SEO is a routine job – it’s not something that can be done in a few hours and that’s it. Sometimes the changes you implement will do good, sometimes it will do bad. The key to remember is track what you are doing, and take note of the things that work and learn about seo.

Search engines – play by the rules
First of all, don’t ever assume that all search engines work the same way. What makes Google happy will not guarantee you a ranking with Yahoo, MSN or other engines. Each search engine has guidelines that need to be followed strictly, and it’s your job as SEO to find out what they are.

Google has Webmaster guidelines, along with SEO guidelines. Yahoo has content quality guidelines and advice on how to improve your rankings with them. MSN has indexing and content guidelines.

Same meta description (and keywords) on every page
Avoid using the same title on every page of your website. It’s much better to have different keywords and descriptions on each page. If you’re not utilising meta data, it’s probably time that you reviewed this, as your meta data can often be your first chance at creating a good impression for your website. Ensure you use title, description and keyword meta tags.

Title tags
A lot of sites just use their company name as their titles, or they use the same title on every page. Using the company name is OK, but try and include keyword phrases in your title as well. For example, “Keyword Phrase – Company Name”. Don’t stuff keywords in your page titles, and never use tricks like stuffing keywords into your content with lightly coloured or hidden text.

Targeting wrong keywords or not enough
The first step in choosing keywords for your webpage is knowing what your customers are searching for. Just because your company name is “Fairy Flowers” does not mean your customers will be searching for this term. It’s more likely they will be looking for “florist Sydney or “buy red roses online”. Use Google Keyword Tool for your keyword research.

Using H1, H2, H3 tags
H1 tags should be used for the heading of your page and should only be used in one instance. Use H2 and H3 tags whever you feel appropriate.

Duplicate content and duplicate meta description
Content is king. This is the number one golden rule with SEO – without good content you will not rank well in search engines.  If you have more than one URL with exactly the same content, for example your Home page contains the same information as your Products page, the search engines will see this as duplicate content and you’ll be penalised.

Using link farms
If you don’t have backlinks to your website, avoid using link farms as most search engines consider them to be low in quality. You should always aim to get good quality, relevant links to other websites within your industry. The best way to get great incoming links is to have really good content that other sites will want to link to. Examples of this would be useful information, articles, and tools.

Anchor text
Your anchor text (underlined text that denotes a link) is really important when it comes to SEO. It’s very common for websites to use phrases such as ‘click here’ or ‘read more’ as  a text link. Instead, try using keyword phrases that actually link to a relevant page about that particular keyword. An example would be “ABC Pty Ltd provides blue widgets straight to your door, with no fuss, at a great price.” Blue widgets is the anchor text.

Link to relevant websites
Be careful of sites you’re linking to, as search engines appreciate quality links over quantity of links. Choose relevant sites about your industry, similar product or service to link to. Always test your links to make sure they go to the right place.

Overuse of images and flash animations
Everybody loves a Flash presentation; unfortunately most web sites with Flash do not use it properly within their site (from an SEO point of view). Search engines are not able to index any content or navigation items that are embedded in a Flash file. Instead of having your whole site built in Flash, use it only for presentations, videos, or tutorials within a page of your site.

These are just a few of the more common mistakes that beginners make when implementing an SEO strategy. There are loads of mistakes you can make, if you’d like to add to this article please email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .