Kleinburg Brewery
- design
- / web
In case you weren’t aware, Google can make it seem as though your website has dropped off the face of the earth for seemingly no reason. One day you’re getting hefty traffic, and the next day – nada.
Probably the worst part is that most of the time you just don’t know why your site dropped from Page One to Page 100. It happens all the time.
But the good news is, there are some ways to help you minimize the odds of Google dinging your site in the page ranks. Here are some things you should NEVER do, or else you’ll face the wrath of Google.
1. Buying Links
You’ve probably noticed that there are plenty of ads floating around in cyberspace claiming to help you get thousands of backlinks to your site. But don’t trust them. All they’re doing is grabbing links from spammy sites with bad reputations.
Getting links these ways is basically like forging your signature on pertinent documents – it’ll do nothing to help. While it might actually work for a short period of time, Google will eventually find out, and you’ll feel the consequences. NEVER buy or sell links.
2. Keyword Stuffing
What is “keyword stuffing,” you ask? It’s basically cramming rich keywords all throughout your website pages. Not only does this create a negative user experience, it also looks bad to Google.
Let’s say you want to rank for the keyword “accounting services in Springfield.” Then you decide to stuff your pages with that keyword. When reading the page, it sounds so unnatural that it’s more annoying than ever to read through the entire excerpt.
Google wants to make sure that users are getting a good experience. And if they’re not, your site’s rankings will suffer.
3. Unnatural Anchor Text
“Anchor text” refers to the text inside of a link. When Google decides which terms to rank your web pages for, anchor text is one of the places it looks to.
Of course, many people try to trick the system, and build links with some frowned-upon techniques. They use the terms that they want to rank for as the anchor text in hopes that it will boost the odds of getting ranked.
Using the same anchor text in every link basically tells Google that you are gaming the system. Odds are, you’ll be penalized for it.
4. Broken Links
As time goes by, just about every website or blog will accumulate a certain amount of broken links as sites become outdated and no longer active. But why is it your fault if the links to these sites are broken?
Which page offers the best user experience – one with 5 broken links, or one without any at all?
Obviously, it’s the one with no broken links. A page with no broken links is most likely to outrank a page that has broken links.
Don’t fret though – just like a lot of the other algorithm factors, broken links are a small one.
Nevertheless, it’s a sin that can be rectified. A couple of times a year, check out Google Webmaster Tools and fix all the broken links it presents to you. You may notice a bump in the rankings of some of your web pages.
Do yourself a favour and have a web designer who is well-versed in the field of web design tackle your website for you. They are fully aware of the no-no’s in the world of SEO, and will ensure that your site follows the rules that Google enforces.