Greed and Miscalculations Jeopardize SEO

I see two extremes in SEO – marketers who can’t get enough high rankings (and traffic) and those who waste their time trying.

In either scenario, these marketers lack vision and discipline, and could jeopardize sales opportunities.

Hard to please (greedy) marketers and those spending too much time living in the clouds both need to be realistic. Here is a quick look at both types of SEO marketers:

Hard to Please

If you have a good ranking for a competitive word on a single page (i.e. on Google), don’t try to push the limits of the page by squeezing in two or three additional search terms on that page. Primary pages, such as the home page or a products overview page, can support multiple terms.

But even if they each support 5, you need to look at the mix and wonder if all 5 rankings are really helping. What is the user experience on the site? How are rankings translating into traffic? Is one good term in the top 3 while the others average #9?

Going after yet another term may seriously weaken others that already perform well for one or many search engines. Lower rankings translate into less traffic and sales. It’s best to find other pages to support the extra words you cherish.

At a minimum, stagger the testing. If you must add another keyword, do so in small ways – a slight change to a title tag followed by a slight change to a header followed by a slight change in the content. Keep in mind that internal linking and inbound links/descriptions may need to correspond with your desire to milk a page for all it’s worth.

Living in the Clouds

Desperate for dollars and eager to play in this space, small businesses have unrealistic notions about what keywords to choose for their programs.

They may have page-milking tendencies as well, but the real problem is keyword selection. They favor broad words or even very competitive phrases with 2-3 keywords. They’re living in a fantasy world that somehow suggests that they deserve to rank simply because they have a site and like the traffic possibilities.

When their feet are firmly on the ground, these marketers can make wiser choices about keywords – focusing on the least competitive terms (and maybe localized phrases). Other strategies over the long haul may include:

- Making note of the age of the site
- Keyword-friendly design
- Adding depth to content
- Aggressive linking
- Exceptional traffic/ROI analysis

It’s better to get some traffic from potential customers than to reach no one while chasing after especially popular terms. With measured testing, marketers with new websites can occasionally introduce second-level or top-tier keywords and phrases.

But they should be comforted by the fact that longer phrases often convert better anyway.