Brighton SEO: Our Key Learns

A day by the seaside, with fish and chips, fresh sea air and The World’s Biggest Search Conference! Brighton SEO is such fantastic day with the aim of (in their own words) ‘Helping search marketers meet, learn, and do their jobs a little better’. Here’s our key learns from the day: 

Chat GPT and AI tools have a place in your SEO strategy and content marketing 

Chat GPT and other AI tools are here to stay and can be used to benefit search marketers IF used correctly. Almost every talk we went to at Brighton SEO, Chat GPT was mentioned at least once. Chat GPT can be useful for research, top level keywords and idea generation but don’t be tempted to use it as a copywriter. Learning how to prompt Chat GPT is your secret weapon to unlock insightful research and the right keywords. Asking for blog ideas around a certain topic, the most searched keywords etc are all great ways to get inspiration for your content marketing and to find out what people are searching for. What Chat GPT can’t provide (yet) is the more detailed information SEO tools can, such as search volumes, keyword difficulties and more importantly the ability to analyse these with knowledge of how relevant they are for your business.  

One thing that was made very clear at the talks we attended at Brighton SEO was that unique content is still and probably always will be one of the biggest google ranking factors and taking content straight from Chat GPT will result in uninspiring, unengaging and possibly even duplicate content. If searchers start to realise that companies are churning out content from Chat GPT they will eventually cut out the middleman and go straight to chat GPT themselves. In response Google and other search engines will reward unique content that solves the users search query in a way that Chat GPT wouldn’t be able to, meaning it’s more important than ever to make your content original, useful and inspiring.  

SEO is not dead, but it’s about more than just Google 

There’s been a lot of talk recently around ‘SEO is dead’, most people at the conference would probably agree SEO isn’t dead, but it is changing. Searchers are using platforms other than just google to perform their searches. No, we don’t mean Ask Jeeves is making a comeback. Many people are using platforms such as Tik Tok, Instagram, YouTube and Pinterest to start their research whether it be for a holiday, or outfit inspo. Finding out where your users are looking is the first step and optimising your content on these channels to ensure you’re appearing in the right searches is the next. Tik Tok are now, like google making use of featured snippets, it’s worth keeping up to date with the features that these platforms are offering to drive search and optimising your content to make full use of them. 

How to make use of featured snippets 

A featured snippet is known as position 0. Making use of featured snippets can really improve your brand awareness and even your CTR. It makes sense, taking up more space at the very top of google, what’s not to like? So how can you get a featured snippet?  Focus on the keywords you’re already ranking for and use questions in your content. Why questions make up 70% of all featured snippets. Ensure your content answers the question succinctly and in a non-complicated way. Using heading tags and ensuring the readability of your content also helps. Make sure content is factual and use appropriate images with optimised alt tags where possible.  

Link building remains an important ranking factor, but go for quality over quantity 

Link building is still one of the best ways to improve your rankings! How can you get links? It really comes back to content. High quality, unique and fresh content. There are ways to build quicker links but consistently publishing new, engaging, unique content that answers a search query is one of the best ways to consistently build links and authority. It creates a cycle, once you build authority you will be more likely to acquire links, building links creates authority. But you have to start somewhere, prioritise the keywords which are most important to your business based on search volume, relevancy and intent. 

In summary, the quality of your content and how your audience engage with it is so important to your SEO strategy. EEAT, the new acronym from googles search rater guidelines includes an extra E for Experience. Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness all things you won’t get from solely using AI tools. 

We don’t expect you to do it all alone, that’s what we’re here for. We have expert search marketers who have the tools to carry out keyword research, analyse the SERPs and the knowledge to create an SEO strategy tailored to your business.  

Get in touch to find out more.