These are NOT the SEO trends of 2021

That year, my then boss required me to write a blog about the SEO and online marketing trends of 2017. At that time, I had to get the inspiration mainly from the other blogs on SEO trends.

Even then, I was unhappy with the quality of the blogs. Things that have been important for 5 years and will be important for the next 10 years are at once described as SEO trends and the thing of the next year.

You really MUST capitalize on that now...otherwise you will miss the boat.

Today in 2020, the quality of those same blogs is still not very good. So I want to take you through some SEO trends that I think are really no longer a trend, but the norm.

So things you should always do. 3 years ago, but also in a few years.

Ps. Read this article with a grain of salt. Within every part of SEO things are being developed, but these days many people seem to know the next big thing within SEO.

Non SEO trend 1: Speed

Speed is and always will be a thing. Initially, of course, you do it for your visitor, because everyone just gets tired of a slow website.

Waiting more than 10 seconds for content few people do

Meanwhile, the loading speed of your website is also something Google bases its ranking on, among other things. This has been true for desktop since 2010 and for mobile since 2018.

So this can't really be called a trend anymore in 2021. Except when 5G is integrated into our society and everything can be loaded even faster. But that will take a few more years, so there's no need to focus on that next year.

Not SEO trend 2: Mobile first

And on to non- SEO trend number 2. One that I also encounter often: mobile first.

For years, there have been websites where more than 95% of visits come in via desktop. Take a B2B website, for example, where virtually everyone uses the desktop.

But in addition, for years there have been websites where 95% of visits come in via mobile. We are long past that switch to mobile usage. Mobile usage is already ingrained in our society.

In 2015, the number of mobile searches already overtook the number of desktop searches, and globally, mobile's market share is also higher than desktop's.

Mobile first will not be THE trend to capitalize on in 2021. Because mobile first, it has been for a long time :).

Non SEO trend 3: Link building

When it comes to link building, "No black hat SEO" and "Google is going to look at links differently in 2021" are common SEO trends of 2021.

And for that matter, also from 2020, 2019, 2018 and so on. Because in my opinion, quality backlinks have been a thing for years. And so has quantity.

The bottom line of link building is that you want to gather as many relevant and quality links to your Web site as possible.

Yes, there are developments in the field of link building, but unfortunately I don't read anything about that.

What is important to mention then is that Google introduced rel="sponsored" and rel="ugc" last year. The use and impact of these are well known by now.

I hear and read virtually nothing about that. Is there a reason for that? Is this something from Google that no one is going to use and die lonely? I can't tell you, unfortunately.

Not SEO trend 4: Content is king

Content = king (and [Insert something yourself here] is Queen). Yes, content is a terribly important part of SEO.

I support that 100%. But these days, no part of SEO is king. Even if you write the best content on earth and are the best copywriter, if your website has a load time of 20 seconds and you have no backlinks, you are simply not going to score.

So content = king must become SEO = king. Because SEO should be seen as a whole, not just a few separate parts anymore.

Non SEO trend 5: Video

'But if I make 3 good videos and add them on my homepage, will I get much higher in Google?'

No. Video, like the other trends in this list, is not a panacea that will get you good rankings. It's important that the video matches your keyword, that your video is optimized and that the rest of your page is optimized as well.

If your website or page is crappy, it's still just as crappy with a video. This has virtually no positive impact and may actually only have a negative impact because the video actually worsens the load time of your page.

Small nuance: YouTube is currently one of the most important search engines, which is why you should treat it like one. Like SEO, it is not something you do on the side. It takes time, knowledge and good material.

Non SEO trend 6: Long texts

So far, it feels to me like I've always run into two camps when talking about text length.

Camp 1: No. You shouldn't have too much text. It should be short, powerful and to the point. Text is important, but it is supportive of the website.

Camp 2: CONTENT=KING AND YOUR TEXTS MUST BE LONG. BECAUSE WITHOUT LONG TEXTS YOU WON'T SCORE.

I totally disagree with both. We have achieved No. 1 positions for clients with 300-word text, but there have also been times when a powerful 4,000-word article did not even make it into the top 10.

The bottom line: the length of your text says nothing about quality and findability. Keywords matter here, semantics, headings, internal link structure and so on.

So saying that you need to write even longer texts in 2021 is really not an SEO trend....

Not SEO trend 7: Blogging

Blogging, of course, fits perfectly with the "trend" regarding long texts. Because blogging, yes that is the thing of 2021.

I had to look it up, because it was before my time ... but blogs have been around for 20+ (or maybe 25+) years. Blogging is a part of your content strategy and marketing and the impact of your blogs will not be greater next year.

After all, Google doesn't care about blogs. Google cares about valuable content. Whether that's in the form of a blog or not, Google doesn't care.

There are also plenty of companies that do extremely well online without blogs, so blogging is absolutely not a must.

Not SEO trend 8: SEO basics

Surely I find this the most comical of the list. 'Next year the basics of SEO will become even more important'. Seriously? Come on, you can really put more effort into writing your blog.

SEO these days is more than just adding an H1, an H2 and an alt tag. Personally, I even think the basics are actually less important. We can all add a headline, but writing good text and achieving a good link profile is another matter.

Non SEO trend 9: AMP

AMP still feels like yesterday to me. When this was launched and the plugins came on the market that made it very easy to create an AMP version of your website, I felt like a bee descending on the honey.

Or like a kid in the candy store.

At the time, this felt like THE thing to capitalize on, and for SEO it seemed perfect. Fast landing pages, user-friendly content and perhaps a positive effect on your rankings.

Unfortunately, AMP wasn't as good as everyone thought after all. You lost part of your corporate identity, for conversion it's jerk and it had no direct impact on your positions.

In other words, AMP was a flop. The same goes for Facebook Instant Articles (FIA), by the way. This was launched around the same time, but also failed to make enough of an impact and is used by few people.

Non SEO trend 10: Long tail keywords

15% of search terms used (note I say used and not typed in. Did someone say voice search?) in Google have never been used before. That's why it's important not just to look at volumes, past competition, but to look at the hype and real trends of tomorrow.

So this means that a whole range of new short tail keywords are going to be added in the next few years, as well as a whole number of long tail keywords.

That last one is what I want to talk about. Because when people often talk about long tail keywords, they make it seem like that's the gold of SEO.

But there can also be a lot of volume on the most important long tail keywords in a niche. Perhaps even more than on the short tail, precisely because the buying intent is so very present.

In other words, long tail keywords have also become an important part of SEO and thus is no longer a trend. At least not in 2021. Maybe it will be in 2015.

So what are the SEO trends of 2021?

Now, of course, you expect me to tell you what the SEO trends of 2021 will be.

I have to disappoint you, unfortunately. In fact, I am not going to do that.

Of course there is a lot to gain with SEO in the short term, and of course you can make an impact quickly with the right strategy. But SEO is always a long-term game where you have to do many things and do many things well. You can't just be good at link building or just be good at writing immensely long blogs and expect that that alone will get you good rankings.

In addition, it is also common for something to feel like the next big thing (AMP), but then be a flop. So my advice to you? Don't focus on all the frills and frills, just get really good at SEO in general.

So does this mean you should ignore the items in this article? Absolutely not :).