6 Common Website Mistakes

Since learning about search engine optimization (SEO) techniques at my first nonprofit job, I've long been a fan of Jill Whalen and her site High Rankings.  Below are her tips for what not to do on your web site which appeared this week on SearchEngineLand:

1. JavaScript or other crawler-unfriendly navigation that may impede indexing.

2. Navigation that buries important pages within the site architecture. The deeper that pages are buried within the website, the less importance they are given (and the less likely that visitors will find them).

3. Same content appears under multiple URLs, often caused by content management systems.

4. No keyword phrase focus in the content or conversely, keyword phrase stuffing. Keyword phrases must be used within the content and must be different for each web page.  You can't use the same phrases all through your site.

5. Only optimizing the home page for search engines, but not paying attention to interior pages.  When your site visitors find your site through search engines, many won't enter through the home page.

6. Additional domains owned by the company are not properly redirected.  Jill suggests using 301 redirects to the main web site.

My additional tip: if you're planning a web site redesign, make sure you pay attention to SEO during the process not as an after thought after the new design has been rolled out.