8 SEO Mistakes That Are Impacting Your Website Rankings
Are you trying to navigate the ever-changing SEO world and get your website ranked higher than it did last year? Well, chances are you’re making one or more of these common SEO mistakes.
The experts at ‘Integrated IT solutions’ have shared the top mistakes that most people make regarding SEO strategy and website ranking. We’ve listed them out, so you can identify the mistakes and give your website a chance to rule the ranks!
Top 8 SEO Mistakes to Stop Making Today!
Let’s begin, and don’t forget to share and comment on this article if you like what you’re about to read.
SEO Mistakes – No. 1: Not Paying Attention to Search Intent
Ignoring search intent can impact your ranking because it is important to know the motivation behind a user’s search. Search engines favor websites whose content fulfills the search intent of a particular query.
The trick is to understand what the user wants when searching for a particular keyword. Are they looking for information, a service, or a product?
For example, if someone searches for ‘human resources’ – it’s presumable that they are looking for human resources information. Therefore, their intent is for information. However, if they type ‘human resource management,’their intent would be different. So, to answer both searches, your website needs to provide details/information that satisfy both intents.
Takeaway: Ensure your website satisfies various user search intent in your niche to improve your rank.
SEO Mistakes – No. 2: Ignoring Mobile Traffic
When creating an SEO strategy for your website, it is vital to include the mobile traffic demographic into your plan. Depending on your niche, the majority of users today are accessing content on their mobile devices. Therefore, search engines are favoring mobile-friendly websites.
Do this by making sure your website loads in under 3 seconds and is responsive on handheld devices. Also, factor in the user-friendliness of your website design on mobiles and the overall aesthetic when your website is accessed on a mobile. These are important website ranking factors to consider in 2021.
Takeaway: Ensure that your website is optimized for mobile usage to increase your website’s organic traffic.
SEO Mistakes – No. 3: Creating Duplicate Content
This is a common mistake most companies make when creating content for their website – they replicate the content on their website’s multiple pages. While this might not necessarily get you penalized, it will lower your SEO score if it contains identical content.
Search engines aim to show only the most relevant results for a user’s search – therefore, when multiple webpages show duplicate content, they might only show the most targeted page. This will cause your website to fall in SEO ranking.
Takeaway: Create unique content on your webpages that target various value-added info that your audience can benefit from.
SEO Mistakes – No. 4: Too Many Keywords
Stuffing keywords was a technique used to work a decade ago; however, this is no longer the case. Too many repeating keywords can decrease the overall ranking of your website.
Search engines have become a lot smarter than ten years ago, and the algorithm prefers content that is a perfect balance of keywords and value-added content. This is an important factor to remember when creating content for your website – remember that actual people will be reading this content. So, it should be geared to information that is vital and relatable to your target demographic.
Takeaway: Find the right balance between adding keywords and genuine content. A simple read-through of your content will give you a fair idea of whether it sounds authentic or too SEO-focused.
SEO Mistakes – No. 5: Focusing Solely On Text-based Content
Millions of text-based SEO content are available online; however, nowadays, people want to experience their content in more than just the reading format. Over the last few years, and especially in 2021, the biggest shift is that the written word has evolved into other formats such as video, audio, infographic, podcast, and visual content.
These different types of formats can drive organic traffic to your website, so it’s a good idea to implement them in your website’s SEO strategy. Currently, video content is reigning supreme as most users prefer to receive their information through this format. This is evident by the growing number of videos on different platforms and also on Google SERP.
Takeaway: Curate a variety of content in different formats and drive more traffic to your website.
SEO Mistakes – No. 6: Too Many Backlinks
Backlinks are still an important factor when it comes to website ranking. However, buying too many backlinks to boost your ranking may get you penalized by Google. It’s important to remember that quality is better than quantity when it comes to backlinks.
Instead of mass buying without much thought, spend some time researching the most notable and helpful backlinks relevant to your website and niche. Create a list of relevant and value-adding backlinks that will help your existing content.
Takeaway: Identify notable, relatable, and influential links to be associated with your website to help with your ranking.
SEO Mistakes – No. 7: Slow Speed, Got You Down!
It’s no secret that if your website has a slow loading speed, users will run out of patience and navigate away. However, this is not the only reason why you should pay attention to your speed. Google has added ‘page speed’ to their list of factors that determine SEO ranking – so you must implement techniques to reduce your website’s loading time.
Takeaway: A faster loading time will help your website rank higher and keep your users from navigating away!
SEO Mistakes – No 8: – Not Incorporating EAT
Ultimately when it comes to increasing your ranking – it’s about being authentic, not just to your clients/readers/demographic but also to search engines. Google’s EAT (expertise, authority, and trust) concept favors websites built on genuine value, information, and trustworthiness.
Increase your website’s ranking by including EAT factors such as:
- Having an SEO strategy that incorporates brand-related searches.
- Getting the website/company featured by other top media publications
- Giving clear information such as location, about us pages, awards and accolade received, etc
Takeaway: Create your SEO strategy with the EAT concept in mind to increase your website ranking on Google.
Conclusion
Correct these common SEO mistakes if you’ve been making them, and we’re sure you will start to see an improvement in your website ranking. Apart from conducting a thorough SEO audit, when it comes to truly unlocking your website’s potential, we suggest hiring a firm like ‘Integrated IT solutions,’ which can help you with all your website-related needs.
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