94 SEO Statistics You Can’t Ignore: 2024 Market Share Analysis & Data

If you are a business owner or a marketing professional, you know how important search engine optimization (SEO) is to your online presence. SEO has become a critical component of any company that seeks prominence online. It has proven itself useful as a marketing tool, targeting quality site traffic, and increasing site clicks. You can also use it in conjunction with your public relations efforts. SEO statistics reveal that all these are currently benefiting many companies

Additionally, the number of people going online has been increasing since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. As such, it is the perfect time to capture this increasingly digital market.

You can further benefit from using SEO by using it with SEO software. To give you a better appreciation of SEO and what it can do for you, we have compiled the latest SEO statistics. From data on current SEO investments to the effect of COVID-19 on the industry, all the pertinent information is here for your perusal. After these statistics on the importance of SEO, deciding whether or not SEO is right for you should no longer be a problem. You’ll likewise develop a better appreciation of statistics and learn how to use them to improve your business.

General SEO Statistics

Given the SEO benefits mentioned above, businesses’ incorporation of the practice to boost marketing does not come as a surprise. Notable facts about the efficacy of SEO in improving a company’s online presence include increased traffic share and improved Google rankings. Companies can also take advantage of the benefits that the best SEO software offer. Here, we take a look at the most prominent SEO statistics that reflect these developments and more. These statistics on the importance of SEO will change the way you view the value of online searches.

Over 118 million users in the United States were projected to use a voice assistant at least once a month in 2019. (eMarketer, 2019)
More recent research suggests that over half of smartphone users are using and engaging with voice search technology. (Comscore)
Around 21% of people are using voice search every week. (Search Engine Watch, 2019)
The average click-through rate of the first organic search result in Google Search is about 28.5% (Search Engine Journal, 2020)
After the first position in the ranking, the average click rate falls to 15.7%. (Sistrix, 2020)
The third website on the search engine results page (SERP) only has an 11% click rate, and the tenth down to 2.5%. (Sistrix, 2020)
Around 65% of total e-commerce sessions are generated through search traffic. (Statista, 2020)
Of the total e-commerce sessions, 33% came through organic search traffic. (Statista, 2020)
The remaining 32% were coming from paid search campaigns. (Statista, 2020)
Mobile users account for about half of the web traffic worldwide. (Statista, 2020)

Source: StatCounter, 2020

SEO Spending Statistics

Being a useful marketing tool, it just follows that businesses will invest in SEO. Corporate SEO spending has reached $47.5 billion in 2020, a testament to the popularity of SEO. There are more reasons to invest in SEO. Here are some more SEO spending stats to help you better understand why the practice is worth investing in.

Businesses spent about $47.5 billion on SEO and related products and services in 2020, even during the COVID-19 outbreak. (The Business Research Company, 2020)
While recovery is still slow, the SEO market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 10% starting in 2021 to 2023. (The Business Research Company, 2020)
That means the value of the SEO industry will reach up to $77.6 billion by 2023. (The Business Research Company, 2020)
$41,305 – The estimated total business spending on paid search marketing in 2019. (Moz, 2019)
Up to 54% of marketers say that there’s an overall budget reduction for marketing campaigns. (Moz, 2020)
Around 50% of marketing professionals also saw cutbacks in paid ad search budgets. (Moz, 2020)
What is more, 17% of enterprises do not have any full-time SEO staff. (Moz, 2019)
Typical SEO projects cost about $750 to $2000 a month. (WebFX, 2021)
One-time projects will range anywhere between $5,000 to $30,000. (WebFX, 2021)
Additionally, SEO consultants are paid around $80 to $200 per hour. (WebFX, 2021)
Full local SEO services cost about $500 to $4,000 per month. (Strategy Beam, 2020)

Local SEO Statistics

For businesses that depend on local markets, local SEO is an incredibly effective way to market their products/services locally by promoting them in real-time. You can use local SEO marketing through so-called “local searches,” which commonly include a location or the phrase “near me.” Local SEO results in localized search results, which benefit both sellers and potential buyers. Below are some of the most significant Google local search statistics to date.

