Are you doing these SEO mistakes as most do?
A site that has not been optimized is likely to fail at reaching the targeted clientele. SEO might not be an easy undertaking, but it is worth the effort. Based on the keywords used to optimize your site, you can achieve a high ranking in search engines. Good SEO can change how both human visitors and search engine spiders see your website. Well applied SEO tactics will result in a better website in terms of value, maintainability and relevance.
The following are some SEO mistakes that should be avoided while optimizing.
SEO Mistake #1 Not using alt tag for images
Though images cannot be indexed by search engine spiders, alt tags can. Such tags can contain short descriptions of the images used, which is a great place to include relevant keywords.
SEO Mistake #2 Using JavaScript extensively
Nowadays, many people are trying to make their sites as attractive as possible for their customers. JavaScript elements are commonly used to achieve this. Though practical and attractive, JavaScript elements that offer links to other pages of the website are not identified by search engines, and therefore cannot be referenced.
SEO Mistake #3 Failure to use CSS
CSS is a tool which allows you to reduce the size of your pages, eventually lowering the time it takes to load. This was a major consideration when designing my blog which features ediet coupons and weight watchers discounts. CSS gives you a cleaner code, thus enabling you to focus on the text which search engine spiders feed on. CSS should not be overlooked in the optimization process, since it enhances the readability of your web pages.
SEO Mistake #4 Page cloaking
This is a tactic that is meant to separate the pages which people will see and the pages spiders will crawl. A common practice for many is to cloak pages which are rich in keywords to attract search engine spiders, while keeping them hidden from visitors and competitors. However, search engine spiders would want to index and reference the same pages which web users can see. If cloaking is detected, your website could risk being banned altogether.
SEO Mistake #5 Exchanging links with promiscuous or banned sites
You need to be very careful about the websites with which you exchange links. Better still, just avoid link exchange schemes altogether. Link exchange with promiscuous/banned websites is frowned upon. Furthermore, it dents your credibility and might result in penalties.
SEO Mistake #6 Using splash pages
Splash pages, with their flash animations and big images, only contain a single link to redirect visitors to another page. Since splash pages lack text, they cannot be found by search engine spiders.
I hope you’ll avoid these SEO mistakes and give a boost to your site’s ranking.
About Charles Mburugu
Great tips. You can never learn enough about SEO.
hunter recently posted…How to Make Money with Google AdSense
Thanks Hunter.
cloaking what is meant here?
Page cloaking means having 2 pages on a website for same purpose. One is for site visitors and one is for Google bots, I haven’t tried it yet but it must be very hectic to maintain 2 pages for same purpose.
Riya @ Couponseasy recently posted…Goa Holiday Packages
These tips are great because most SEO occurs after a site has been designed. These SEO tips should be part of the initial planning stages for your website. You will reap the rewards.
Jim Zamichieli recently posted…Social Media: Put It In Your 21st Century Disaster Kit
Great collection of seo tips……….thanks for sharing
Charles
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You are welcome Abhinav
Charles, Are you sure about “Exchanging links with promiscuous or banned sites” Thing? I mean, it seems logical, but what if my competitor posts links to MY site? Google can’t punish me for my competitor’s wrongdoings, or can it!
Thanks for the informative post, by the way.
K.
Hey Ken, thanks for the comment. You have to monitor the links that are posted on your site and delete any suspicious ones. Regardless of who posted them, you might still get penalized.
Avoid using flash on website, it increases the page load time on your site which put negative impression for Google and hurts your ranking as well.
Nice tips for Search Engine Optimization. you are working well for me and other readers as your every post brings something new for me.
Thanks Charles.
You are welcome Reeha…
Nice list – just like to add a point. One of the biggest mistakes I see people make is building links too fast – that gets Google suspicious. Build your links gradually and over time and it’ll look more natural and will show the search engines that you aren’t just building a site, smashing it with backlinks and then moving on… that’s a trait of spammers
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Good point Sandip, thanks.
These are some major things to avoid. I remember when I first learned about CSS, I thought it was the best thing that ever happened to the internet. To be able to change elements on your entire website by simply changing one file was brilliant and a time saver, especially if you have thousands of pages. Thanks for sharing.
Hey Lionel, thanks for your contribution.
Image is an integral part of a blog and still many people end up not using AlT tag, titles, description for images. Nice Point.
Sanjeev@Make Web World recently posted…Tips – Image optimization in SEO
Thanks Sanjeev.
Lucky for me I don’t seem to be doing any of these mistakes. As to CSS, I don’t have anything to do with that and rely on my theme being adequately designed to cover it.
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Hello Charles. If these were the six sins of SEO/blogging #1 would be my biggest. I’ll tell you, adding alt tags to images is just TOO much work!
What is the significance of it. Do people search for images with your keyword and then land on your page?
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Hi Ivin. As I said, images cannot be ‘read’ by search engine spiders, but alt tags can since they contain text. So if you have keywords in the alt tags, you will improve your ranking. It is worth the work!
Hi Charles,
Fortunately I’m not doing those mistakes, about the CSS I let my theme to be care of that
About #5 I’m constantly receiving offers for that and I reject them! I don’t like either.
Other point is start not ignoring the benefits of social media for SEO.
Cheers,
Gera
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What do you think about link exchange with webpages that have already exchanged links with… let’s say 100 other pages?
One time I saw a guy that exchanged links and had more than 1000 links in the blogroll. Of course, I didn’t exchange with him, no way. Too much spam…
I have heard that blogroll links are not much effective in the last years, I’m not sure about that, but if you add to it that the blogroll has a lot of links, I’m sure that those links can’t be effective for SEO
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Hey there Charles,
You make some great points, 2 through to five are definite mistakes and should be avoided. Number one is more of an oversight as is one of the most missed points in SEO. Correlationis good and this little bits all help in the grander scheme of things – alt tags are a must.
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Yes.. We have to be very careful when being asked of link exchange. Making, at least, a brief analysis is good prevention as the scrappy sites also give bad impacts on our sites.
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Using too much javascript is bad for SEO ? Never heard of it. But yes it is true that slow the page loading time and indirectly is bad for SEO
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Using too much javascript is not bad in SEO, in my view, but because crawlers can’t render what’s produced by those codes, you won’t be able to index the content produced by Javascript. If you already have sufficient text to rank, its OK, but if your major content is produced by Javascript, it won’t be able to claim position in SERP.
Great point Suresh, having more javascript than text can adversely affect your rankings. Thanks for sharing.
Hi Charles,
This six tips shared in this article are killer! It helps.
Sharing and exchanging links with a banned site do affect the authority of blogs and it can affect yours too if you are not very much careful of how you exchange links with other sites.
BTW: Charles, can you brighten me more on the number one line…using alt tag with images? Hope you can and expecting your reply asap?
Thanks a ton
Olawale
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Hi Olawale, thanks for stopping by.
The alt attribute is an attribute of the img tag and is meant to be an alternative for non-visual browsers when they come across images. This means, that the text is meant to be used when the image is not visible on the page. Instead, what is displayed (or read) is the alternative text.
Many browsers also display the alt text when the customer rests their mouse on the image. This means that the text should be clear and easy to read.
I hope this helps.
mistakes that we need to avoid…for me the best is to do the SEO but don’t over do
neo @Malaya Media recently posted…Penulisan Blog – Mengapa Anda Perlu Fokus
Thanks for the great tips. Simple mistakes can be costly when it comes to SEO!
Hi Charles,
This are very helpful tips for newbies like me. I also agree with Suresh. Point noted my friend. Thanks.
Abhi….
Just want to say Thanks a lot because I am looking for these answers since a month ago.
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