If you’re still just checking off the basic SEO boxes – keywords, meta tags, alt text – then you’re already behind. 

Because let’s be honest, basic SEO just doesn’t cut it anymore. Now everyone’s optimizing their titles and building backlinks. So, how do you really stand out in search engine results and leave your competitors behind?  

That’s where advanced SEO comes in. We’re talking about smarter tactics that focus on user experience, technical health, content quality, and data-driven decisions. In this blog, we’ll give a full step-by-step guide on how to improve SEO.  

Let’s jump straight into it! 

Advanced Strategies to Improve SEO and Beat Competitors

Do you know that Google handles over 16.4 billion searches every single day, that’s nearly 189,815 every second? And nearly 69% of all clicks go to just the top three results.   

This means that if your site isn’t ranking high, most people won’t even know that you exist. With search engines getting smarter and the industry competition tougher than ever, basic SEO isn’t enough anymore. 

To really stand out, you need to take things further with strategies that are smarter, more focused, and built to outpace the competition. Here are some SEO improvement tips:  

1. Get Your Technical SEO in Shape

If you have a website that is slow, clunky, or hard for Google to crawl, then you’re definitely going to have a tough time ranking.  

Technical SEO is all about tightening up the back end of your website, so that it runs smoothly, loads fast, and makes it easy for search engines (and real people) to find what they need. For that here’s what to focus on:  

• Core Web Vitals: These are performance metrics Google cares about: page speed, responsiveness, and visual stability. To know where your site needs help, you can use tools like PageSpeed Insights or GTmetrix. 

• Smart Internal Linking: Make sure important pages are linked from others in a natural way. It helps users find content and tells Google what pages matter most.    

• Advanced Schema Markup: Schema is code that helps Google understand your content. You can add it for things like products, reviews, FAQs, or events, which can get you rich snippets (those extra details in search results). 

Bonus Tip: You don’t need to be a developer to do most of this; tools like Screaming Frog or Sitebulb can give you visual reports that are easy to act on. 

2. Build Authority with Better Content (E-E-A-T)

Google now cares a lot more about the quality and trustworthiness of your content than just how many keywords you use. That’s where E-E-A-T comes in:   

• Experience: Share your own stories, case studies, or examples. Readers (and Google) love real-life and personal insights.  

• Expertise: Show who’s behind the content. Add author bios, link to credentials, or mention qualifications. 

• Authoritativeness: Get mentioned or linked by trusted sources in your industry. This boosts your credibility. 

• Trustworthiness: Secure your site (use HTTPS), keep your content updated, and be transparent about who you are. 

Also, instead of just writing random blog posts around individual keywords, try this: 

• Create Content Hubs: Choose a broad topic (like “email marketing”) and create one in-depth guide. Then write smaller, focused articles on subtopics (like “best email subject lines”) that all link back to the main guide. This structure tells Google you’re an expert on the whole subject.

Bonus Tip: Use AI tools like ChatGPT or SEMrush to help brainstorm topic ideas or optimize content but always keep a human touch. 

3. Build Links That Actually Matter

Backlinks (links from other websites to yours) are still an important SEO factor, but it’s not about quantity anymore. It’s about quality and relevance. Here’s how you can earn better links: 

• Study Your Competitors’ Backlinks: Tools like Ahrefs or Ubersuggest can show where your competitors are getting their links. Reach out to those same sources with your better content.  

• Create Link-Worthy Resources: Make sure that your content is not generic but filled with rich content. Think free tools, original research, useful guides, something worth linking to.    

• Find and Fix Broken Links: Look for lines on other sites that are broken and offer your content as a replacement. It’s a helpful and effective way to get more links.  

• Convert Brand Mentions into Links: If someone mentions your brand but didn’t link to your site, reach out and ask politely. Often, they’ll add the link.  

Bonus Tip: Focus on building relationships, not just backlinks. Genuine networking pays off for long-term success.  

4. Make User Experience a Priority

Google looks at how people interact with your site. If visitors leave quickly or don’t click around, it can hurt your rankings.  

A good user experience (UX) not only helps your site show up better on Google but also helps turn visitors into customers. Here are different ways to improve it:   

• Improve Engagement Metrics: Use tools like Hotjar or Google Analytics to see which part of your site make visitors leave. Improve slow pages, confusing layouts, or walls of text.  

• Get Featured in SERP Snippets: Structure your content to answer common questions clearly, use bullet points, Q&A sections, and summaries to help.    

• Boost Conversions: SEO gets people in the door, but your site should make it easy for them to take action, like buying something, signing up, or contacting you. Test headlines, buttons, and forms.    

• Personalize When Possible: Use location-based content or show relevant recommendations to keep users engaged.  

Bonus Tip: A fast, mobile-friendly, easy-to-navigate site = happy users = better rankings.     

5. Use Date & Competitive Insights to Stay Ahead

The smartest SEOs use data to figure out what’s working and what their competitors are missing. So, it’s great to analyse your competitor’s keyword strategy and stay up to date with current trends. But a question arises.   

How can competitor keyword analysis improve your SEO performance?   

By seeing which keywords your competitors rank for (that you don’t), you uncover real opportunities. These “keyword gaps” help you identify missed topics or subtopics, especially long-tail keywords with low competition but high intent.  

This way, you can make content that gives people the answers they are looking for, but that your competitors haven’t covered well. 

Other smart data-driven tactics are: 

• Top-Performing Content: Use tools to see which pages drive the most traffic for your competitors. 

• Analyze the SERPs: Look at the top results for your target keywords. What type of content is ranking? A listicle? A how-to guide? Match what Google’s showing. 

• Spot Trends Early: Use tools like Exploding Topics or Google Trends to see what people are starting to talk about in your area of interest, before it becomes popular. 

And don’t forget, data alone isn’t enough. You can take it even further by integrating AI and machine learning into your SEO workflow. 

What are the key benefits of integrating AI and machine learning into your SEO efforts? AI helps you work smarter, not harder. It can:  

• Look through lots of SEO data very quickly 

• Help you find missing keywords or drops in website traffic early 

• Give your ideas for content based on what people are looking for 

• Guess which types of content might do well 

AI doesn’t replace strategy; it enhances it by giving you better insights, faster.  

6. Stay Ahead with Emerging SEO Trends

SEO isn’t standing still, and neither should you. Search engines update how they work all the time, so if you don’t keep up, you could fall behind. To get better results and higher rankings, you need to adjust your SEO strategy as things change. Learning what’s new and making small changes can help your website stand out. 

How can AI-generated search results influence your SEO strategies in 2025?   

As search engines like Google roll out AI-powered results (like Search Generative Experience), users will start seeing summaries at the top of search, often without needing to click.   

This means your content needs to be more than just relevant. It has to be clearly structured, fact-based, and trustworthy so AI systems can pull it into those summaries.  

Bonus Tip: The best way to keep your website strong in the future? Focus on helping people and be ready to adjust when things change. 

Final Words

In 2025, advanced SEO isn’t about hacks or shortcuts. It’s about thinking smarter, digging deeper, and constantly improving. While most businesses are still stuck on the basics, you’ll be playing on a higher level, with stronger content, smarter data use, better user experience, and a more trusted online presence.  

You don’t need to do everything at once. Start with one area, improve it, then move to the next. 

Because in SEO, the real winners are the ones who keep learning, testing, and improving, while their competitors stand still.