Around 72% of customers who conducted a local search visit a store within 5 miles from their current location. (Junto, 2021)
Up to 86% look up the physical location of a business on Google Maps. (Junto, 2021)
78% of local mobile searches result in an offline purchase. (Junto, 2021)
Furthermore, 18% of local mobile searches turn into a sale within a day. (Junto, 2021)
91% of marketers say that reviews impact local rankings. (Moz, 2019)
Among local ranking factors, proximity is the third most important element. (Moz, 2020)
62% of marketers lack confidence in the availability of good local SEO training resources. (Moz, 2019)
Additionally, 58.3% of experts say that reviews are very important in local rankings. (Moz, 2020)
Searches for ‘store open near me” have been growing by 250%. (Google, 2019)
Some of the search terms with the most growth throughout the years are “on sale + near me” (250%), “insurance near me” (100%), “bank near me” (60%), and “repair near me” (110%). (Google, 2019)

High-Growth Search Terms

Source: Google, 2019

Organic SEO Statistics

Most businesses prefer to use organic SEO given the fact that it is inexpensive, and as the term implies, grows and adapts over time. Doing organic SEO involves processes like backlinking, keyword optimization, and the creation of high-quality content. These help boost site ranking and subsequently improve website traffic. Companies can also take advantage of content management software benefits for good measure.

However, it is best to note that optimizing your content will take a lot of effort. This is especially because search engines don’t stick to the same set of algorithms for long. Meaning, you’ll have to keep on innovating to make your content stand out online.

More than 53% of a website’s traffic comes from organic search. (BrightEdge, 2019)
Updating a website with fresh content can increase its organic traffic by 111.3%. (Safari Digital, 2019)
Around 63% of Google’s organic search in the US is from mobile devices. (Merkle, 2019)
61% of marketers say growing organic presence and improving SEO are their top inbound marketing priorities. (Hubspot, 2020)
55% of marketers view blog content creation as a top inbound marketing priority. (Hubspot, 2020)
50% of search queries contain four words or longer. (Hubspot, 2020)
65% of marketers see a close correlation between local and organic rank. (Moz, 2019)
More than 41% of queries in search engines result in an organic click. (Sparktoro, 2019)
On the other hand, up to 48.96% of queries become zero-click searches. (Sparktoro, 2019)
In 2020, there were 11 major rollouts, updates, and significant bug fixes in Google search algorithms. (Moz, 2020)

SEO and Business Statistics

One can ever overstate the importance of SEO to businesses. For instance, it has made marketing a much easier undertaking, helping companies reach out to online audiences and create new customers. Moreover, it lets you take advantage of the millions of Internet searches that happen every day by directing prospects to your website. Find out more about how you can use SEO to boost your marketing by going over the statistics below.

There are more than 4.6 billion Internet users in the world. (Statista, 2020)
In 2020, more than 50% of web traffic is through mobile devices excluding tablets. (Statista, 2020)
In 2019, 80% of users search the Internet through their mobile devices. (Quoracreative, 2021)
There are more than 63,000 Google searches per second. That amounts to almost 227 million an hour or 5.4 billion per day. (Review42, 2020)
With the growing number of people searching on the web, 20% of small businesses see rankings as their top priority. (Moz, 2019)
At least 77% of businesses say that they have one or more SEO staff. (Moz, 2020)
Around 53% of small businesses have started their SEO strategy in the last few years. (The Manifest, 2020)
However, only 30% of small businesses have an SEO strategy in place to enhance their websites’ ranking. (The Manifest, 2020)
Up to 62% of companies have in-house employees to manage their SEO strategy. (The Manifest, 2020)
Consequently, around 77% of those employees work on SEO strategies on top of their other responsibilities. (The Manifest, 2020)
B2B enterprises generate twice more revenue from organic search compared to other channels. (BrightEdge, 2019)
Retail and e-commerce companies earn 36.4% of their revenue from organic search through SEO. (BrightEdge, 2019)
Travel and hospitality businesses earn more than 40% of their revenue from organic search. (BrightEdge, 2019)

Mobile SEO Statistics

As the term implies, mobile SEO is a brand of optimization that focuses on a visually attractive mobile display. Consequently, this type of SEO targets users who utilize devices like tablet computers and smartphones, giving them great surfing experiences from the comfort of their devices. The explosion in the number of mobile users has resulted in the need to develop mobile SEO. So, we have listed some of the most relevant stats on the topic below.

