Aleyda Solís - The State of Technical SEO in 2024

October 17 - 18 2024 CAM Raleigh 409 W. Martin
Street Raleigh, NC 27603 ALEYDA SOLIS SEO CONSULTANT & FOUNDER   AT ORAINTI October 17 - 18 2024 CAM Raleigh 409 W. Martin Street Raleigh, NC 27603 THE STATE OF TECH SEO IN 2024 THE TRENDS, CHALLENGES & OPPORTUNITIES

STATE OF TECHNICAL SEO 2024 BY @ALEYDA FROM ORAINTI AT
@TECHSEOCONNECT AI OVERVIEWS CHATGPT, PERPLEXITY, AND LLMS THREAT Welcome to the “fine” state of SEO in 2024 GOOGLE DOC LEAKS GOOGLE SEARCH   UPDATES AI ORGANIZED SERPS STATE OF TECHNICAL SEO 2024 BY @ALEYDA FROM ORAINTI AT @TECHSEOCONNECT

@TECHSEOCONNECT The pace of changes and the uncertainty that comes with it is at all-time high in search

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/the-seofomo-seo-consulting-survey/ It has never been harder to sell SEO

@TECHSEOCONNECT It has also never been harder to achieve SEO goals https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/the-seofomo-seo-consulting-survey/

@TECHSEOCONNECT But LLMs have also brought an unprecedented number of opportunities for SEO automation

@TECHSEOCONNECT I’m kidding! I’m not talking about these

@TECHSEOCONNECT Sadly, these have only made it harder for   Google to index content, especially new one at scale

@TECHSEOCONNECT I meant these! With new tools or integrations   to automate & scale our SEO workflows + +

@TECHSEOCONNECT It has never been easier to code & create your own apps than w/ Claude Artifacts & ChatGPT Canvas

@TECHSEOCONNECT We now also have access to SEO solutions that solve some of the most challenging Technical SEO executions

@TECHSEOCONNECT Tools for implementing from internal linking   to structured data at scale https://inlinks.com/

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://www.cloudflare.com/ CDNs that allow us to not only optimize loading times, but execute rewrites, change HTTP headers

@TECHSEOCONNECT Real time SEO alerting tools to monitor any   updates in key technical configurations https://www.contentkingapp.com/

@TECHSEOCONNECT Cloud based crawlers with detailed reports featuring the raw vs rendered HTML gap at scale https://www.contentkingapp.com/

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://ahrefs.com/ SEO platforms that allow us to check code changes not only of your own pages, but any site page

@TECHSEOCONNECT How is all this impacting our technical SEO day- to-day? What are the trends, challenges & opportunities?

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ I asked and got +280 answers to the SEOFOMO Technical SEO Survey to assess them and identify solutions

@TECHSEOCONNECT Let’s start by understanding today’s   Technical SEO auditing habits STATE OF TECHNICAL SEO 2024 BY @ALEYDA FROM ORAINTI AT @TECHSEOCONNECT

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ Most tech SEOs develop monthly, followed by quarterly technical SEO audits

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ The majority use a mix of desktop and cloud based crawlers

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ Most SEOs use between 2 to 3 crawlers in tech SEO audits

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ The most popular tools used for Technical SEO tasks are the Search Console, Screaming Frog, Ahrefs, Semrush and Sitebulb

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ The majority pre-schedule crawls to automate validations of site configurations

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ Most also use SEO alerting tools to be notified whenever a configuration has changed

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ The majority validate tech SEO executions in a test environment before they’re released

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ However, only 23% of SEOs enable JS rendering when crawling the site +90% of the crawls

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ We usually integrate Search Console, analytics and 3rd party SEO metrics in our crawls for better context

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ Although most only do Web log file analysis when the nature or complexity of the project requires it

@TECHSEOCONNECT We’ve clearly come a long way when auditing! What about technical SEO recommendations execution?

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ With LLMs/AI, no-code, edge SEO, API accesses,   this is my expectation

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ Almost half said to be using   AI/LLMs to automate tech SEO tasks, but only 13% are leveraging it for implementation

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ Fewer have developed their own tools for SEO tasks, and those who have are for analysis

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ However, we use third-party plugins, add-ons and CDN based solutions to implement a high number of core technical related configurations

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ We also use Jira and Slack, to coordinate with developers or product teams for implementation

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ And most tech SEO recommendations “only” take between 4-6 weeks to get executed

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ Despite this, most only see between 40% to 60%, of their tech SEO recommendations implemented

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ Unsurprisingly, the majority say that it’s now as hard or harder to achieve technical SEO goals vs two years ago

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ The main reasons for tech SEO executions being delayed or not implemented are “same old”

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ Some issues seem to never change!

