Now is the Time to Revisit SEO Strategy

Though consumer behavior changed drastically as a result of COVID-19, the desire to remain informed holds steady — making search a more important channel than ever before, as is SEO strategy.

As the COVID-19 pandemic heightened, organic search spiked as people looked for timely news on the virus and how it impacted their daily lives, as well as for new products they needed (personal or business) or new ways of getting goods they’d regularly purchased.

These behavioral shifts — and the accompanying pivots to many business models — made it a near-requirement for marketers to review their SEO strategy. What worked before may no longer be effective.

In fact, there are constant changes to the search landscape, spurred by market shifts, changing consumer values and interests, societal trends and more.

While we can't always predict these seismic changes, right now it’s safe to assume that organic search will continue to grow as a non-intrusive, convenient option for consumers and a massive opportunity for brands to serve their needs. SEO remains a smart investment with long-tail impact on search- and purchase-oriented content.

To ensure your brand is capitalizing on these critical organic traffic opportunities, it's important to constantly re-evaluate your strategy now for long-term organic visibility, taking into account:

• Changes that specific events or evolutions usher in, such as growth in “at home” and “remote” keyword modifiers
• Increased resilience on eCommerce, and the potential for a long-term behavior switch
• Growth in search around trending themes, new priorities and new needs, from the wellness category, to VPN solutions
• Local search and support burgeoning — if your business has a local play, now is the time to look at long-tail keyword strategies
• Decreased mobile traffic levels due to a more stagnant, non-commuter lifestyle

With today's change of pace, it's pretty much always a good time to revisit SEO and keyword strategy, and the narrative built and told around it.

For organizations looking for support with how to refresh their SEO, we created “SHIFT/SEO Reboot” — tiered solutions to help organizations improve their organic search performance. They’re built to work within budgets of all sizes and focus on the most critical needs defined by the current moment:

• Staying ahead of industry and competitor search trends & activity (including the acceleration of audio searches)
• Optimizing existing owned content to maximize potential search traffic and building new full-funnel content strategies focused on rich, user-friendly content
• Mapping audience-focused content opportunities to varied search intents (informational, consideration, transactional and branded)
• Ensuring general website health, mobile experience and UX are shored up to reduce bounce rates and capitalize on conversions — particularly within industries where demand is on the rise

Whether we support you or you DIY, we leave you with one piece of advice: keep up with frequent review of keyword targets and accompanying narratives. It'll deliver in both the short- and long-term, and can help companies maintain or gain ground (especially through challenging times).