The mobile data traffic is expected to reach 77.5 exabytes per month by 2022. (Quoracreative, 2021)
In India, more than 73% of web pages are accessed using mobile phones. (Quoracreative, 2021)
In the US, mobile traffic makes up around 40% of the total online traffic. (Quoracreative, 2021)
The global mobile traffic is about 48% of the total global web traffic. (Statista, 2020)
Africa generates the most mobile internet traffic at 60% of the total global mobile traffic. (Statista, 2020)
Google still holds the majority of mobile internet market share at 93.87%. (Smart Insights, 2020)
Only 13% of websites retain their ranking positions across different devices. (Semrush, 2019)
As such, around 30% of pages that appear on the first page of desktop search results do not show in the top ten when viewed on mobile devices. (Semrush, 2019)
Google announced that they are switching to mobile-first indexing for the whole web starting September 2020. (Google Search Central, 2020)
As of December 2020, mobile devices comprise 55.73% of the market share worldwide compared to 41.46% for desktops and 2.81% for tablets. (Statcounter, 2020)
“Where to buy” + “near me” mobile searches increased by over 200% in 2019. (Google, 2019)

Mobile Internet Traffic as Percentage of Total Web Traffic by Region

Africa

60.04%

Asia

58.07%

Europe

41.04%

North America

42.59%

Oceania

40%

South America

32.14%

Source: StatCounter, 2020

SEO and Marketing Statistics

If SEO can boost your online presence, imagine what would happen if you integrate it with your marketing strategy. The result would be a sound digital marketing direction that is sure to drive customers to your company. By encouraging more traffic to your site, SEO effectively brings in new business and increased revenue. Furthermore, it can help any size and type of business make the most out of their websites. So, consider the following statistics on SEO and marketing.

43% of users admit to skimming blogs when reading them. (Hubspot, 2020)
In 2019, users spend browsing the Internet using their mobile devices for about 3 hours and 30 minutes a day. (Vox, 2019)
Experts are expecting that time to grow up to 4 hours in 2021. (Vox, 2019)
86% of companies use video as a marketing tool in 2020. (Hubspot, 2021)
Up to 93% of marketing experts say that video content is an integral part of their marketing strategy. (Hubspot, 2021)
This claim is supported by 87% of marketers who reported that using video in their marketing campaigns resulted in positive ROI. (Hubspot, 2021)
And, 91% of marketing professionals say that the pandemic has made video content even more crucial. (Hubspot, 2021)
55% more site visits are generated by companies with active blogs. (Hubspot, 2020)
Marketing professionals who prioritize blogging are 13 times more likely to enjoy positive ROI. (OptinMonster, 2021)
61% of the most successful B2B content marketing connect with their content team daily or weekly. (OptinMonster, 2021)
Additionally, 57% of marketers reported that they’ve acquired new customers through blogging. (OptinMonster, 2021)
70% of business owners say that SEO generates more sales compared to PPC (30%). (Databox, 2020)
Around 64% of marketing experts actively spend and invest time in SEO. (Hubspot, 2020)

Searcher Behavior Statistics

The best way to successfully optimize your content is to first understand how internet users perform queries. After all, search engines were created to serve searchers and help them get access to the information they need in the fastest possible time. So, to help you put yourself in the shoes of internet users, here are some of their search habits that are worth noting:

As of 2020, Google still leads the market share in search engines at 91.38%. (Statcounter, 2020)
Google is followed by Bing (2.69%), Yahoo! (1.46%), Baidu (1.36%), YANDEX (1%), and DuckDuckGo (0.6%). (Statcounter, 2020)
More than 246 million people will search online at least once a month. (eMarketer, 2020)
Users will consider Google’s autocomplete suggestions 25% of the time. (Backlinko, 2020)
A searcher will typically take 14.6 seconds to click on something in their results. (Backlinko, 2020)
Up to 19% of searchers will click on a Google Ad in their search results. (Backlinko, 2020)
During the pandemic, there is a shift in search interests among users. Some of the most popular topics are home delivery, retail, short-term work employee, mortgage rate suspension, and “can you freeze” various types of food. (Search Engine Journal, 2020)
Additionally, there’s an increase of “with me” searches on YouTube such as “study with me” or “cook with me.” (Search Engine Journal, 2020)
As countries slowly ease on their lockdown measures, users are looking for more guidelines. Some of the most popular terms in different countries are “shops open” in the Netherlands, “is it allowed to” in Germany, and “guidelines” for salons, restaurants, and other businesses in Poland and Italy. (Google, 2020)
Similarly, people are searching for work opportunities and government support. Some of the relevant search terms are “seasonal employment” in France, “job offer” in Italy and Belgium, and “part-time jobs” in Germany. (Google, 2020)

