the key factors we’ve uncovered in working with our clients that you should consider in your organic search strategy to help win featured snippets:

Make Keywords Clear: Many blog posts with featured snippets include a primary keyword in the form of a question in the headers and body copy.
Longtail Keywords Set Off Snippets: Longtail keywords are highly-specific search queries, often 3 to 5 words in length. These kinds of searches are more likely to trigger snippets for users seeking immediate answers.
Prudent Header Placement Wins: Strategically placing H2s and H3s within website content increases the likelihood of that page or post winning a snippet.
Outperform Competitors with Word Count: Blog posts and website pages with a competitive word count consistent with (or slightly higher than) the competition’s copy and with a specific number of words between headers (H2s, H3s) help content win snippets.
Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI) Works: Latent semantic indexing occurs when SERP results are populated based on similar and conceptual keywords. For example, a blog post about anxiety might include supporting related terms like “depression,” “mental health,” “phobias,” or “panic.” The use of these related keywords might also increase the likelihood of content owning a featured snippet.

Reap the benefits of featured snippets in your SEO strategy

The benefits of featured snippets for SEO abound. Winning featured snippets and “position 0” SERP placement directly translates into contextualized search visibility for your brand or business, increased and better-qualified website traffic, proven website authority, and, ultimately, more customer conversions.

Providing SEO solutions and website and content strategy is just part of how Tallwave wants to drive your success. As a leader in providing integrated marketing solutions and more to both established and up-and-coming brands, Tallwave is ready to deploy our customer-centric and cohesive approach in a way that is unique to your vision and creates exceptional experiences for consumers of all kinds. From customer journey mapping to paid media services to product design and beyond, we’re ready to talk about how we can help your business win.

Tags Client Results, Featured Snippets, SEO, Web Strategy