Expert’s Predictions for 2020

Welcome to the Roaring ’20’s Old Sport!

To kick-start the New Year, we have yet another “Predictions for 2020” article waiting for you. But don’t worry, ours is unlike any other one you’ve probably read and that’s because we rounded up some SEO experts to give you the best advice and their predictions as experts in the field! Here’s what they had to say.

1. Voice Search

Unless you’ve been living under a rock all 2019, you’ve heard that Voice Search is “the next big thing”. With voice assistants like Alexa and Google Assistant coming out, the way people conduct searches is changing. Gone are the days of good old typing and correcting wrongly auto-corrected words.

One thing to keep an eye out for, is the audience using it as well. Don’t just fall for the classic Millennial and Gen Z audience trap, I saw my dad use it the other day because he was “too lazy to type” so maybe an older audience could be profitable? But that’s just me contemplating (or is it?), let’s hear out the experts.

Voice was touted as the next big thing in 2018, 2019 and it’s not really taken off yet from an SEO point of view. This is very similar to the mobile is the next big thing a while back – that also took a longer time to mature than expected. With Bert now being rolled out at Google, and probably a lot more to come I think we will start to truly see their AI’s coming into play on search results – and that does include voice so that really will need to be factored into SEO strategies in 2020. Also I think we will continue to see the SEO industry maturing as it fits more into an established marketing practice and we will see less of the grifters and hustlers selling snake oil seo as gaming Google gets harder for them. Could we also see a resurgence of Bing?

2. Rise of Video Content:

The rise of video content has not been preached all 2019 for nothing. Simply put, users enjoy easily consumable content because well, it’s easier to understand. Scientifically, videos stimulate consumers’ visual and auditory senses better than plain text content.

Here’s what the experts have to say about it:

There are a number of SEO predictions for 2020 however this one has been not only my favourite back in 2019 but many others. Let’s make it obvious videos onlines have been for a while and they continue to rise.

Cisco has confirmed – by 2021 we are going to have 80% of online traffic almost from video entirely alone. This will not stop anyway soon – Hubspot states: “43% of people want even more video content.”

Well, if video isn’t in your marketing plan – you might be out of business very soon.

Let me give you more numbers. 55% of all google search results contain at least one video, huge right? Here’s some quick tips:

• Embed Video Content Into Text-Based Blog Posts
• Provide a Transcript
• Optimise Your Video for SEO

With the massive increase in video content consumption in 2019, I have absolutely no doubts about “video content” ruling this year. I would highly recommend keeping it in your marketing strategy if you’ve covered it yet.

3. Surge in Data-Driven SEO

It’s no secret that data is the new oil (or not, whatever your stance is on that one) mainly because of its extreme value to marketers. Data collection is getting more and more sophisticated and Serge Bezborodov says, it’s even beginning to resemble the PPC model, here are his thoughts:

SEO is not about reading the tea leaves. SEO becomes more and more data-driven. To gain the upper hand over your competitors in 2020,  you should consider how to collect, store and analyse a wealth of statistical data. 

Yes, it can be boring and time-consuming but leads to a predictable SERP performance. I believe that SEO will be pretty similar to the PPC model in the long run. I mean, you will be able to enter the URL and see the exact ROI of organic optimisation for this particular URL.

4. Enhanced Universal Search & UX Optimisation

Google is notorious for their constant changes (and failure to confirm them) that strives to continuously improve the user’s experience on the search engine. 2020 will be no different according to Nitin Manchanda.

Featured snippets have been growing massively and I see them growing further in 2020. Google has always been testing new featured snippets to make it easy for the user for the desired results as quickly as possible. I expect more zero click results in 2020 than any other year in the past.

I also expect UX signals to get more power this year, which includes site speed, mobile experience, dwell time etc. You can also add positive social signals, links, mentions etc. in this bucket.

5. Change in Long Tail Phrases

Are you even an SEO if you don’t recommend using long-tail keywords in your content every time someone asks about it?

Given the recent changes in Google’s Algorithms, it is important to understand how to optimise them in 2020 to secure the highest organic visibility. This is what Kyle Roof had to say about it.

Successful sites will win the new long tail phrase battle.  At the end of 2019, Google changed how they grouped many long tail phrases with shorter phrases by uncoupling them.  This change puts an emphasis on having specific content on your site to win those longer tail phrases. Right now there is a real opportunity to get ahead of your competition if you have a strategy to identify and win the, now independent, long tails.

And there you have it! The experts have had their say in what’s to come in 2020 so get in that meeting room and re-evaluate your strategies; it’s gonna be a fun year.