Having the Wrong Keywords

Before you can even begin to measure your SEO ranking, you need to know which keywords you are trying to rank for. This can be more challenging than it seems. Often times companies will pick keywords that they think define their business, but their audience disagrees. When picking your keywords, try and look at your business from your customer's perspectives. What would they search for to find you? What aspects of your business are they looking for?

Stuffing Keywords

It’s good SEO practice to include your keywords in your page title and body. However, it’s not good practice to stuff in as many keywords as possible. Not only does this make your content difficult for the reader to understand, it also looks like spam to Google. Users leaving your site after a short page visit coupled will the spammy appearance of your content will have a detrimental affect on your websites ranking.

Not Having Title Tags and Meta Descriptions

Every page on your website should have a unique title. Not only does this help with social sharing, it also drastically increases SEO by giving Google another way to see what the page is about. The same goes for meta descriptions. Including meta description on each page gives Google another place to crawl.

Posting Irrelevant Content

You’ve doubtless heard that content is king. While this is true, it would be better to say that quality content is king. In a recent update Google stated they look at the quality of your pages instead of the sheer number. It’s better to have one well written article with internal and external links, media, and back links than a dozen shorter entries.

Forgetting about Local Search

40% of Google’s mobile searches are for local businesses. If you’re a brick and mortar store you can’t afford to ignore the local search results. Always make sure your name, address, phone number, and hours are accurate and up to date. Create listings for yourself in multiple directories such as Yellow Pages, Yelp, and Tripadvisor to show Google and Bing you are an operational business ready for customers.

The world of SEO is constantly changing in response to new algorithms and user behavior. To ensure you’re not being left behind it’s imperative to stay on top of the newest updates and techniques.