The world of SEO is changing at lightning speed and medical businesses have to use medical SEO tools to stay ahead of competitors. The customer behaviour and expectations and Google algorithm updates keep medical marketers busy, continuously making the necessary adjustments. SEO is the lifeblood of any online business and one of the most important ways to gain and maintain a competitive advantage. The following are five essential changes that occurred in 2016.
- Keywords Research: This is one of the stable search engine optimization elements that never change; however, the importance of keywords and its usage has declined. This is due to the Hummingbird Update that gives Google a better idea about the user’s query. Now, long-tail keywords and phrases are much more important.
- Penguin Update: Google announced some major changes to the Penguin algorithm. In fact, there were 2 updates – one that penalized spam and the other that made Penguin a real-time thing that can help penalized websites recover more quickly.
- Index Split: This announcement was about splitting Google’s search index into two i.e. it signifies businesses also need a mobile website to cater to the increasing number of mobile users. Google wants to stay abreast with the changing times and user behaviour, and keep its index up-to-date for mobile users.
- Location: Another major change in SEO is the Possum update that was an unexpected development. It provides more options to local searches and also prevents the spam from racing to the top of the list.
- Importance to relevant content with backlinks: Content is still considered the king but the search engine algorithm looks for informative and up-to-date content with backlinks. But you need to be careful where those links come from.
Some significant SEO changes can be expected in the year 2017 too and with the help of a reliable digital marketing agency, medical businesses can stay ahead of their competitors.
