You Still Need the Basic SEO Skills in 2023
Trends may come and go and technology advances but SEO basics remain the same and are still relevant in 2023.
Creative Writing – Users aren’t looking for SEO, they want something interesting to read that answers their questions and gives them new, accurate, and authoritative information. SEO does not exist without creative content to hold it. Think outside the box and come up with content that will attract users and please search engines.
Use and Understand Analytics – Taking a look at your Google Analytics won’t do anything for you unless you do something with the insights. In 2022, SEO experts need to be skilled in understanding and using analytics to adjust their SEO strategy according to what works and what doesn’t.
Know Your Goals – Your SEO strategy may be bringing in a lot of traffic but is that traffic converting to sales? Traffic is great but what businesses really want to do is get more leads and make more sales. SEO experts need to be clued up on Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) to increase the percentage of visitors who follow through with the desired action – make a purchase, fill in a form, etc. CRO is becoming more and more important. Websites want to stand out from their competitors and improve their conversion rates. Adding a “tap to call button or website chat is a great way to convert traffic to leads.
Top 5 Must-Have SEO Skills in 2023
1. Technical Skills
In 2022 SEO experts will need to be skilled in HTML, CSS, JavaScript, A/B testing, and using Google tools such as GA and GSC. Your technical skills will be vital for finding and fixing errors such as broken links. Use your tech skills to improve page speed, add structure data, and canonical tags for domains. On-page tech skills cannot be underestimated and should be used to fix duplicate title tags, improve meta tags, optimize images for SEO, and perfect your backlinks. SEO experts with coding skills will be able to take their SEO to the next level.
2. People Skills
SEO experts need to work well with others. There are content writers, social media experts, influencers, coders, clients, PR people, marketing managers, and others that all need to work as a team for successful SEO. Implementing a successful SEO campaign in 2023 requires excellent people skills. And with so many people working remotely, people skills are even more important. You need to know how to bring a team together over zoom and get them to collaborate and manage projects using programs like Trello, Monday.com, or Asana.
3. Watch Trends and Be Flexible
In 2022, SEO experts have to adapt to the ever-changing algorithms of Google and test to see which titles, meta descriptions, keywords, etc work best. For example, test different types of content such as videos, images, or graphics to see which increases time on site. Try using split screens, to test your SEO strategy. Remain flexible and if something doesn’t work, drop it. You need to keep trying new strategies to see what improves your ranking and what damages it. It’s ok if your traffic fluctuates while you’re testing because in the end you will learn from it and know what to change. You won’t always be able to please Google’s changing algorithms, but you should educate yourself on the broad core algorithm updates that take place every few months. Most importantly – don’t be afraid to experiment.
4. Good Old Fashioned Keyword Research
Although you can’t avoid doing keyword research for SEO you can make use of time-saving tools that do the research for you. Tools provided by Ahrefs, Semrush, and Neil Patel will put you ahead of competitors. Use these tools to find long-tail and short keywords, question keywords, and your main keywords. These tools can also be used to identify your competitors, analysis of the page intent for particular keywords. I know it can take hours, but keyword research is the backbone of good SEO.
5. Mobile, Local, and Social
We can’t discuss SEO in 2023 without mentioning mobile devices, local SEO optimization, and social media. SEO experts in 2023 need to be focused on SEO that works on the small screen. As most mobile users make local queries, mobile SEO needs to take this into account. With more and more people using their mobile devices rather than desktop computers, SEO experts should make mobile optimization a priority. After all, 50%-80% of website traffic comes from mobile devices.
SEO experts must also lean heavily towards social media to find marketing opportunities, and spot user trends. The average user spends 147 minutes a day on social media. Although social media won’t contribute directly to SEO ranking, links shared on social media will increase brand exposure. Also by analyzing your social media performance and using social listening, you can improve your content strategy and find trending keywords.
