7 SEO Mistakes You Probably Didn’t Know You Were Making

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SEO – search engine optimization – is something you would pursue to improve the visibility of your website on the Internet. It’s an essential process and one that requires a great deal of thinking, strategy, and action to achieve the desired results.

As you’ve probably gathered, there’s a great deal of information and resources out there to help you on your SEO journey – some of which you’ll discover on this website, of course. The trouble is, a few people end up making big SEO mistakes without even realizing it.

With that in mind, take a look at the following examples so you can avoid inadvertently making them:

1. Not Working With An SEO Expert

Arguably one of the worst ways to thwart efforts to improve your search engine rankings is by not working with an SEO expert. Yes, there are plenty of online resources that can help you create an effective SEO strategy for your website.

However, what you don’t get from reading online SEO guides is experience. You aren’t benefiting from the skills and knowledge of seasoned professionals who have worked with clients from various industries and niche markets.

If you didn’t want to work with an SEO expert for cost reasons, you could always have one analyze your website and make a list of recommendations. You can then action those changes yourself.

2. Targeting The Wrong Keywords

Another top mistake that businesses and organizations make when optimizing their websites is targeting the wrong keywords. As you know, it’s essential to target specific keywords and phrases that are relevant to your content and audience.

The thing is, it’s easy to select the wrong target keywords. Why? The answer is simple: there are so many of them to choose from! The best way to determine which keywords are right for you is by looking at the ones your competitors use.

3. Not Optimizing Page Titles And Description Tags

There’s no denying that much of your focus should be on the main content of each page when applying various SEO techniques. After all, Google and other search engines “index” the text content visible to what people see in their web browsers.

You probably know about the importance of optimizing your content. But, are you aware that you should still pay attention to your page titles and meta description tags? Search engines still use them as guides for what gets displayed in search engine results pages.

4. Forgetting To Write Decent Content

So far, you’re aware of some top mistakes to avoid with your content, such as having the wrong keywords and not optimizing your page titles and meta description tags. But, one of the factors that some folks forget about is the page content itself!

When you have people visiting pages on your web page, you only have a few seconds to hook them in and keep them engaged. If your content is hard to read, irrelevant, or doesn’t capture their attention, they’ll go back and check the other search engine results.

5. Not Checking For Plagiarism

Are you aware that copying other people’s content is wrong in so many ways? Firstly, it’s plagiarism, and it could see you faced with a cease and desist request at best or legal action at worst. Secondly, it shows your readers that you don’t put any thought into your content.

Lastly, and perhaps worst of all, from an SEO perspective, search engines like Google will de-rank your content because you’ve copied it from elsewhere. The solution for avoiding those problems is simple: write unique content and check it with a tool like Copyscape.

6. Not Checking Content Readability

Even if your content doesn’t flag up any plagiarism warnings, you still need to make sure that people can actually read it. For example, if someone gave you lots of text to read that didn’t have proper grammar or paragraph breaks, would you find that text easy to read?

Of course, the answer would be “no.” That’s why you need to ensure that your content is easy to digest by its intended audiences. Don’t assume that everyone who visits your website will take the time to decipher what you’re trying to tell them.

7. Forgetting About Server Optimization

One final consideration that many businesses and organizations fail to make is forgetting about server optimization. You must ensure that your web host is stable and has a fast Internet connection from their data center.

Otherwise, your content will be slow to load, and that can count against you in Google’s search engine ranking algorithms and those of other search engines.