Common Seo Mistakes

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As sophisticated and complex SEO is, there are basic common mistakes that we see all of the time from new clients:

1. Failing to read, understand and closely follow the Google Webmaster Guidelines. It’s free, informative and authoritative to say the least. The 800lb gorilla is providing you a wealth of information including all of the do’s and don’ts and why? Pretty basic stuff and often overlooked.
2. Poor URL selection †either too long or non-descriptive, sometimes just a series of seemingly non-related letters or abbreviations. URL’s should be easily read, recognizable and ideally actually contain the most important keyword. Sometimes URL’s are better purchased if you can find one that is relevant and already has some page rank or authority value.
3. Not doing the extensive keyword research. Often, people think that they know their keywords and they never really do because they really didn’t do the research; they are often surprised, even shocked about the keywords we uncover. ...
... Few recognize that 60% of all keywords entered are 4 or more words long.
4. Not doing competitive research. You seek to compete successfully. You need to know how high the bar is. You need to watch your competitors like a hawk. They are watching you if they know what they are doing.
5. Poor onsite SEO elements. The list is extensive:
* Failing to have unique Titles for every page.
* Failing to make the Titles relevant to the page.
* Poor descriptions and poor inclusion of unique keywords relevant to the page / title.
* Cramming / stuffing keywords on the pages
* No sitemap or poorly organized sitemap.
* Absence of interlinking relevant content within and between the pages of the site.
* Poorly organized navigation.
* Poor Call to Action (Conversion Optimization)
* Graphics with no alt descriptions.
6. Failure to install an SEO Friendly CMS (Content Management System).
7. Using Flash to design the site. Search Engines can’t read Flash. Use HTML.
8. Believing that doing all of the onsite elements perfectly (Titles, Descriptions, metadata, et al) will achieve page 1 results. This is almost never true. The onsite elements are just the foundation you need to get right just to have a chance online.
9. Not adding content daily through a blog and weekly through articles, press releases et al. You need the spiders coming back to your site more and more often. Without this, you are destined for “nuclear winter” online.
10. Not syndicating content as a major part of developing a quality Backlink growth strategy.
11. Failure to install Analytics software to monitor and respond to the onsite stats to guide the optimization process.
12. Failure to understand that SEO is a marathon and not a sprint. Failure to understand that SEO is forever and if you stop, you will lose eye share as your rankings sink.
13. Trying to do SEO themselves. No one individual can be expected to do a great job in all of the areas, specialties, sub-specialties involved in SEO and Website Optimization. Optimum7 requires a team of individuals that are highly trained. We could not handle even a single client by relying on only one individual!
14. Being susceptible to shortcuts. There are no shortcuts or “tricks” … call it Black Hat SEO if you wish, it just is fool’s gold. SEO rankings are earned.

Avoid these mistakes. Hire a full service Internet Marketing Company who can demonstrate live and deep results for existing / renewing clients.

Ready to take the first step? It’s free! Just contact us for a no-obligation initial consultation.