SEO Predictions for 2024: What To Expect From Google & How To Succeed

2023 has been a rocky year for SEOs.

We had to live through major updates by Google, such as October’s Helpful Content Update. But how are things looking for 2024?

In this article, we will go over what we believe will most likely happen next year as we give our top 7 SEO predictions for 2024.

Prediction #1: Unique, first-person content backed by experience will start winning

2023 saw the first big wave of AI content. 

Some of it was crappy, and AI writers were one of the SEOs who got hit hard in Google’s HCU this October.

But for 2024, we predict that authenticity, unique content, and personal experience will be the key to ranking.

Even if unique content doesn’t rank right away due to the lack of immediate authority and topical authority, the content will start ranking with time.

Producing content is a commodity. The personality, expertise, and experiences of the writers are not.

Start using first-person in your writing and strive to provide a different perspective.

The goal of the content will not be only informative, but also interesting and humane.

Prediction #2: Multi-channel marketing will help SEO

In 2024 it will be important to exist outside of blogging.

With authority and personal experience being more important than ever, a multi-channel marketing approach will help your SEO.

Build your presence outside of Google to reinforce your brand and get on the map.

That will help you with E-E-A-T.

An added benefit is you will improve your website’s indexing.

If you are linking your content on your socials and using hashtags, the crawlers can find your content.

This is because the hashtags are indexed on Google.

Start up your social media channels if you haven’t already and link to them from your website and vice versa.

Start building authority on these platforms and improve your industry standing.

Prediction #3: Google will try figuring out a better algorithm for what ”quality content” really is

Google throws around the concept of ”quality content” and even ”helpful content” but I doubt they can know for sure which content is truly quality.

If they could tell quality, they wouldn’t need backlinks and authority as external factors.

This is why I believe that Google will try to improve its algorithm for figuring out quality content.

The way they are most likely going for would be rewarding information gain. 

That is new, unique information that is being shared that has never been stated before.

An example of information gain is that Reddit and Quora gained a lot of traffic after Google’s HCU since their users are providing unique perspectives

Another angle Google could take may be relying more on on-site metrics such as tracking user engagement signals like time on site and bounce rates.

Google may double down on user experience metrics to better understand the impact of your content and your brand’s quality.

Prediction #4: Google will try to battle Parasite SEO

Parasite SEO is when an SEO pays an authoritative website (high DA) to post an (affiliate) article on their platform so they can rank on 1st page.

The problem with Parasite SEO for searchers is that the content is often not ideal – it rarely has any uniqueness or personal experience.

It just ranks because of the high authority of the website.

Google is aware of the problem and has tried dealing with this issue by handling manual penalties, such as their manual penalty to Outlook India.

Although I’m not sure how exactly they will battle Parasite SEO, the most likely outcome is that they will start applying more manual penalties.

That could scare the website owners of these high DA websites and they will be more reluctant to accept SEO’s money.

The way I imagine Parasite SEOs to continue doing this trick will probably be to start contacting only websites within their industry.

Prediction #5: There will be more AI content, but it will need to level up if they want to compete  

Even though the AI hype has already slowed down, AI content will continue being produced.

I believe that we might see even more AI content since AI writing tools are getting better every day.

But AI content will need to level up as Google’s detection software is going to become better as well.

And if we are right about Google potentially rewarding information gain (new info) better, AI writers will need to spend more time editing their content pieces

The AI content that struggles to keep up with Google’s quality standards will probably lose both existing and future rankings.

I’m personally not a fan of AI content as I believe that AI can only replace generic writers, not the good ones. 

But it’s undeniable that AI content is not going away despite Google’s penalties.

Prediction #6: SEOs will need to start being more picky about backlinks

Most SEOs are just happy to get any backlink, as long as they are DA50+ and it’s a dofollow.

The problem is that Google started putting more emphasis on topical authority.

That means that it will be contextual backlinks from within the industry that will be considered more valuable than ever.

You shouldn’t disavow backlinks from non-industry sites, but you can disavow low-quality backlinks from websites that are not within your industry.

And, as Matt Diggity has predicted for 2024, backlinks might as well become a stronger ranking factor in 2024.

Even though Google mentioned that backlinks are not the top 3 factors anymore, they will still need to battle unhelpful AI content somehow.

Prediction #7: Google will double down on Gemini (Bard) and will implement AI-powered search

It’s no secret that Google has been heavily experimenting with their new Search Generatitive Experience (SGE).

The goal is to implement an AI-powered search by placing quick answers at the top before the SERPs.

The problem with SEOs is that we might see more search journeys that do not result in a click.

Why else would they read your top 5 weight loss tricks article if users can get them from Google’s AI search?

But SEOs are protected from the fact that this will also become problematic for paid search, which is Google’s main source of income.

This is why a sub-prediction is that Google will try to incorporate both SEO and Paid Search into their new AI experience.

Key Takeaways & How To Best Prepare For SEO in 2024

• Improve the quality of your content by providing your  perspective and unique experiences
• Build your presence outside of Google to improve your industry authority in social media channels
• Think of how you can add additional information that is unique to the SERPs (information gain)
• Disavow low-quality backlinks from websites that are not within your industry
• Avoid using AI content at all costs, unless you want to do heavy editing
• Cut back on your Parasite SEO budget, unless you are writing articles for websites within your niche