Blog SEO Tips: Top SEO Mistakes to Avoid
If you’re a blogger, by now you have already found out that the majority of your blog’s traffic comes from search engines and social media & bookmarking sites. There is a lot of information available on any of these two traffic sources to help you get started in either optimization you choose to make, although I would suggest you do both, to diversify your incoming traffic.
I know that for many start-up bloggers, the blogs they manage are probably the first contact they had with a website from the role of an administrator, and surely the first contact they had with the concept of SEO (Search Engine Optimization). In terms of blog optimization, I have shared with you a few articles in the past that offer a good range of blog SEO tips, so, in case you need to refresh your memory, feel free to go through them again.
The problem is that even with the available information, those new to the concept of SEO tend to try anything and everything, without taking the time to decide what’s best and what could actually damage their rankings. In what follows I’m going to present a list of the top SEO mistakes you must avoid.
SEO Mistake #1 – Ignoring Basic Search Engine Guidelines
From my point of view, this is the biggest mistake a SEO beginner could make. SEO is a set of actions meant to improve search engine rankings, so the most important thing would obviously be to first check out the targeted search engines’ quality and submission guidelines. Here are the links to the guides of two of the most important search engines, Google and Yahoo:
Any further SEO actions you take should abide by the above guidelines. After all, is their “approval” you’re seeking.
SEO Mistake #2 – Not Having a Keywords Strategy
There is one common mistake that people do and it’s about the way they understand the concept of using keywords. Keywords are not what you would want you’re website to be found for, but what your website could show up for in relation to its content.
I’ve seen hundreds of websites with that keywords META filled with the most incredible and unrelated words and phrases, most times on the homepage. It’s a mistake to target numerous keywords and actually diminishing that chances to succeed with either one of them.
The development of a keyword strategy is done in strong relationship with your blog’s structure. Just like your blog’s homepage is a gateway to more detailed content topics, so should be its keywords and the keywords of its subpages, categories and posts. Focus on choosing keywords that go hand in hand with the actual content and topics you approach rather than keywords that you’d think might be representative.
Work from your homepage downward in your blog structure, going from more general keywords, to very specific keywords as you get to the posts, like in the diagram below:
Here are 3 past articles you might find useful when it comes to developing and maintaining a keyword strategy:
- How to check and improve your WordPress SEO
- Using Keywords for Blog Optimization
- Advantages of Long Tail Keywords Optimization
SEO Mistake #3 – Ignoring the title tags (H1, H2, H3, H4…)
When writing and publishing blog posts, many ignore these HTML heading tags. You’ve probably seen that I use them in most of my posts, and not only for optimization reasons. They also help your readers better follow the post’s structure and ideas.
Use appropriate keywords inside these tags. The search engine bots give special attention to these headings and continue to “read” your content based on the information found inside them. It builds up relevancy.
Also, a look at how your theme uses heading tags, SEO wise, would do good too.
SEO Mistake #4 – Too much focus on one of the optimization elements
Due to not filtering the incoming information on SEO, some people make the mistake on focusing too much on optimizing the meta tags, or the titles, or the body text of posts. Optimization is a process that should cover all aspects in a very close relationship.
Once you’ve decided which keywords to use, make sure you optimize your page title, META’s, subheading, body text, links, alternate (ALT) text on images and so on. The more consistent the whole page looks in terms of optimization, the better the chances of a higher ranking.
SEO Mistake #5 – SEO is Not a One Time Process
No Sir, it’s not! It’s a matter of trial and error, of research and observation of evolution. Don’t make the mistake of resting at peace once you’ve finished optimizing a page or website. Check the results from time to time, adjust your keyword strategy if necessary. You don’t have to do this only because search engines change algorithms. You have to do it also because you’re definitely not the only one targeting those keywords, assuming you’re targeting competitive ones – otherwise, what’s the point?
Research -> Analize -> Experiment. It’s the only path to success, in any field.
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I don’t know GARBAGE about SEO! How do you feel about the SEO plug ins for WordPress?
Hi, Very nice site to know the info about seo.
nice article, Thanks.
Fantastic post there. I think you have summed it very very well. I have bookmarked this post for further reference.
