This was my basic strategy when I started SEO 20 years ago. But those were the days before 10 blue links. The times have changed.
Today, more items appear on search engine result pages (SERPs) than ever. These are known as Google SERP features and include the following questions, ads and star reviews.
Make a video of your article.
Google guides visitors to videos, particularly YouTube videos. This is something I wouldn’t be able to do if I focused only on the ranking of my pages.
Let’s say you write a How-To post about Google Analytics. This post explains how to share GA access.
Add articles to these sites.
It is a beautiful keyphrase. It would be amazing to rank.
However, if you search for it and examine the search results closely, you will see that there are no brands that rank anywhere. There is not a single competitor in the mix. Only media sites and large blogs rank higher than pages.
This usually means that you have found a highly competitive key phrase beyond the brands’ reach. Each article on a domain with high authority is a page of high rank. All publishers are involved.
This is an example of a page that displays search results.
Improve your reputation on review sites.
Although you may be ranked number one on the search results page, whether they click or not may depend on what else is available. They may decide to search for another person because of the number of low-star reviews. They may decide to search for reviews or complaints about a brand.
This problem is an indicator of a problem in your Analytics. This is not an SEO metric. This metric is not included in any reports unless you track clickthrough rate changes to your homepage via branded queries. This is impossible. To find such issues, you must look at SERPs.
You’ll be able to see the issues when you look at the SERP. It will be obvious which sites don’t have many positive reviews. The next step is to get the support of your superfans. You can send a simple, friendly request. They will be happy to assist you.
Make gathering feedback a part of your business. If the feedback is positive, it’s time to make it a point to boost your reputation on the review site that needs it. It’s a quick, polite, low-pressure request.
Another SERP analysis example, this one, is not related to keyphrase difficulty or competitors. This is part of a brand reputation audit and assessment. It’s also SEO.
If you see UGC sites in the SERP…
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We did a roundup of SEO experts and answered the question, “will SEO never die?”. While keyword research was done, Quora posts ranked high in the SERP. Like Reddit or Stack Overflow, Quora is a site full of user-generated content. You can ask questions or get answers. Anybody can post. These posts are often ranked.
