Running a Search Engine Optimization campaign for your website has become a necessity today in order to stand out from your peers in your chosen industry. While it is advisable to entrust the campaign to professional agencies, it is also important to keep in mind a few basics as you embark on an endeavour so critical for your website. Here are the 5 most important things you should avoid when running an SEO campaign.
Expecting Instant Results
There are few shortcuts involved in running a successful SEO campaign. Those companies that promise you immediate success, are likely using black-hat techniques (more of that later). There is a common misconception that an SEO campaign will result in an immediate, dramatic increase in traffic to the site. However, each website’s history is also important when it comes to search engines and SEO campaigns and this will take time. SEO is also an ongoing thing, something that has to be tweaked and adjusted as long as you keep the website running.
Linking Down
It’s the old schtick — Show me your friends and I’ll tell you who you are. With billions of webpages littered about on the internet, links are one of the key factors used by search engines to sort websites. Links to other websites are seen by search engines as votes of popularity and importance. However, search engines’ algorithms are also programmed to analyze the links for trust, spam and authority. Links to trustworthy websites tend to link to other trustworthy sites, while spammy sites are linked to by few trusted sources. So when doling out links, do it a touch cautiously.
Keyword Stuffing
Keyword stuffing is exactly what is says on the can — stuffing keywords over and over again on a webpage in order to trick search engines into giving the page a higher rank. This stuffing is done with little thought to relevancy, readability or user experience. There was a time when this gambit worked and search results could be easily manipulated. Now, however, the search engines — most importantly Google — have wisened up and keyword stuffing is considered a black-hat tactic. Aside from the fact that this ruse results in numbingly dull user experience, you could be penalized by Google if found to be using this method. Your page could be demoted in rankings or be removed altogether.
Content Spinning
Content spinning is basically writing the same sentence or article in a thousand different ways to make them look superficially different, but in truth they all make up a solitary piece of writing.
Content spinning has become easier today, with automated content spinners that can churn out thousands of duplicate copies out of a single original article that seem different from one another. There are bot applications that can trawl the web for specific keywords, make thousands of duplicates, embed links and upload them, all by themselves. But Google is very serious about cracking down on this tactic and could have your page penalized, blacklisted or removed altogether from search results.
Ignoring Social Media
Social Media is sometimes seen –rightfully — as a specialized field, demanding its own campaign. However, you can gain a lot by aligning your social media marketing campaign with your SEO campaign. Building up your following on social media adds to your website’s authority with search engines. Sharing your content with your audience and interacting with them increases awareness of your content and may result in link backs in their own websites. You can also optimize your social media posts for search engine optimization. Capitalizing on current and controversial events is a great way to do this.
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