As we come to the end of 2017, we’ve decided to take a look back at some of our most-read articles throughout the year. For the rest of this week, we’ll be highlighting the top five most popular articles in various categories across the site.
First up is, of course, the bread and butter of Search Engine Watch: SEO. Several of our most-read articles in SEO were list articles (hard to go wrong with a good list), and they often dealt with how to prepare for the year ahead: how to plan your strategy for 2017, tips to boost your SEO in 2017, trends to watch in 2018.
If you missed any of these excellent articles when they were published, now’s your chance to check them out. And if you’ve already read them, well, it never hurts to refresh your knowledge.
#1: Five quick tips to boost your SEO in 2017
Everyone loves quick tips for SEO, and Tereza Litsa has some great ones to get your SEO off to a strong start in the new year. These might be tips for 2017, but they stand the test of time – there’s no reason why you shouldn’t apply these to your SEO going into 2018, if you haven’t already.
#2: Seven SEO trends to watch in 2018
What does the year ahead hold for SEO? While it’s hard to say exactly what will unfold in 2018, based on the events of this year and the prevailing winds in the industry, we can make a pretty good guess as to what the major trends will be. Tereza Litsa outlines seven you need to watch and account for in your search strategy next year.
After you’ve clued up on the trends ahead, don’t miss our follow-up article on how to optimize for them: How to future-proof your SEO for 2018.
#3: The 15 best Google Chrome extensions for SEO
Google Chrome dominates as the world’s favorite desktop browser, and its thousands of extensions give it an almost daunting level of customization. You can do just about anything with Google Chrome extensions, including – no, especially – SEO. But which are the best extensions to use?
Clark Boyd rounds up 15 Chrome extensions to aid you in your SEO efforts, from a quick site review to on-site content analysis, technical SEO and backlink analysis.
#4: Building your SEO strategy in 2017: What’s most important?
In another enduring piece about SEO strategy for 2017, Marcela de Vivo looks at the areas you should be focusing on for SEO amid hundreds of possible ranking factors and points of optimization. Again, it’s still highly relevant as we come to the end of the year and well worth a revisit. How many of these areas did you nail in 2017?
#5: How to create SEO-friendly content
The increasing merging of content and SEO, once thought of as separate disciplines, has been one of the enduring themes of the past couple of years. By now, if your content strategy and SEO aren’t at least on the same page, if not working hand-in-glove, then you’re definitely taking the wrong approach to both.
If you need a primer or a refresher on creating the best content to rank well in search, Tereza Litsa has you covered with her guide on how to create SEO-friendly content.
Check back tomorrow for our next set of highlights – the top 5 most popular articles in PPC.