Top 7 Most Common Mistakes with Do-It-Yourself SEO

Top 7 Most Common Mistakes with Do-It-Yourself SEO

Most people today seem to understand that they need to optimize their website for search engines. However, with the vast amount of conflicting information on the internet today, many people are still getting it wrong. In recent investigations, it has been found that one out of three websites has at least one of the following seven issues on their website.

Check your website for the following seven mistakes:

1.  Description Tag – The description tag is supposed to describe the page on your website. It should not be used to stuff keywords for search engines. This tag should be about 25 words long and it should include your keywords as part of the normal sentence structure. You also shouldn’t overdo it; a whole paragraph is not going to improve your results.

2.  Keyword Tag – The keyword tag is meant to hold the keywords you want your site listed for. The tags should represent the things visitors can find on that particular page. Do not use things from other pages on your site or keywords that you think people might search for if they are not part of your site. The keyword tag should only contain twenty words or less; do not go over. You also shouldn’t repeat the keywords more than three times. For example, if you sell shoes, you shouldn’t put red shoes, blue shoes, black shoes, tennis shoes, and basketball shoes. You should only use the word shoes three times and each of the descriptions three times.

3.  Anchor Text – Many people think that they should use the name of the link they are providing on their webpage. This could not be further than the truth. Search engines want to see your keywords used as anchor text whenever possible.

4.  Title Tag – This is one of the most important aspects of your website. It is the very first thing a search engine will see when it comes to your page and this is what the engine will look at to decide what your page is about. Don’t include your url in your title tag and your company name should not be in the beginning of the description either. Don’t go over 60 words.

5.  Keywords In Your Text – Your keywords should be included within the text of your page. They should flow as a part of the normal sentence structure, and should not be stuffed into sentences that don’t make sense. The keywords used on your page should be the same ones you used in your title and description.

6.  Abstract Tag – many people are now using abstract tags within their sites. Some are replacing the description tag with an abstract and stuffing it full of unnecessary keywords. This should never be done. Most experts agree that an abstract tag is just that abstract. Leave it out.

7.  Image Tags – While Google and other search engines rarely look at image tags, they do hold value. Many sites like Google Images or Flicker spend their time searching sites for pictures. When they find a picture, they don’t want to see “jpg123,” they want to see “shoes worn at the Grammy’s”.

If you are one of these people, don’t get discouraged.  You might consider hiring a professional SEO expert to give you some advice. The rules of SEO change on a regular basis; you just have to stay ahead of the curve.

Owning a Website Is More than Just Having It Built

Many small business owners think they can buy a website, pay someone to build it, then sit back and wait for the customers to roll in. Unfortunately, that’s not the way it works. You can’t expect to build a website, and compete against thousands, if not millions, of other websites without some effort.  If you are looking to make online sales or provide information to your customers, you need to understand the way it works. If you understand how customers find you online, you can quickly draw them to your site.

When online searchers type a keyword into the search bar, the search engine will display the most relevant sites for that term. For example if you sell shoes, someone will type in shoes and the search engine will display your site in the search results. The problem is that most terms have thousands of sites that use those keywords. Just like when you search for shoes with Google, you get 307,000,000 different sites. The search engines only show ten results per page, so if you are at the end, you are likely to never be seen. As a matter of fact, recent studies show that over 60% of searchers never go past the first two result pages.

In order to get your site up in the search results, you have to maintain an ongoing search engine optimization campaign. Search engine optimization is the process of making your website get noticed by the search engines. This includes using keywords throughout your site, as well as building links to and from your pages to other pages on the intent. This is an ongoing process that requires a lot of time and effort. You can manage the process yourself or pay a professional SEO company to handle the process for you. It can cost quite a bit to hire a company, but if you do not have hours to spend each week working on your own site it may be much simpler.

Most people choose to hire a company to perform part of the process and then, when the website is ranking higher in the search results, they take over the campaign themselves.  You might be able to find a company that will build your site and optimize it at the same time. This is often the best way to go, since you won’t have to pay for changes later. When you are considering a company, you should ask to see their portfolio and ask for proven results. Not every company can provide the results they claim.

Another option to bring visitors to your site is starting a pay per click campaign. You can use paid ads on Google or Yahoo to get your name on the front page. These ads cost you a certain amount for every time someone clicks on them. The more popular your keyword is, the more you will pay to place your ads. However, on the up side, you could see a quick increase in the traffic to your website. Whichever way you choose to attract visitors, you have to be prepared to stay with it for the long run.