These days, a small business owner needs to be well-versed in SEO to help achieve maximum site traffic, but finding the time can be a challenge when your priority is the day-to-day running of your company. When it comes to developing your expertise, it’s quite common to focus on the how and what to do and forget about the valuable lessons to be learnt from some of the not to dos too!
So let’s take a look at some of the more common mistakes businesses can be guilty of in the SEO world to help you get it right.
3 Common SEO Mistakes to Avoid
1. Watch your site load time
Most people are put off by websites that load slowly and chances are they won’t be keen to visit again. Load time is also factored in by search engines – the faster it is then the higher it is likely to be ranked (i.e. these sites attract more traffic resulting in more page views). Analyse your site speed using Google’s PageSpeed Insights and if you do find it is slow it will also help you see what can be done to achieve faster page load times.
2. Be careful with your links
As the name suggests, an internal link is a link from one page on your website to another. These links are used by both your site visitors and search engines to navigate your website. Without these links, search engine crawlers will not be able to index your pages so it’s important to set them up to increase your chances of relevant pages being found by both your user and the search engines. Any external links that your domain points to could also affect your rankings. Remember that Google’s search algorithm is all about trust, authority and expertise so make sure you link carefully and be wary of low quality or suspicious sites.
3. Check your image file names
All too often, images are labelled incorrectly or not at all and this is an SEO opportunity a business can lose completely. Remember that a search engine is not able to see the images on your site so give them as much information as possible through meaningful file names and alt text tags. When adding images to your website, think about how you want someone to be able to find this image again. Create file names and alt tags that clearly explain your image and try to include an SEO keyword if appropriate.
For help maximising your online presence, speak to the web and digital experts at your local Kwik Kopy today.
