Search engine optimisation is always changing, it is like game of cat and mouse between the SEO world and the search engines, the nexus of course being Google. 

As time goes by, Google’s algorithm is always undergoing changes, but two things that always seem to be constant are content and links.  Even then there are various tricks and techniques that you should know about and soem you should avoid.

Here are a few of those naughty tricks you should avoid and if your SEO company do any of these things, question them, better still . . .RUN AWAY!

Keyword Stuffing – This is the technique of ‘stuffing’ your target keywords in title tags, description tags and alt tags, etc.  In the past, keyword stuffing worked a treat, but that was in the 90’s and is now frowned upon and can lead you to bother by at least having your page ignored or ranked extremely low.

Reciprocal Links – Links are, even today, the main factor that indicate to the search engines that a site is of interest to more people, the more links you have, the higher your page ranks.  But reciprocal links (you give me a link and I’ll return the favour) are easily spotted by the engines and whist they will be spidered, perhaps even indexed, they will most likely not provide you with much in the way of rankings.  One way links are by far better than reciprocal links and even then, they need to be from related web pages.

Mass-submission – You know the offers, I’m sure you will have seen them, perhaps even been tempted to try them out.  DON’T!   It’s not big and it certainly isn’t clever.  Whilst the idea of having your website submitted to 1,000 directories & 500 search engines may sound ideal, it isn’t and will most likely see you site dropped like a stone.

Page footer site wide links – This technique can often be handy and is primarily designed to promote search engines to quickly get around your website and the use of keywords in the links’ anchor text, can have a positive effect on those keywords rankings.   However, if you over egg this, it can have a negative effect.  So always make sure you are using footer links in moderation – design them to be useful and not overbearing for your visitors and you may get it right,

Super high keyword density – It’s vital you have your keywords/keyphrases featuring in your page content, that’s pretty obvious, but overdo it to your peril.  Again, if you can do this with your readers in mind instead of just the search engines, you should be on the right track.
Here’s an example using Dave’s Dog Collar Shop.

Bad Dave’s home page introduction is like this:

“Dave’s Dog Collar Shop is the best dog collar shop of them all.  Our dog collars are for dogs that want collars and so trust us, you have come to the dog collar shop that is the dogs when it comes to dog collars”

Yep, not only does it read so badly that your average reader will be scared off, but it’s an open and shut case of extreme keywords density and will get you in bother.

Here’s good Dave’s introduction:

“Hello and welcome to Dave’s Dog Collar Shop.  Our dog collars are sourced from all over the worlds and come in all kinds of sizes, styles and colours.  From Jack Russells to Great Danes, if you have a pooch, we’ve got a dog collar for you.”

As you can see, this reads well and will work for your readers and the search engines - As long as you sell dog collars of course.

Header tag abuse – The h1, h2, h3 tags etc. are key in providing a style that is consistent across all your pages and these header tags really help your users to quickly identify the subject and sub-subjects on your pages and they also serve the purpose of telling the search engines the same thing.  However, if your pages have numerous occurrences on a h1 tag for example (on a single page), then it can be seen as search engine manipulation, so avoid this one also.   

Incorrect user of h tags can be done unwittingly by the novice html’er, so if you think that could be you, check your code.

There are many more search engine techniques that can land you in both, but these are some of the common ones and unsurprisingly all of the above are still around today.

Because of the nature of search engine optimisation and the constant evolution of search engine algorithms, you must always be up to date on which techniques are considered good (white hat) or bad (black hat), so here’s a few tips to help you decide which advice to take and which to drop.

• Get a second opinion – This should always be done if you are not up to scratch on your SEO skills.  So after receiving advice, consider visiting an SEO or web marketing forum and ask some of their members.   If it’s dodgy, they will definitely tell you
• Check if the advice is new - When you search for SEO resources and advice on the search engines, always try to identify how old the article is.  What may have been acceptable a few years ago, may no longer be acceptable today, so always make sure your advice is as up to date as possible.
• Seek testimonials – Any SEO company worth their salt will be able to provide you with details of some of their past clients.  Check out those clients’ websites to see how they rank.  See if you can prove the site was definitely worked on by the SEO company.

.

Do you use any of the above techniques? 

Have you prevailed or suffered?

If you want to share your experiences of bad SEO, we’re always interested to know.

John

Indeed and as I mentioned, our readers need to know that these are by no means ALL the pitfalls as there are many more to highlight and discuss, but this is certainly a good start.

Feel free to throw in any other less obvious techniques to avoid.

john

It's a good point and these days more than ever.

It is suggested that Google identifies duplicate content as it knows that articles do get redistributed, such is their nature, and then identifies which of those articles is the oldest, then giving credit to the article it sees as being the original and taking it away from the distributed copies.

So yes, spin those articles so this duplication is not seen.

Using sites like CopyScape can be a great way to test your new spun version of an article as it counts word duplication as it's main indicator so you know if your spun version still has a 60% match (for example) then you may not have spun your article enough.

There are also keyword density tools all over the net, which analyse your web page and show you in simple form how much of your page is populated by your keywords compared to the rest of the content.

But, be sure you don't get involved in trying to strike that perfect level of density because it's nonsense to think that algorithms penalise you purely for being above/below x% density.  That may have been the case years ago, but times have moved on and algorithms are a lot more advanced than that.  The other reason you shouldn't get sucked in is because by the time you have misguided yourself into believing you have found that sweet density level, you could have produced a lot more good quality content for your website.

All this said, if you do see that your keywords feature in your pages with a dizzy-heights density, then you probably already know you are stuffing your keywords.

SEO Book provides a nice, simple keyword density tool and at the same time, a few tips on how to use keyword density tools to your advantage, that mainly being to benefit your keyword research.

What tools do you use to develop your keyword strategy? 

Do you even have a strategy in place?  It's amazing how many people don't.

Yes, to some it's all basic knowledge, but lots of people still use some of these techniques.

I use the footer linking method on some of my sites but now I am going with links on the footer that a footer usually contains like "advertise", "about", contact and etc.

Nothing wrong with a few footer links pointing to key pages, as long as its not overdone and not too keyword-stuffy.

Very good tips given here.

Super high keyword density – It’s vital you have your keywords/keyphrases featuring in your page content, that’s pretty obvious, but overdo it to your peril.  Again, if you can do this with your readers in mind instead of just the search engines, you should be on the right track.
Here’s an example using Dave’s Dog Collar Shop.

I think this is one of the most common mistakes people make soon as they think they've figured out what SEO actually is. Keywords and phrase should appear in textual content in a natural manner. I think this is something you get better at with writing articles.

Very good, quality information about SEO especially from Jon and Castle.
Keep up the good work and share as much as you can with us.