Welcome to the latest Relevance round-up of Moz’s Top 10 expert findings and observations from SEO publications. This edition covers topics ranging from everything marketers need to be doing (but probably aren’t) to ranking for head terms. Moz has started to really focus in on local search SEO tips, which you will find in the last three links.
The hottest tips from SEO publications this week
1. 48 Things You Should Be Doing (But Probably Aren’t)
You try to follow digital marketing best practices, keep up to date with your title tags and know your SSL certificates from your HTML. But have you ever wondered if you’re doing everything right? Ian Lurie has created a checklist for marketers that should be fun to follow – unless you realise you’ve neglected to do any of the things on it, or worse, have been spending lots of time doing them incorrectly.
2. Key Search Ranking Factors For Original Content
How is your content performing? Moz has manually collected data from 96 blogs to correlate ranking performance for original content. SEOs can also learn which factors impact performance. Take a look at the study to see how you can apply the findings to your content and strategy.
3.How Google Search Console Can Help If You Are Mistakenly Removed from the Google Index
Digital SEO publications should ensure they have access to Google Search Console in case of removal from the Google search results. It happened to Search Engine Land last week when Google’s system misidentified it as being hacked. Google Search Console helped solve the issue quickly and identified the problem as a Google error. Without Google Search Console, staff might have spent countless hours speculating about why the site wasn’t indexed.
4. Advanced SEO Strategies At TechSEOBoost 2018
Catalyst’s second annual conference is packed with advanced technical SEO strategies and insights. The event took place on 29th November and you can listen to the recordings here.
5. Ranking for Head Terms May Be More Dynamic Than We Think
Head terms are competitive, popular keywords that drive high search volume. Tom Capper has built a hypothesis that head terms are no longer about static ranking factors, but based on a more dynamic and responsive model that includes SERP interaction speed and bounce rates. He based his findings on real-world experience and statistical research.
6. How The Filter Bubble Affects Your Search Results
Google’s ever-present manipulation of search results based on data collected by users has been dubbed the “filter bubble”. Google claims that it has taken steps to reduce the filter bubble but DuckDuckGo Blog’s research suggests otherwise. Interestingly, most individuals who participated in the experiment saw search results unique to them even after they logged out of Google and used incognito mode. Take a look at the full study – it’s fascinating!
7. Use Questions & Answer Content To Be Included In Rich Results
Do you rely on Google to answer all your questions, from DIY problems to word definitions? You’re not alone. Google has developed a new rich result type for question and answer sites so users can better identify which search results may provide the best information about their question. If you want to be included in the new format, you should use Q&A structured data in your content. This helps SEOs get content to the right users and helps the enquirers access the most relevant answers quickly.
8. Local Search Ranking Factors 2018: Darren Shaw’s Key Takeaways
Local SEO has been the subject of intense change over the past year. In this SEO publication’s blog post, Moz examines Darren Shaw’s key takeaways from the 2018 Local Search Ranking Factors survey. The findings can help us strategise in 2019 according to the local SEO experts. Google My Business, reviews and links are all big factors and Moz has a ton of local search SEO tips to keep you on track.
9. Google Continues To Push Towards Social
Google Plus may have failed but Google is unperturbed in its pursuit of social networking. David Mihm and Mike Blumenthal discuss the downfall of Plus and how Google is adapting Voice, Google Maps, Hangouts and other applications in socialising local. As they add more and more social media features to local, Google’s messages are mixed at best.
10. Building Linked Unstructured Citations for Local SEO: An Actionable Strategy
This detailed tutorial shows you how to capitalise on your local business listings by building powerful linked unstructured citations. These local search SEO tips give you an actionable strategy on how to manage listings on formal directories like Facebook and Yelp and unstructured ones like blog posts, online news and Top 10s (like this one!).
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