Changes are coming to Search in the next few months. We will take a deep dive into G4 later this week. In the meantime, here are the top five On-Page optimizations you need to do in 2022:
1. Prepare for Mobile-First Indexing
As much as 70% of web traffic now comes from mobile devices. Mobile-first indexing means Google primarily uses your mobile site for page ranking, rather than your desktop version. In order to have your brand’s content appear in search engine results pages (SERPs), your site must be optimized for mobile. Here are some steps you can (and should) take to ensure your site is optimized for mobile:
- Make sure Google can crawl your content — Meta tags should be the same for both versions of your site.
- Recognize and fix mobile errors — Utilize Google Search Console and use the Coverage and Mobile Usability reports to identify issues that may be affecting your site’s mobile performance.
- Keep your content the same — Your desktop site and mobile site should have the exact same content. Google has warned that if you purposely have less content on a mobile page, your site will be penalized as a result.
2. Google Title Rewrites
A lot of studies show Google is rewriting 60% to 80% of a site’s titles. What we’re finding is a lot of people aren’t evaluating those Google title rewrites. When you do, you can learn a lot about your own titles.
Why is Google rewriting it? Is my title too long? Am I missing important keywords? Do I have fluff in there that Google doesn’t like? IF Google’s rewrite has changed your meaning or intent, you can go correct their changes. But, do consider if Google is rewriting your titles, it’s worth reviewing their changes and learning from them.
3. Eliminate The “Fluff”
We recommend you review and eliminate those flowery keywords from your site’s copy. Remove long-winded descriptions an try to get to the point faster. Unnecessary content could be detrimental to your SEO. This can be excessive lead-in’s or descriptions of your products and services, or “throw-away” words like “innovative” or “cutting-edge” that have been so overused, they’ve lost their meaning.
Glenn Gabe wrote a great case study where they reduced a lot of their fluff on category descriptions and they actually saw an increase. As mentioned above, Google is already removing fluff from title tags. So this marketing, flowery, SEO writing may not be helping you, and, in fact, it may be hurting you. Today Google is rewarding sites that provide quick answers and more direct engagement.
4. Optimize Your Website Speed
Page Speed is always a critical factor when Google is ranking a website. As more sites are found through mobile and customer attention spans continue to dwindle, it becomes even more important for businesses to deliver fast and smooth website experiences. Loading page speed is now a crucial factor of SEO and led to Google’s three new Core Web Vitals:
- Largest Contentful Paint (LCP) — This new signal focuses on the largest element on a web page and measures its total loading time.
- First Input Delay (FID) — FID involves calculating the time a user engages (clicks, swipes, etc.) with a page to the time when the browser starts processing event responses.
- Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS) — Pay attention to sudden text movements including how much a page shifts or elements loading and covering others as it loads.
To thrive in 2022, you’ll want to receive a “Good” Core Web Vitals score, which means achieving:
- At least 75% of page loads need an LCP of 2.5 seconds or faster.
- An FID of 100 milliseconds or faster.
- A CLS score of 0.1 or less.
5. Optimize for Featured Snippets
Featured snippets are expanded excerpts that appear on the first position of a Google search results page in order to answer a question immediately on the search page.
Featured snippets can be a powerful tool for boosting your brand’s reputation/recognition and driving organic traffic to your site as they can help Google better understand when your page is the best answer for a relevant search.
If you need assistance with your on-page optimization to improve your brand’s SEO, please contact us today. Acronym has been leading (and defining) the search industry for nearly thirty years. We are here to help.
