5 SEO Mistakes You Should Avoid from Being Penalized

There are a series of more or less sophisticated techniques you can apply in order to improve the status of your website for search engines, but some of them are not going to be too effective in the long run. In fact, it is said that some techniques might be taken for a problematic spam. The search engines are constantly updating with new and complicated algorithms, therefore, today it is no longer that easy to promote a website. The spam is a practice that implies cheating on a search engine on purpose, only to display some results that has nothing to do with the user’s request. It may also artificially increase the result of a page for specific searches or keywords. If some spam techniques are obvious, many others are harder to determine, therefore, there are so called experts who adopt them without being aware of the fact that they will soon be penalized. So what should you stay away from?

Invisible text

First of all, stay away from the invisible text, which has the same color as the background. It is an attempt to trick the search engines by introducing some keywords in the same color, so they will not disturb the users, but will only help the website get more appreciation from the search engines. It is not really recommended to do it, especially when the keywords have nothing to do with the content.

Random, yet popular keywords

A second major mistake implies using keywords that are not really connected to the website. Obviously, this is about attracting as many visitors as possible. Although you may write about your favorite movies, adding keywords about the latest events will draw some traffic, but most guests will leave your website within seconds due to this form of spam.

Keyword density

When you truly care for the organic traffic, you might pay attention to the proper connection between the content and the keywords. But then, have you thought about the density? This is about excessively adding a series of keywords in the tags or the content. The excessive keywords will soon turn your website into a spam one, so the search engines will seriously consider ignoring it. From this point of view, too much can be harmful.

Doorway pages

The doorway pages are those special web pages created to attract the search engine robots and crawlers. Such web pages are optimized for particular keywords or phrases, without actually including any useful information for the visitors. The doorway pages will give you a positive result in the short term, but not in the long run, so try to avoid them.

Small text

Finally, avoid the small text. You often run into websites that may include some very small texts. Most users don’t even bother to take them in consideration, but the search engines will definitely do. The effect is the same as if you used invisible texts.

Any of these techniques may be harmful for the users who look after something else and even when you avoid misleading them, you target the search engines. They will eventually figure out and penalize your website.

This article was contributed by Adam who works as head of link building operations for an SEO Reseller Company. He loves to read SEO blogs like this one and also at times he blogs about his views on the latest search optimization trends.