- Okay, so in this video, we're gonna be talking
about seven of the worst SEO mistakes
you absolutely need to avoid
if you're a complete beginner to SEO.
And this is really gonna help you
because SEO is quite a time-consuming task.
It can take months to work on, or even years.
And if you wanna save yourself a lot of time
and avoid the mistakes that I made initially,
then you'll definitely get a lot of value
out of this video.
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Okay, so let's jump into it.
So the biggest mistake I see most people making
when it comes to SEO is not being consistent enough.
Because obviously it takes time when it comes to SEO,
and this is a game of patience.
It can be months before you see results,
and that's why you absolutely need to be consistent
in terms of building links, producing content,
and overall working and improving your site.
So what do I mean by this?
Well, a lot of people, they give up way too early.
So they might get bothered
by the lack of results they're seeing,
and therefore, they're not consistent,
and they don't work on their website every single month.
So it's important to keep on going
whether your website's performing well,
or whether it's even performing poorly.
Because that consistency is really gonna help you
in the long term.
And almost, you wanna make sure that producing content
and building links to your website becomes a habit
and a monthly routine that you do consistently,
because Google is gonna reward you
for that in the long run.
Next up, I see a lot of people making mistakes
with their content.
So usually, especially beginners to SEO,
they try and scrape by by doing the absolute
minimum amount of content on the website.
They might pump out a 300-word article,
and then think that's enough to start ranking on Google.
And the problem is, it's absolutely not.
And if you don't do this,
if you don't make your content really high quality,
then your competitors will,
and that obviously only gonna outrank you in the future.
So you have to be really careful
about the content that you produce,
and make sure you're producing it
to a really high standard.
And what do I mean by this?
Well, you wanna think,
one of the most important ranking factors
with content is search intent.
So what's the user looking for?
And when they find your content,
is it solving their problem?
Because if it's not,
it's not gonna stay around for long,
it's not gonna be ranking on the first page for long
because you're not helping the end user.
So you have to think about, okay,
how can you improve your content?
Could you make it more engaging?
Could you make it more detailed?
Could you make it more to the point?
And could you make it more actionable, for example.
So it's really important to nail your content
if you wanna rank highly on Google
and generate that traffic.
Now I also see a lot of people sort of ignoring
the value of link building to their website,
especially beginners because they don't understand
how much of a difference off-page SEO
can actually make to your website.
So if you don't already know about link building,
this is essentially like you build links
from other websites to yours.
And each link that you build,
depending on the quality and the relevance
of that link,
is like a vote from other websites
to say that your content is good.
Then Google recognizes this.
It ranks, consistently proven to rank blogs
with more links higher up on Google.
So it's really important to do link building.
And it doesn't matter, it doesn't really matter
how much content you produce,
because if you're not building links to it,
then there's a high chance it's not gonna rank.
There's over 200 ranking factors on Google's algorithm,
and link building is easily in the top three,
if not the number one ranking factor.
It's something I see consistently,
and it's something you absolutely have to do
if you wanna see your website gain traffic.
Additionally, a lot of people don't have
a good keyword strategy in place.
And what I mean by this is selectively
going through your niche and the keywords
people are searching for
and picking out the ones that are the most profitable
for your website,
and the ones that you can genuinely rank for.
Because some keywords you won't be able to rank for,
and they're just gonna be a total waste of time.
So you have to be really careful
about your keyword strategy,
and make sure you're targeting the right keywords
for your site.
So if you don't already have one in place,
you need to get one.
This is extremely important,
and it will save you a lot of time along the way.
So don't avoid it.
You may have great content,
but if you haven't chosen the right keywords
for that content,
then you're wasting your time, almost.
So you have to be very careful about this.
And luckily, there are tools in place like Ahrefs,
for example, that will give you
a breakdown of the keyword difficulty,
how easy is to rank for that piece of content,
who's ranking for it already,
and how many people are searching
for that keyword each month.
Now these are all extremely useful pieces
of information that you wanna incorporate
into your keyword strategy.
But also on top of that,
when you're searching for keywords,
you should be thinking about what's the business value
of that keyword to your site.
So how can you make money for it?
