5 Mistakes That Can Hurt Your Site’s Search Engine Rankings

Search engine rankings matter. By bringing more traffic to your site, higher search engine rankings can help build brand loyalty, increase brand awareness, and even make some direct sales. Because SEO is so important, it is surprising and unfortunate to see so many business websites falling into the same traps that hurt search engine rankings–while oftentimes degrading the entire online experience of their potential customers. Here are five of the most common search engine mistakes.

1.       Online Sloppiness. Failing to spell check your website, using obviously sloppy design, using broken links, and posting false/outdated information are all great ways to harm you search engine rankings. Search engines seek to offer quality experiences to their users, so simple mistakes like the ones listed above really count.

2.       Lack of Variety. Mixing content up is one of the best ways endear yourself to search engine algorithms–so if you’re not using a variety of content formats (video, audio, images and texts), then you are most likely missing out on an easy opportunity to really improve your standings.

3.       Never Updating Content. “Freshness” also counts a lot, and can be boosted fairly simply by posting occasionally to your blog, updating a video, etc.

4.       Not Using Links. Hyperlinks help search engines prowl your site more efficiently, and they also encourage search engines to consider your site an authority (since it is being referenced.) Both of these factors can improve your search engine rankings. Moreover, such links often make for a better user experience (as they improve navigability), which brings us to our final point:

5.       Poor User Experience. Any element of your site that creates a poor user experience is a big mistake that can hurt you both in terms of your search engine rankings and in terms of how the people who do find your website perceive your company. Investing in quality web design, quality web content, and a reliable hosting service to tie it all together are all great decisions, therefore. Visit People’s Host online to learn more about how great hosting can help your business!