SEO can be a complex puzzle that marketers must piece together for profitable results.

Content development, link building, Keyword research, social media — all these components play a role when it comes to boosting a website’s rankings, authority, and traffic.

What a lot of marketers miss, however, is what happens in the endgame. That is, turning their website visitors into subscribers, brand followers, and paying customers.

Remember, generating traffic isn’t enough if you have plans of monetizing your website. You also need to pay close attention to the experience that your site offers and whether or not it would lead visitors down the conversion path.

Since plenty of marketers overlook the connection between SEO and Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO), many of them commit mistakes that effectively cripple their website’s profitability.

These mistakes are what we’re about to address today.

In this post, we’ll tackle some of the worst SEO mistakes that you need to avoid at all costs (along with strategies on how to fix them).

1. Targeting the wrong keywords

Before anything else, make no mistake that your target keywords can single-handedly decide the outcome of your SEO and CRO efforts.

On the internet, keywords determine who gets to see your content online.

It doesn’t even matter if it’s on a search engine, a forum, or a social media network. In order to find the information they need, users must type in relevant keywords and scan the results for anything that gets their attention.

With KWFinder, you can easily look for lucrative keyword ideas that will connect you with the right kind of audience. You simply need to enter a “seed keyword” or any term that’s related to your niche, adjust the language and location settings, and click “Find keywords.”

Within seconds, KWFinder will generate a list of long-tail keyword suggestions along with metrics that gauge their viability. A thorough analysis of your seed keyword will also be displayed, which includes the top results in Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) that give you a quick look at the competition.

Just remember that the average monthly search volume isn’t the only factor you should consider when selecting your target keywords.

To make sure you have a fair chance of grabbing one of the top positions in SERPs, aim for keywords within the low-medium keyword difficulty brackets (0 to 54).

Also, pay attention to the user intent behind each keyword you’ll select.

The keyword “wedding photographer services,” for example, is probably going to be used by people who are interested in hiring that particular service. As such, it’s more likely to yield profitable leads than a more generic keyword like “wedding photography.”

2. Not using enough visual content

The disadvantage of foregoing the use of visual content on your website is two-fold.

First, it makes for a bland and forgettable experience for your audience.

With user attention spans at an all-time low, you must be able to pique your target audience’s interest within seconds to keep them from bouncing off of your site. A brilliant featured image or infographic right on top of your content is a great way to accomplish this.

Here’s an example of a page that starts off with a brilliant, eye-catching image:

Next, not using images causes you to miss out on the social shares that multiply your content’s chances of earning quality links.

According to statistics, infographics — a popular and accessible form of visual content — receive 3 times more social media shares and likes than any other content type.

The good news is, creating infographics nowadays don’t involve any back-breaking work. There’s no need to hire a professional graphic designer to get the job done, either.

A Tool like Canva can help you create professional-looking infographics within minutes. This is thanks to the ready-to-use templates and drag-and-drop interface.

Don’t forget to optimize your images for SEO by inserting your target keywords in the file name and alt text tags. More importantly, be sure to use lossless image compression to keep them from slowing your site down and putting off your prospective leads.

This leads us to the next crucial SEO mistake that droves of marketers tend to make:

Learn more:

• 10 Frequent Questions about WordPress SEO that took me Years to Answer
• 3 Tips for Writing SEO-friendly Content

3. Ignoring Your Website’s Loading Speed

Not only is your website’s performance a known search engine ranking factor, it also affects how your visitors respond to your content.

Statistics show that 40 percent of online users will abandon a website in a heartbeat if it takes more than 3 seconds to load.

In other words, nearly half of your prospective leads will be thrown out the window if you fail to optimize your website’s loading speed.

The first issue would be your website’s images, which can consume a lot of bandwidth if they’re left unoptimized.

One strategy is to use a lossless compression tool like Imagify to reduce the file size of your images without any discernible changes in quality. All you need to do is set your desired compression level, upload your images, and let the tool do the work.

If your website runs on WordPress, you can automate the image compression process with Imagify’s official plugin or alternatives like WP Smush and ShortPixel.

To give your website a significant performance boost, especially if you’re getting an ever-increasing volume of traffic, consider using a Content Delivery Network (CDN).

Put simply, you use a CDN to boost site performance by leveraging a network of proxy servers that share the responsibility of storing, managing, and sending your cached website data to users. To reduce latency for international users, these servers are distributed across key locations around the globe.

Lastly, you can discover more optimization strategies that match your website’s unique needs with performance evaluation tools like GTmetrix and PageSpeed Insights. Both tools can provide you with a detailed assessment of your website for free — you just need to provide your URL and give the tool some time to complete the analysis.

These tools will also provide you with actionable recommendations that will guide you every step of the way. Feel free to run additional tests as you implement each strategy to check if it works or not.  

Learn more: 

• 5 Essentials To Master Mobile SEO for Your Business
• 7 Simple SEO Audit Tips You May Have Missed

4. Not reclaiming links

Finally, you don’t need to be a veteran SEO practitioner that backlinks are the building blocks of a rank-worthy website.

Apart from boosting your overall ranking power, backlinks — when done correctly — can also funnel quality traffic to your content from authoritative sources.

Since building backlinks naturally are hard enough by itself, you can’t afford to overlook links that you rightfully deserve, but currently, don’t have for some reason. And that’s where link reclamation steps in and saves the day.

In a nutshell, link reclamation is the practice of building links through existing brand mentions or citations. Webmasters may have simply forgotten to leave the link, removed it by accident, misspelled the URL, got your brand name wrong, or pointed to a post that no longer exists.

One way to look for missed link opportunities is to use social media listening tools like Mention. You can also use LinkMiner to quickly look for backlinks that your website has recently lost.

For the actual reclaiming process, just be upfront with the webmaster and politely request for the proper link via an email. If they truly believe that your brand adds value to their content, they should be more than happy to insert the link the right way.

Learn more: 

• 8 Efficient On-Page SEO Tips for Beginners
• Search Engine Optimization Strategy: Max Your SEO

Conclusion

Nothing in SEO is supposed to be easy, which is why it pays to be wary of the common mistakes that may hamper your results.

With the guide above, you should be more than capable of devising an airtight SEO strategy that actually benefits your bottom line. So, be patient, take one step after the other, and remember that great results take time. Good luck!

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