If you’ve researched adding SEO to your digital marketing plan, you know there’s a lot of debate over whether it still works. We assure you, it does. The problem stems from the approach. Many marketers make common SEO mistakes that can negatively affect website traffic. If you’ve experienced this before, you know it can impact your rank on Google and your bottom line.
The bad news is SEO mistakes are common. Every time Google makes an algorithm update, SEO changes. If you aren’t tweaking your site regularly to adjust for updates and current trends, it can quickly sink lower on the search engine result pages (SERPs).
And there are a lot of things that can impact a website each year. In 2024, Google’s March 2024 core update saw a 45 percent reduction in low-quality and unhelpful content. In May of that year, Google launched its AI Overviews (AIO) to bring AI to the search function. These are just two of the many updates that have changed SEO.
Still think SEO won’t impact your website? Luckily, fixing common SEO mistakes is doable. It starts with knowing where they are.
Duplicate Content
The average US adult is expected to spend almost 8 hours a day on digital media in 2025. All that content has to be produced somewhere, which makes it advantageous for companies to get creative with the content they provide. It also means that companies look for ways to repurpose content they already have to use it in some other way.
Duplicate content refers to a page of content on your site that also exists on another page. It’s the exact copy, with minimal changes.
Duplicate content is an SEO issue. If you don’t handle it correctly, it can decrease page rankings and create problems when Google tries to index your website pages.
Keyword Stuffing
Keyword stuffing has been around since SEO originated. It’s the practice of using keywords unnaturally in your content for the express purpose of ranking higher for those keywords. Google frowns upon it because it reduces the user experience.
When Google catches it, it penalizes the site, meaning some or all your pages may be removed from search results. It’s seen as an attempt to manipulate the search algorithm.
Optimizing for keywords should never mean sacrificing the flow of content for your readers. It’s always about creating a better user experience.
Slow Load Speed
Load speed measures how quickly your content loads and is just one of the many confirmed ranking factors Google uses to rank your pages for the SERPs. Again, Google cares about the user experience, and a slow-loading page can frustrate users.
Think of your own search habits. If you click and content and graphics don’t instantly appear, you might back out of the site and look for alternatives.
Mobile Optimization
If you’ve had your website optimized in the past, what about your mobile experience? Today, the majority of Google searches are made on mobile. That’s why Google now prioritizes mobile pages.
Google looks for a number of factors when considering mobile friendliness of a site. A site has to have a responsive design, which means the same page should be optimized for both desktop and mobile. It also must be dynamic serving, meaning the URL stays the same but the HTML changes depending on the device.
Does your site pass this test? If not, you’re making a common SEO mistake that’s costing you money.
Poor Crawlability
Technical SEO ensures your site is crawlable and indexable, meaning Google can easily flow through your pages to rank them for search results. An easy way to do this is to type site:yoururl.com into Google and see what it displays. If it’s only a handful of your pages, you have work to do.
Google bots routinely reach out and crawl through web pages to rank them accordingly. Poor crawlability can result in various SEO issues, including:
- Link issues
- Unindexed pages
- Redirect loops
- 4xx errors
- 5xx errors
- Poor site architecture
On-Page SEO
Many sites duplicate page structure as they create different pages. This can lead to different pages using the same titles and meta descriptions, which can negatively impact your SEO. Metadata still matters for ranking. It tells search engine bots what a given page is about, and titles and descriptions must be unique for each page.
It also means optimizing the user-facing elements of a webpage to rank higher on Google. Address content structure, internal links, keywords, and other items that can lead to poor user experience.
Local SEO
Local businesses often approach SEO generically, forgetting there are many ways to optimize for local SEO. If you’re a local brick-and-mortar business, local SEO can help you achieve Google’s coveted “three-pack” position. For a given search, Google highlights three businesses at the top of the search query. This can be a big boost for your business.
With prominent placement and good visibility, it’s easy to see why businesses strive for these rankings. What many local business owners don’t know is that you must have a Google Business Profile to appear there. Local SEO ensures the profile is set up and optimized to help you rank well in local search.
Does Your Website Make Common SEO Mistakes?
These are just a handful of the most common SEO mistakes businesses make. Fixing these can help you rank better, which ultimately means more traction, more leverage, and more business.
Just don’t forget search engines are constantly changing. And with every change search engines make to their algorithm, there’s an opportunity to adjust your website to become more search-friendly.
Even the top websites face common SEO mistakes and always have a team tweaking and making improvements. It’s what’s necessary to ensure your digital marketing plan continues to be successful.
Not sure where you stand today? We can help. Find out where your problems lie, fix them, and get back to driving qualified traffic to your site.
