Local businesses often feel they don’t have the resources to compete with big-name brands in the search engine optimization (SEO) arena. While this may be true nationally, they must remember that all business is local when it comes to SEO. This means the right optimization tactics can pay off, but only if current trends are followed. With this in mind, here are the SEO trends of 2017 that local businesses must keep up with.

1. Increased Focus on Content Density
Nearly one-third of total marketing budgets go directly towards content marketing, so it’s obvious how important this form of promotion is. Unfortunately, any Google search shows that the top results of most queries are usually just reworded copies of the same article.
Google has taken note of this, and they’ll be fighting against it in 2017. Simultaneously, many companies bucked this trend by creating long and extensive content, but consumers don’t always like reading that much. In 2017, Google will be rewarding content creators who fit highly-valued info into shorter pieces – thus increasing their content density.
2. Accelerated Mobile Pages Become Necessities
Online users want their experience to be as speedy as possible. This is such the case, in fact, that many will move onto another company’s website if they feel a page is taking too long to load. Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMPs) remove the likelihood of this occurring.\
These pages load much quicker and with less data use than traditional mobile pages. AMP compliance will be essential since it’s a Google initiative. This means they’ll give higher marks to pages using the technology, so marketing managers need to bring their pages up to speed.
3. Even More Focus on User Experience
As evidenced by Google’s AMP initiative, the search giant will be focusing heavily on user experience in 2017. Outside of AMP, this means every aspect of a website, from value of content to click-through rates, will need to be focused on. The goal is to get people on the website and keep them there, so if there are user experience improvements that need to be made, now is the time to do so.
Search engine optimization strategies are not an option in the modern digital world. Companies that don’t focus on SEO will certainly fall behind. Luckily, the aforementioned SEO trends of 2017 will help them avoid that.
If you would like help with your SEO campaigns, or need to start getting more visibility on the search engines, give us a call (888-416-7752) or click here to request a strategy session, and one of our marketing consultants will help you define a path forward.