Do’s and Do Nots of SEO

The competition in the SEO industry is only getting fiercer. Google continues to roll out one algorithmic update after another. SEOs and webmasters who invested their time and money into building links for a long time are now planning link removal strategies. One thing is for sure that today’s SEO includes a lot more than simply the old-fashioned ways or tactics. The role of an SEO professional has broadened in many ways.

But where does your website stand in the midst of all of these changes? On the one hand, you need to keep a close watch on the recent search algorithmic developments at Google. On the other, you need to abide by the significant do’s and don’ts of today’s SEO.

Let’s have a look at what to do and what not to do –

#1. Think About the User

In the current scenario, you can never ignore the user. If your site exists only to rank at the top of search engines and not to offer value-added content to the user, you’re in trouble. So, start making the necessary changes to your site to cater to the target audience’s requirements. Get ready to please the visitor and the rankings will follow.

#2. Don’t Participate in Link Schemes

Link spam is closely watched by Google’s Penguin. Gone are the days when you could easily build tons of backlinks by publishing hundreds of articles on article directories or mass-submitting links to web directories. Even blog networks don’t work anymore. It’s, therefore, advisable to go the natural way and build only top quality and authoritative links.

#3. Go Social

In order to improve your site’s SEO, you must also focus on creating as many social signals as possible. Search engines like Google have evolved enough to understand humans and relationships. The more social signals (likes, shares, comments) you can create for your content, the better rankings you will achieve in search engine results pages.

#4. Don’t Manipulate Anchor Text Links

Anchor text linking has been manipulated for years. But there’s no way to manipulate it anymore. If you are always obsessed over exact match anchor text and use it to loophole your site’s way to the top of search results, you’re risking penalization. Always try to make your anchor text linking look natural to search engines.

#5. Use GWT to Improve Your Site’s SEO

Google Webmaster Tools (GWT) provides site owners with a bunch of highly useful data that they can use to improve the SEO of your website. Recently, Google introduced ‘Index Status’, a new GWT feature that gives you an insight into your site’s indexing data. Start using GWT right away.

#6. Don’t Get Caught Up in SEO Trends

Google warns all SEOs and webmasters about not getting caught up in SEO trends. Rather than trying to find the latest tricks to obtain top search rankings overnight, you should stick to the fundamentals of SEO.

#7. Stay Fresh

Regardless of the niche you cater to, you should always make sure that your site has fresh content. Google’s crawler loves to frequent sites that produce relevant and valuable content consistently. Frequent crawling also leads to better search engine rankings.

Are you paying good attention to your site’s SEO? Please feel free to share your thoughts and opinions in comments.