@TECHSEOCONNECT Although automation can facilitate certain implementations, they can’t replace the need of stakeholders support & decision makers buy-in

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ We can see something similar when asking about the biggest Tech SEO challenge in current projects

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ It’s again a mix of resources constraints, buy-in and collaboration issues in legacy, new JS frameworks or during migrations

@TECHSEOCONNECT Are we in 2024 or 2014?

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ Despite all this, tech SEO efforts are still highly or moderately impactful to SEO goals

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/the-seofomo-seo-consulting-survey/ Most of our SEO projects   still achieve their expected goals too

@TECHSEOCONNECT And despite other platforms’ buzz, Google & Organic Search are still the biggest traffic source Source & Source

@TECHSEOCONNECT Make it make sense

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://www.searchpilot.com/resources/blog/google-is-still-your-biggest-traffic-referrer We clearly still need to better influence and communicate the value, need and impact of SEO to get buy-in

@TECHSEOCONNECT Most of our tech SEO challenges still need human solutions despite our new automation capabilities, since they require decision makers buy-in and stakeholders support

@TECHSEOCONNECT Somehow, when asked about new tech SEO features “wish list”, this wasn’t mentioned https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/

@TECHSEOCONNECT However, this “wish list” focuses on analysis   & execution features to avoid reliance on others https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/

@TECHSEOCONNECT It’s time to change how we think about technical SEO problems to better tackle them, going to the source of our challenges

@TECHSEOCONNECT At a high level, the SEO challenge is whether about brand or product, depending on the site size

@TECHSEOCONNECT For bigger companies (and sites), the “product” (execution alignment) is the top SEO challenge

@TECHSEOCONNECT For smaller companies (and sites): solving the “brand” (popularity) challenge is the biggest issue

@TECHSEOCONNECT In terms of SEO areas, the bigger the site, the more important the product (tech) challenge is PRODUCT BRAND

@TECHSEOCONNECT The problem here is not the lack of resources,   but the flexibility and support to execute PRODUCT BRAND

@TECHSEOCONNECT Love it or hate it, tech SEO can’t succeed on a silo without the support of key product areas stakeholders & decision makers

@TECHSEOCONNECT The goal is to achieve SEO alignment with the different product areas of influence: Dev/UX, Biz and Marketing MARKETING TEAM DEV/UX TEAM BIZ DECISION MAKERS SEO SEO SEO

@TECHSEOCONNECT We don’t need to reinvent the wheel, we can use PM principles to better align SEO with product SEO SEO SEO COMMUNICATION IMPACT SUPPORT

@TECHSEOCONNECT We can follow JAD Principles to gather “joint” requirements involving stakeholders from early on https://cooens.com/knowledge-base/the-joint-application-development-methodology-approach-jad/

@TECHSEOCONNECT Audience Goals they Care About Goals Progress Questions KPIs to Report Metrics to Use Data Source Scope Frequency Format CEO   CMO +50% SEO Process ROI in 12 months   +80% Organic Search Revenue in 12 months   1st in Organic Search Traffic marketshare in 12 months What’s the organic search ROI?   What’s the organic search revenue?   What’s our organic search traffic marketshare? SEO Process ROI YoY   Organic Search Revenue YoY   Organic Search Traffic marketshare position Organic Search Revenue   SEO related Cost (Consulting, resources) Website Organic search traffic   Competitors Organic search traffic Analytics Web Traffic Tool Website Level Per Product line Quarterly Presentation Deck   Conference Call Head of SEO +50% SEO Process ROI in 12 months   +80% Organic Search Revenue in 12 months 1st in Organic Search Traffic marketshare in 12 months   +200% Non-Branded Commercial Search Traffic in 12 months Top 10 in Targeted Queries Rankings in 12 months   +20% Promoted pages Backlinks in 12 months   All Optimized Key pages indexability in 6 months   All Optimized Key pages crawlability in 6 months What’s the organic search ROI?   What’s the organic search revenue?   What’s our organic search traffic marketshare? What’s our non-branded commercial traffic?   How are we ranking for targeted queries? What are the promoted pages backlinks? How are we indexing key pages?   How are we crawling key pages? SEO Process ROI YoY   Organic Search Revenue YoY   Organic Search Traffic marketshare position   Non-branded commercial traffic YoY   Targeted queries rankings YoY   Promoted pages backlinks YoY   Key pages indexed 6 months trend   Key pages crawled 6 months trend Organic Search Revenue   SEO related Cost (Consulting, resources) Website Organic search traffic   Competitors Organic search traffic Non-Branded Commercial organic traffic   Organic search rankings   Backlinks per pages Ranked Pages   Indexed Pages Crawled Pages Analytics Web Traffic Tool   Search Console   Rank Tracker   Backlink Tool   SEO Crawler Website Level Per Product line   Per Category Per Page Type Monthly Presentation Deck   Conference Call   Google Sheets … … … … …. …. … Agreeing on what and how you will recommend   and report on based on what they care about

