Outdated SEO Techniques You Should Stop Using

If there is one lesson in modern marketing that we are consistently teaching to clients who come our way, it is that search engine optimization or SEO is a constantly changing field. Google and other search engines are always updating their algorithms to direct users toward more genuinely relevant and valuable content and to filter out pages that have tried to “beat the system.” Because of all these changes, there is a revolving door of tactics and techniques that work well for some time but then become ineffective.

Our healthcare marketing specialists at McCauley Marketing Services know this well, which is why we are constantly reading up on and analyzing the latest search algorithm changes and how to adjust for them. To help you bring your SEO up to date, we’re highlighting a few of the top outdated SEO techniques you should stop using.

Buying Backlinks

A backlink is a link on another site that points to your site. When a backlink is genuine, such as when another site sees that you have a great article about a particular topic and links to your article for their readers to learn more, it gives your site more credibility. The number of backlinks you have and the quality of the site linking to you can have a great impact on your search engine optimization.

But for a long time, some sites would buy backlinks instead of coming about them truthfully. Google’s algorithm has now become well-trained to identify the red flags of bought backlinks, like a low-quality site that is packed with links to other sites but with little content of its own.

Keyword Deception

Keywords are the most fundamental aspect of SEO: the words you use in your content tell search engines about the subject of the content so they can categorize it appropriately. While it is always helpful to analyze relevant keywords and identify the highest-volume keywords that relate to your business, there have been websites for years that took this too far.

There is a deceptive keyword practice of finding ways to use keywords that are high-volume but aren’t related to the content at all. Some sites even do this by dumping a list of popular keywords at the end of a page but making the font color for those keywords match the background color of the page so readers don’t see them.

This is another practice that search engines have become experts in weeding out. It’s best to simply stick to the relevant keywords that actually fit your content.

Quantity Over Quality

In the earlier days of search engines, SEO largely came down to quantity. The more content your blog articles had, the greater your chance of ranking on search engine results pages. As a result, companies would churn out dozens or hundreds of pages of content that wasn’t informative, valuable, or helpful – it was just there.

Today’s search engines, though, are far more sophisticated. They can distinguish between content that is well-written, is well-constructed, and has genuine value. It’s more beneficial to invest your time and resources into fewer high-quality blog articles than a massive number of articles that are sloppily thrown together. You need to make sure those articles are original content too, because publishing duplicate content can hurt your search rankings.

Search engine optimization is constantly evolving, and there’s no way to fully predict how it will continue changing in the future. There is, however, a golden rule that will help you avoid practices that will later become obsolete: don’t try to “beat the system.” Use SEO strategies that genuinely categorize your content appropriately and target readers who are truly looking for the type of content you’re providing.

For help developing and executing an ongoing SEO strategy, call McCauley Marketing Services today. Remember to follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram for more marketing tips.