Is your website still not showing up on the first page of Google’s search results for its relevant key phrases? Or, are you stuck in that bottom spot on the first page that is just not delivering traffic either? These issues make up the majority of the questions we get about search engine optimization.
In this article we are going to tell you how NOT to rank in Google so that you can weed out the things hindering your website and start focusing on the those that will actually help it succeed.
The easiest way to answer this question is to ask yourself, or anyone you know, the following question, “Where is the first place you go to find information on products, companies, services and questions?” The most common answer, by far, is “Google”.
Knowing that most people share this answer, it is imperative that your business is easy to find on the most popular search engine. If your business is not #1, or worse yet, not even on the first page, then all of your potential customers are going to be contacting your competitors that are before they ever find you.
To be a little more objective, let’s take a look at some common statistics that support why having a strong presence in Google is critical for just about any business:
First page Google rankings, specifically those in the top 3 organic positions, bring a lot of benefits to the websites savvy and resourceful enough to achieve such placement. Some of the primary benefits that make these top organic positions so desirable by online marketers and webmasters alike are:
It’s safe to assume that most webmasters are not purposefully trying to prevent their websites from ranking in Google. However, what many webmasters don’t realize is that their mistakes, oversights, lack of knowledge or laziness can easily prevent their websites from ever ranking in Google.
To avoid being one of these webmasters we have compiled a list of things NOT to do if you’re trying to get your website to rank organically.
Want to keep your website from ranking? Do these things…
#1 Avoid Proper Website Migration Steps
Let’s assume that you have an existing website and you’re rebuilding it on a new platform and/or moving it to another server. One of the easiest ways to kill any existing rankings it may have, or even prevent it from ranking in the future, is failing to perform the proper website migration steps. We see this happen far too often and it’s usually due to a lack of knowledge about migrating a website and/or trying to move or rebuild a website too quickly.
#2 Try to “Trick” Google
We continue to find it humorous, but also frustrating, to see so many people spend so much of their time and money trying to trick Google to attain rankings. The irony here is that it’s much more work to try and trick Google (in the long run), then it is to follow their guidelines and focus time and money on building a user-friendly, resourceful website.
#3 Ignore Usability
One of the easiest things to overlook when developing and launching a website is usability. Usability is all about creating a website that is easy for visitors to navigate, read and interact with. Designing / developing without usability in mind, or just forgetting to test everything, usually leads to terrible user experiences that can affect your website’s rankings.
#4 Forget a Content Development Strategy
If you think you’re going to get to the first position just by launching a new website or even writing a couple blog articles every 6 months, then you’re setting yourself up for a huge let down. Making your website a resource is required if you want top billing for your most important key phrases. By planning and implementing a solid, consistent content development strategy your website will have the best opportunity to compete for the top organic spots.
#5 Never Promote Your Content
We hate to discourage you, but you could spend a lot of time and/or money on a great piece of content, but if you don’t promote it properly then it may never produce any results for you. Getting content to be seen and shared can often times be harder then creating the content in the first place. Fortunately, online marketing provides some of the most cost-effective ways to broaden the reach of your content.
#6 Do Your Own SEO
As an agency, of course we are going to recommend that you find and hire a SEO professional. However, this is not just because agencies like ours would love your business. Rather, we truly believe that two of the more damaging marketing decisions you can make are (1) spending your valuable time trying to learn SEO from scratch instead of focusing on what you know best (your business) or (2) using your marketing budget on a cheap solution just because the initial cost is less only to have to pay for and redo everything correctly in the future.
Hopefully you were able to pick out the useful tips we sprinkled throughout the sarcasm above. Either way, we commend you for reading through to the end. As a bonus for doing so, we’re going to provide you with 5 primary tips to get your website to rank #1 in Google:
All you have to do is click the big orange button below to schedule your FREE consultation to get that conversation started with us.
Are you ready to get serious about your website’s organic rankings?
One Comment
Spook SEO
November 23, 2013
Hello Vinny,
Strong presence in Google is indeed is an ultimate priority that every business should consider nowadays. For some types of business, it became the prime medium for marketing and eventually influenced the affairs in dealing with competition.
Suberb move in applying reverse psychology to your article – it is surprisingly very effective, so thought provoking and full of valuable lessons. Excellent!