Many business owners and digital marketers make the mistake of focusing on the short-term gains of SEO. They think they can use the technical side of SEO to boost website ranking quickly on the Search Engine Result Pages (SERP).
Some people also end up using Black Hat SEO techniques to improve website ranking in the short-term. However, these Black Hat SEO tactics can get penalized by Google or other search engines, which can hurt the website's rank on search results. When it comes to SEO, good things come to those who wait.
That is why reputable companies like Monte Verde Media will advise you to give adequate time, consideration, and consistency to your SEO efforts. We contacted a team of entrepreneurs and tech wizards at Monte Verde Media to understand why it takes time to see the results of our SEO efforts. This is what we learned.
It Takes Time to Build Domain Authority
Search engines can be extremely opaque when it comes to declaring the exact parameters affecting website ranking on result pages. Digital marketers have noticed that websites that have been around for a while tend to have some benefits over the new ones.
Older websites can build up brand authority, high-quality content, and productive backlinks over time. Backlinks sourced from credible sites with high domain ranking can tell search bots that the content is trustworthy.
The only way to get the benefits of backlinks for SEO is to publish quality content linked organically to premium sources of information like Forbes, CNN, Fox News, and other websites with high domain authority. As you can imagine, it takes time to create and publish high-quality content and add backlinks to build up domain authority.
Search Engine Algorithms Are Constantly Changing
Anyone associated with SEO knows that Google keeps changing their search engine algorithms all the time. Even though their primary objective behind changing their algorithms is to offer a better experience to the users, it can create a lot of confusion and frustration for digital marketers.
Some websites have also been adversely affected by these changes resulting in considerable loss of visibility on the Internet and search ranking. That is why digital marketers and business owners need to make long-term plans for SEO campaigns while considering the possibility of search algorithm updates.
These updates may be infrequent, but they can affect your SEO ranking and traffic when they roll out. That is why long-term SEO strategies are much more effective, especially the ones that take future algorithm changes into account and prepare the website accordingly.
Search Intent Keeps Evolving
Most people are already relying on mobile phones for Google searches. With the increasing popularity of smart speakers, voice search has also gained importance over the last few years. Currently, smartphone, local, and voice searches have changed the game plan for SEO.
Small businesses and large enterprises need to boost their local SEO efforts to achieve maximum visibility because searches for businesses “near me” have grown exponentially. Optimizing for voice search has also become crucial for companies targeting younger generations, especially B2C organizations.
Business owners and digital marketers must keep in mind that voice searches can only provide the top-most result. SEO experts have also noticed that long-tail keywords have a better SEO impact.
Competition for Organic Ranking Is Fierce
Billions of websites exist on the Internet, focussing their SEO efforts on the popular keywords in every industry. It takes time for any website to rise through the ranks on SERPs, depending on a handful of factors. Your website ranking can be affected by its page titles, content quality, and meta descriptions, as well as those of your competitors.
For example, your competitors may have higher budgets than you and can spend much more on creating high-quality content for their websites. However, using the right SEO strategies and planning for the long-term can boost your website ranking on result pages.
That is why marketing experts emphasize the fact that content is king. It is not enough to write a blog post stuffed with keywords without providing any real information to the users. In fact, Google penalizes keyword stuffing along with other Black Hat SEO tricks these days and rewards content that are accurate, current, and easy to read.
The digital marketing experts we spoke to made it clear that there is no shortcut to SEO success. Business owners or digital marketers who prioritize speed over quality usually end up losing the SEO game.
Intelligent digital marketing is to foresee the future landscape for SEO and formulate your strategies accordingly. Bear in mind that the efforts you put in now can produce results for months or even years to come.