Just like every chef has its own secret ingredient or recipe, that he is kind of unwilling to disclose to the crowd, similarly SEO is Google’s secret recipe. Ingredients of which are not much known or disclosed in the world of Digital Marketing.

With no second thoughts, it’s free of cost but has it’s own limitations. To be precise, Google has it’s own parameters, which is not much known or revealed to the Digital Marketers – in order to count the uniqueness, worthiness and relevance of your website, keeping the users in mind.

You decide to start SEO as your primary traffic strategy, optimizing everything so that the search engines send you a huge chunk of visitors per day, that too free of cost. You rush off to do your keyword research, shortlist a few phrases that might bring in massive traffic, focus on getting lots of links, write content for SEO, expecting to see your website gets higher rank. Exactly where you start creating opportunities for mistakes.

SEO is a fairly straightforward and simple thing, which the digital marketers tend to complicate.

The undeniable fact is we have all been there. As it is one of those strategies that we all are still learning, exploring with time and with a few adjustments, but it will definitely take a quiet amount of time to master it.

Here are the most common SEO mistakes we tend to do, also advice on how to correct them:

NOT DEFINING YOUR PURPOSE

Purpose guides the direction. It applies in SEO as well. Why the user will visit your site, what will he get by visiting your site, how will it benefit him – at the end of the day, the fact remains the user comes to you when he needs something and if your website doesn’t serves his query, he won’t stay there.

Take Away #1

Give your existence a purpose

 WRITING FOR SEO

Well, it’s one of the biggest mistakes that one commits – writing for SEO. Quality outplays keyword stuffing at all touch points. Sites that focus on quality are ranked high, visited and shared. Write quality.

Take Away #2

Write to satisfy both the crawler and at the same the user.

STUFFING KEYWORDS

Keyword density is just a small part of the whole SEO Equation, don’t stuff your website. Using keywords appropriately adds to the worthiness of your website. Don’t forget, stuffing won’t enhance the quality of your site, it will rather have a reverse impact. Identify keywords that are worthy, make appropriate use of it by giving it a clear structure. Keyword density counts but it not everything.

Take Away #3

Practice the art of developing content around keywords.

NOT UNDERSTANDING CLIENT’S OBJECTIVE

When you don’t understand the client’s objective, you can never optimize on the Right Keywords for SEO. For instance: using global keywords, when you only offer services to local customers. Using high volume keywords, when the client does not have a strength that can handle the calls. Using keywords that only bring in visitors looking for free information, and not prospective customers who will buy something. Using broad keywords that have lots of competition for a tight-budget client.

Take Away #4

Be as specific as possible.

NOT IDENTIFYING AIDA JOURNEY OF THE USER

AIDA has been used for ages to describe and guide customer journey. Identifying the AIDA journey of the user helps you define the what’s, why’s, and how’s of communication. It helps you reach your users at every touch point.

Take Away #5

Identify the AIDA journey of your user

 EMPHASIZING ON LINK QUANTITY OVER QUALITY

While we understand the importance of links, we tend to overlook the importance of quality. At times, one good quality link from a popular blog might do more for your SEO ranking than multiple low-quality links. With no doubt, they are hard to find, but then nothing is impossible. You need to be more focused, more dedicated and more result oriented.

Take Away #6

Use good quality, relevant links

NOT HAVING XML SETTING

While its important to ensure happy users, it’s equivalently important to please the crawler. Having XML settings instructs the crawler on which page is more prior and which is not, their location and when to revisit the site next.

Take Away #7

Adjust your XML settings.

 NOT OPTIMIZING YOUR WEBSITE FOR MOBILE

Today, more than half of your website traffic comes from a mobile device. Yet many of us, digital marketers resist from having a mobile-first approach. This may lead to high bounce rate from users visiting your site through mobiles.

Take Away #8

Encourage Mobile First Approach

NOT HAVING UNIQUE TITLE TAGS AND META DESCRIPTION FOR EACH PAGE

Every page of your website should have a unique Meta Title, Meta Description depending on the page content and defined Meta Keywords. As the Meta Tags are the sales pitch for your page in the search results.

Take Away #9

Make each page’s Meta Tags as unique and penetrating as possible that will push the user to click on your link in search results.

NOT HAVING ALT IMAGES

Alt attribution is nothing but an alternate text for an image. If the image cannot be displayed, the alt text provides alternative information for an image. But that’s not it! The Alt text also contributes to increasing the density of the keywords if optimized properly.

Take Away #10

Encourage the practice of Alt Images.

 NOT USING ANALYTICS TO TRACK WHO CONVERTS

Last but not least, SEO isn’t only about massive amounts of free traffic. It’s also about conversion.

The only way to find out which keyword leads to conversion or which keyword is the quality keyword for your website, you need to track it.

Take Away #11

Use analytics to set up conversion tracking for your keywords, compare them to see what leads to the best results. Knowing will help you better optimize your site as a whole.