Getting your website found by the search engines requires basic optimization or SEO for short. When your site is properly optimized you will see substantial improvement in traffic to your site and ultimately more sales.
8 common, typical mistakes to avoid in properly optimizing your website are discussed below.
1 - Using too many images for headings and menus. Using text for headings and menus helps search engines more easily discover whatever they are looking for. Although images may make your site look good, keep in mind that search engines cannot read images. Because of the inability of the search engines to read your images, having too many images has a zero effect on improved rankings.
2 - Backlink Spamming. Create backlinks from relevant and authentic sites such as article directories. Avoid getting backlinks from link farms, hidden links, certain link wheels, etc. These can have a huge negative effect on your site and may even cause your website to be delisted by Google and the major search engines. Using too much interlinking, especially from non-relevant sites, is considered backlink spamming.
3 - Bad Selection of Keywords. When you select keywords make sure that you do not select highly unique or highly popular keywords. If you use unique keywords (keep keywords relevant) you may find yourself at the top of the rankings but probably not any relevant customers. If you use highly popular keywords you will face stiff competition from sites that are already at the top of the rankings. For example, as of this writing, I did a google search for the keyword phrase 'make money online'. A popular keyword phrase. That search produced 556,000,000 results in about 0.20 seconds. Stiff competition wouldn't you say.
4 - Ignoring Title Tags. Using keywords in the title tags will definitely improve your site's SEO. Search engines can find relevant keywords in the very beginning, which make it easier and faster.
5 - Failing to provide sitemap. Often when you make JavaScript menus and do not provide sitemaps your site fails to make an impact on the search engines. Search engines cannot read JavaScript menus. Use sitemaps to enable crawling and indexing.
6 - Not providing HTML version. If you have designed a website only in Flash then it becomes difficult for the viewers with a slower connection to download it. Similarly, it becomes even more difficult for the search engine spiders to crawl. Search engines ignore such sites. Make sure you provide a HTML version for your website.
7 - Too much focus on MetaTags. Many experts feel that meta tags are fast becoming obsolete, so avoid putting too much focus on them.
8 - Avoid tiny and fancy fonts. Using FrontPage is not advisable. There is a possibility that the output may be poorly crafted and may not even be compatible with all browsers. Though a small spelling mistake may create attention and get visitors, this undermines the quality of your website. Your links should never contain any spelling or grammatical errors.
You should regularly update your site and keep the content fresh. After all, free website visitors is an online marketers dream. Proper SEO is vital.
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