Because it's great if you rank for that keyword,
that is great,
but is it gonna generate any business?
Is it gonna have any monetary value for your website?
And if not, why are you trying to rank for it?
So you have to be very selective
on which keywords you go after.
And some beginners to SEO
don't even have a keyword strategy at all,
which is kind of a total waste of time.
Now, as I said earlier,
SEO is a game of patience,
and some beginners just don't have the patience for it.
For example, if you've got a brand new website
with a completely brand new URL
that you've just bought,
then it's gonna be a sandbox period with Google.
And what this essentially means is, first,
because you're a brand new website,
you don't have any trust in the eyes of Google,
and therefore it's not gonna rank your website highly.
It's not even gonna give you a shot
for maybe six to 12 months.
So you have to be very realistic
with your expectations and realize
it may be a long time before you get any results
from Google, essentially.
So you have to understand that you need to be patient,
SEO is a game of patience,
and you have to be disciplined.
And that's why I said before,
you need to be consistent with this.
Because even if you're not getting results
for six to 12 months,
you still have to do the hard work
and preparation in terms of getting content,
in terms of targeting the right keywords,
in terms of optimizing your content
and building links to your site.
These are all important factors
that you need to start doing really early
if you wanna get results later down the line.
So it's one thing to be consistent,
but you also need to be patient.
And what I'd recommend here is
don't always think about like,
okay, how can I get the fastest results possible?
Because SEO doesn't really work like that.
The longer your site is going,
the more trust it's gonna build,
especially if you're doing all the right things
in terms of content, keywords, and link building.
Now the next mistake I'm gonna talk
about comes into this.
So, as well as being patient,
you have to try and avoid taking shortcuts,
or what's also known as black hat SEO.
So, what this means is that there are certain
ways you could try and manipulate Google's algorithm
to try and rank your website higher
so you could buy public, private blog networks,
or you could spam a ton of links to your site.
You could try and manipulate the keyword density
on your website.
But these are all black hat SEO techniques
that are only gonna punish you later down the line.
So you have to avoid taking shortcuts,
and avoid doing anything
that's gonna jeopardize your website,
or even get you penalized by Google.
So that's why I recommend absolutely
avoiding black hat SEO,
no matter how tempting is,
or how many people tell you, okay, it does work.
Because in my opinion,
you're building your website on a foundation of sand
that's only gonna crumble
if you start doing black hat SEO.
And eventually you're gonna get caught out,
and then all your hard work previously
is gonna get wiped out overnight.
So that's why I recommend sticking
to ethical white hat SEO techniques
that protect your website in the long run.
And finally, you must absolutely be careful
and avoid the mistake of choosing
a bad niche to go into.
Now what I mean by this is the topic
that your website is centered around
must be something that you can genuinely rank for.
So don't just jump into a niche
when you build a new website,
because that's a big mistake that most beginners make.
You should spend a lot of time researching your niche,
and understand, okay, who are your competitors,
can you genuinely rank for it,
what's the business value of some
of the top keywords in that niche,
and how much work and time is it gonna take
to start ranking in that niche.
Because these are all really important factors
that could totally make or break your website.
So niche selection is extremely important
and you should nail it if you wanna be successful
in the long run.
I've seen people who have spent years on their website,
and they get so far into the site
that they can't turn back anymore.
They've spent so much time on their website,
they're not prepared to turn back,
and the problem is that they're in a terrible niche
that doesn't generate their website any money.
So you have to be really careful about that
and pick a niche that you're absolutely certain
will be successful and will be something
you can genuinely rank for.
So that's it for my SEO beginner mistakes.
I hope they've helped you.
And you absolutely need to avoid all of these
if you want to be successful in SEO.
Now, obviously, there are many,
many more mistakes you could make in SEO,
but these are some of the top ones
that I found myself.
And especially when it comes to being patient
and consistent and avoiding black hat SEO,
these things could all make or break your website.
And that's why you need to be careful around them.
So let me know if you if you need any help
with SEO in the comments section below,
or any mistakes that you've made personally.
I know I've made plenty myself before.
And yeah, don't forget to subscribe
if you want more SEO and link building tutorials.