@TECHSEOCONNECT Here’s a Sheet version of the SEO measurement and report Planner to set meaningful Goals & KPIs https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1g88EW02BRQGtaHQQ6wohL0jUVrSqcozaLUcTqbveNfQ/view?usp=sharing

@TECHSEOCONNECT We can create User Stories for each SEO recommendation to easily articulate the benefit and desired action at an strategic level https://caroli.org/en/user-story/

@TECHSEOCONNECT https://caroli.org/en/user-story/ Specifying acceptance criteria to consider executions as done, and establishing the connected tasks with each

@TECHSEOCONNECT The level of granularity of stories tasks & acceptance also help coordination

@TECHSEOCONNECT We can also use the (D)RICE model to assess and prioritize SEO recommendations with the highest reach, impact, confidence, and lower efforts across involved areas to show a positive ROI https://www.intercom.com/blog/rice-simple-prioritization-for-product-managers/

@TECHSEOCONNECT The model also helps to specify the level of scope, effort and expected impact of each SEO strategy

@TECHSEOCONNECT .. as well as the connected resources to facilitate spotting feasibility and cost effectiveness issues

@TECHSEOCONNECT But where do you bring that expected traffic data from? It’s time to get comfortable with forecasts https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1LkcNF4SzTVpcKNWzmYq6IEtVkSAg7kOPuLKjNE7LZTw/edit?gid=1906435056#gid=1906435056

@TECHSEOCONNECT We can use the Simple ML for Sheets for free   (relying on both ARIMA and ETS models) https://workspace.google.com/marketplace/app/simple_ml_for_sheets/685936641092

@TECHSEOCONNECT Copy my (D)RICE model SEO recommendations   specification and prioritization template https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Z6Rw5VblHC_t6xPC-DB-3OyFyxPXkN71a-LEzr4bhBM/edit?usp=sharing

@TECHSEOCONNECT We can also use the SCR Framework to structure recommendations & reports to facilitate action What we need? What’s the obstacle faced? What to do about it? https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/minto-pyramid-principle-scr

@TECHSEOCONNECT This will add needed goals and biz context to each recommendation and help secure support Goal: X% of [METRIC] by [DATE] Audience: [ROLE]   KPI: [KPI NAME] [DESCRIPTIVE KPI PROGRESS SUMMARIZING HEADING] Introduction explaining what happened and if the expected results have been achieved or not.     Why [THE RESULT IS THE ONE IT IS]? Explain why this happened, good or bad. How to achieve the expected goal? Summarize the proposed next steps to start, continue or stop executing to achieve the expected goal. RESOLUTION CONFLICT SETUP KPI CHART Goal: 30% branded traffic share by December Audience: CEO/CMO   KPI: Branded Traffic Share https://speakerdeck.com/aleyda/how-to-develop-successful-seo-reports-number-seokomm

@TECHSEOCONNECT We can describe recommendations using the Minto Pyramid to back them & minimize doubts https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/minto-pyramid-principle-scr

@TECHSEOCONNECT Recommendations & reports will be now organized to facilitate support & drive action https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/minto-pyramid-principle-scr

@TECHSEOCONNECT These might be “soft skills” but with our recurring challenges, also critical for Tech SEOs MEANINGFUL KPIS CLEAR   DATA PRESENTATION DATA STORYTELLING COMMUNICATE RESULTS EXPLAIN THE CAUSE OF RESULTS DRIVE ACTION TO ACHIEVE GOALS

@TECHSEOCONNECT MARKETING TEAM DEV/UX TEAM BIZ DECISION MAKERS SEO SEO SEO We will never automate buy-in! It’s time to solve   Tech SEO challenges by using product principles & getting human support

@TECHSEOCONNECT It’s time to change the narrative and get our tech SEO recommendations executed for success STATE OF TECHNICAL SEO 2024 BY @ALEYDA FROM ORAINTI AT @TECHSEOCONNECT

@TECHSEOCONNECT STATE OF TECHNICAL SEO 2024 BY @ALEYDA FROM ORAINTI AT @TECHSEOCONNECT https://hub.seofomo.co/surveys/seofomo-technical-seo-survey/ Want more technical SEO insights? Take a look at the SEOFOMO Tech SEO Survey Results

@TECHSEOCONNECT I’m Aleyda Solis * SEO Consultant & Founder at Orainti * SEO Speaker at +100 Events in +20 countries * Author “SEO. Las Claves Esenciales.” * Crawling Mondays Video & Podcast Series Host * #SEOFOMO & #MarketingFOMO Newsletters Author * Maker LearningSEO.io * European Search Personality of the Year in 2018 * remoters.net Co-Founder Thanks! Questions?

Aleyda Solís - The State of Technical SEO in 2024

Aleyda Solís - The State of Technical SEO in 2024

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