That is true. I would have to agree on the “keyword” part. A lot of people believe that putting up a site without a definite niche is okay only to find themselves failing. Those who manage to build effective websites without keyword research are there out of pure luck. Everyone else did their homework.
Thanks for your comments friends. I’m glad you’ve enjoyed the post.
Thanks a lot, The Keyword Strategy was a great tip.
This is a comprehensive way of dealing with SEO and making the topic more accessible. And right on number 2, keywords are truly important.
If you don’t know anything about SEO & WordPress, try the plugin: All-In-One SEO Pack
The plugin lets you enter the Title Tag, Meta Description, Meta Keywords for every page and post of your blog individually – the ideal setup for any website / blog.
“Also, a look at how your theme uses heading tags, SEO wise, would do good too.” I read this and went, “Oh crap! What am I supposed to be looking for?” Then I remembered that I’m using Simple Balance and was sure you had it covered. It’s a relief to have a theme that takes SEO into consideration.
Re #3, IMO the SEOs who say title tags (and other meta tags) do not matter, must no have any clients. We have seen on several occasions, rankings affected by changes to just title tag.
Certainly these are mistakes very committed by newbies. Excellent advice about how to avoid them.
I think the best important is the last one. Many people think SEO is a one time thing, when search engines are changing constantly. This is something you need to be studying every time, optimization is the key of SEO.
Thank you for reminding me about heading tags
A well written post..
I’ve been reading many SEO tips, still I feel I’ve learnt something in this great article!
Thx a lot.
From the above tips, only 3 tips which i’ve been already know. But overall, its a good explanation with good chart too
I think I do mistakes. It number 2 and 5. Thanks for this info.
Thanks a lot, I was unaware of mistakes which i was doing….. this blog is very helpful in improving our practice of seo………. thanks a lot, here i;ve come to know about mistakes what i was doing……….
SEO and the campaigns that involve the tweaking of the site to make it appear search-engine friendly is not easy. This takes time, so let’s be ready to wait for results.
i agree with you. thank you.
These are very good & beneficial information for SEO methods…
Grate Work…
What about url rewriting?
How much importance will be there to short url or smart url?
Hi,
I really enjoyed and appreciated the keywords strategy flow chart
This is something every new blogger struggles with. I’ve learned this point the hard way.
Thanks for the great content.
Dali Burgado
You know, I began to read this article expecting to find the same old re-hashed mistakes everyone has talked about over and over again adnauseum.
But not only is this article unique, but it is very well informed. Even from someone that works in the industry on a daily basis like I do.
I’d re-arragne your mistake, though, and put #5 at the top. So many people think they can go out and get 100 or even 100 backlinks and just be done. Quite the opposite. You should expect to put in 20 minutes per day….forever. or at least for as long as you own the site.
Also, it seems that everyone nowdays jumps into the OFF PAGE optimization (link building) before they’ve even started their ON PAGE optimization. Carefully considering and selecting your key phrases, and optimizing your own page for those keyprhases should come well before you start building links.
@selectsplat: Thanks for the comment. You’re 100% right about the off page/on page optimization process. Too many neglect the “on page”, only to jump in the “off page” process.
I am little bit confuse with mistake no. 4. How we consider that, we are doing over optimizing?
Thanks.. It is very useful info and simple to understand.. I also came across an article about popular SEO myths that are still passed around as SEO tips. http://blog.directorymaximizer...../#more-825
I found it quite useful…
The keyword strategy is interesting. I thought that search engines had stopped factoring keywords into relevancy?
David, when talking about SEO and keywords we’re not referring to the keywords that some search engines (including Google) don’t take into consideration anymore. We’re talking about a seamless inclusion of keywords into your content. That’s the way search engines calculate relevancy, based on what you talk about in your content and the keywords you target through writing not META tags.
Seriously, a great article to ponder upon. I’v already bookmarked it. The keyword strategy diagram nails right o your head about the keywords and its magic. Good post.Thanks.
Nice Seo tips thanks so mcuh
They say you learn from your mistakes. A site that doesn’t get enough hits (or none at all) may be lacking in the SEO department. Thank you for imparting this information. These would be helpful in improving site visits.