What Content Stands Out to Searchers

In addition to understanding how internet users search, you should also know what kinds of content rank better on search engines. For starters, more substantial posts have a better shot at landing on the first results page. In addition, publishing videos that are 15 minutes long will help you get more views. Lastly, you might want to continually update your published posts so that search engines won’t overlook them.

On average, pages that end up in the top 10 Google results contain over 2,000 words. (Sweor, 2020)
Long-form content generates an average of 77.2% more links than short ones. (Backlinko, 2019)
Around 49% of people watch more than 5 online videos a day. (Promo, 2019)
Around 74% of marketers said that up to 70% of their content contained some form of visual element. (Venngage, 2020)
40% of marketers use stock photos. (Venngage, 2020)
Around 34% use original graphics such as illustrations, infographics, and more. (Venngage, 2020)

Percentage of Marketers Who Use Visual Elements in their Content

Source: Venngage, 2020

How To Get The Most Out of SEO

Now that you know how useful SEO can be to your company, it’s time to understand how to go about it. Before embarking on SEO, there are several things you should consider if you are to maximize its benefits. So, you should take into account the following factors before diving straight into an SEO strategy.

Don’t Stop With Google Search

Google may be the top search engine today. However, other search engines can help your business and visibility in different platforms. You can likewise extend SEO to app stores, interfaces, and devices.

Produce High-Quality Content

Updates to Google’s algorithm have been focusing on the quality of content. Consequently, websites that offer high-quality content have been found to enjoy high rankings. Being such, producing content for the simple goal of keeping your site afloat is no longer an option. So, use your content and improve customer experience strategies to boost customer engagement.

Who’s Your Audience

The efficacy of SEO can only be measured by how much traffic a website receives. Everything, therefore, boils down to audience reception. As a result, you will need to find out your audience’s preferences–do they like audio, video, text, or images? Being able to know these things will enable you to provide them with the best and most straightforward answers to their queries. These are some of the reasons why you will have to be sensitive to what keywords your customers are targeting when coming up with content.

Use Structured Data

Nowadays, artificial intelligence is used in almost everything. As a result, companies need to leverage structured data. These can support contextual links between behaviors and topics, allowing search engines to understand specific types of content.

Be The Expert

Expertise, authority, and trustworthiness are critical parts of Google’s search quality rating guidelines and should, therefore, be observed when creating content. These requirements mean that your content not only adheres to the highest quality standards but should also come with a superior context. So how do you do this? Just consider reputation when promoting and distributing content. If you are a B2B company, trust elements should likewise be incorporated into your site to establish customer trust. In addition, you should consider hiring content experts who have a degree of affinity to the brand being promoted.

And we’re done here. To sum up, we hope our SEO statistics compilation improved your understanding of how SEO works and how your company can benefit from it. Also, ensure that you consider the significant changes in your industry due to COVID-19. The surge of web traffic both increases and complicates various industries. Keep in mind that SEO is not limited to giving you the big bucks. The practice likewise promotes your brand and improves customer experience through better engagement. If you have been practicing SEO, you may have found potential areas of improvement. But if you have yet to do so, consider using SEO, and you might achieve that online presence you’ve been struggling to have.

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By Nestor Gilbert

Nestor Gilbert is a senior B2B and SaaS analyst and a core contributor at FinancesOnline for over 5 years. With his experience in software development and extensive knowledge of SaaS management, he writes mostly about emerging B2B technologies and their impact on the current business landscape. However, he also provides in-depth reviews on a wide range of software solutions to help businesses find suitable options for them. Through his work, he aims to help companies develop a more tech-forward approach to their operations and overcome their SaaS-related challenges.