{"id":4675,"title":"7 ways to fail at SEO","description":"Continuing our SEO series, we talk about 7 main ways that you can fail hard at SEO. We list common mistakes when comes to search engine optimisation and give you advice on how to make sure your store stays on top.","content":"<p>Continuing our <a href=\"\/blog\/?search=SEO\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">SEO<\/a> series, we talk about 7 main ways that you can fail hard at SEO. We list common mistakes when comes to <a href=\"\/blog\/?search=SEO\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">search engine optimisation<\/a> and give you advice on how to make sure your store stays on top.<\/p><p>This is part of our Learn SEO series, you can check out our other videos and blogs where we talk about the <u><a href=\"https:\/\/teemill.com\/blog\/the-principles-of-seo\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">principles of SEO<\/a><\/u> - <strong>relevance<em>, <\/em>quality<\/strong> and <strong>trust<\/strong>, the importance of <u><a href=\"https:\/\/teemill.com\/blog\/how-to-do-keyword-research\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">keyword research<\/a><\/u>, using <u><a href=\"https:\/\/teemill.com\/blog\/how-to-use-answer-the-public\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Answer the Public<\/a><\/u> for better content and <u><a href=\"https:\/\/teemill.com\/blog\/building-trust-with-reviews-on-your-store\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">how reviews can help your trust score<\/a><\/u>.<\/p><h3><strong>1. Keyword stuffing<\/strong><\/h3><p>One way to fail hard at SEO is key phrase or keyword stuffing. If you want your website to come up first in the results on Google, you might have done some keyword research to figure out the kind of phrases people are using to search with.<\/p><p>For example, if you wanted your Recycled Remill T-shirt to be at the top of Google, you might have a whole load of search phrases like:<\/p><ul><li><p>Recycling t-shirt<\/p><\/li><li><p>T-shirt recycling<\/p><\/li><li><p>Recycled tee,<\/p><\/li><li><p>Circular tee<\/p><\/li><li><p>Men's tee recycled<\/p><\/li><\/ul><p>Key phrase stuffing or keyword stuffing is basically taking all of those words and trying to ram them into the page unnaturally somewhere, like in the description or in the body a page. It might look like this:<\/p><blockquote><p>recycling t-shirt t-shirt recycling recycled tee circular tee men's tee recycled<\/p><\/blockquote><p>This is an extreme version but Google also considers something to be stuffed of keywords even if it was written in sentences - just not in a natural way. It's really important that when you write for search engine optimisation to remember to write for your customer, not directly for SEO.<\/p><p>When you write, it's a really good idea to research your key phrases and make sure you use words that the customer would use. Then when you write use those words, make sure to write them naturally, like how you would talk. You only really need to mention your key phrase once or twice on a page for Google to understand what you meant and decide if it's relevant.<\/p><p><img src=\"https:\/\/images.teemill.com\/5eccd22bb14846.42122628.png.jpg?w=1140&amp;h=auto\" alt=\"\" title=\"52035732\"><em><br>- WWF uses specific keywords like \"natural world\", \"forests\" and \"rivers\" in their description for their For Nature T-shirt.<\/em><\/p><h3><strong>2. Content duplication<\/strong><\/h3><p>Duplicate content is the second way to fail hard at SEO. Google will figure out and categorise all of the content on your website. When Google looks at all of your different pages, if some of them are exactly the same or have really similar content, it reduces the value of them and dilutes the relevance.<\/p><h3><strong>3. Quantity over quality<\/strong><\/h3><p>One of the things that can be an easy mistake is to have 10 keywords and have multiple pages talking about each specific one. Google will just see that as a confused or imprecise website and will prefer to use a website that is more focused and precise.<\/p><p>When it comes to search engine optimisation, a really big website with lots of low quality pages won't necessarily be better than a small website that's very focused and very helpful.<\/p><p>If you've got one awesome product, like a recycled t-shirt, your website should reflect the fact that there is only one t-shirt. Try and describe this product as clearly as possible. Making lots of duplicates of the same product with different keywords as the product name to try and cheat the search engines will result in less traffic, not more.<\/p><h3><strong>4. Slacking by hacking<\/strong><\/h3><p>One of the biggest ways to fail hard at Google is to pay someone or to try and use tricks or hacks to get to the top of Google.<\/p><p>This is a really simple one when you think about it. In our first principles video and <u><a href=\"https:\/\/teemill.com\/blog\/the-principles-of-seo\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">blog<\/a><\/u>, we talked about how Google's algorithm assesses your site for its <strong>relevance<\/strong>, <strong>quality <\/strong>and<strong> trust<\/strong>.<\/p><p>When a person performs a search on Google, Google looks at websites and assesses how relevant it is to the search, how good quality the website is and how credible and trustworthy it is. This function affects where websites show up in rankings.<\/p><blockquote><p>SEO is about helping people who are genuinely looking for an answer to find something that genuinely <em>is<\/em> the answer.<\/p><\/blockquote><p>Google is the most popular search engine. It's the most popular search engine because it almost always finds what you're looking for and by definition that means it almost always finds out people who are trying to cheat.<\/p><p>It's successful because it's so successful at beating the cheaters. There are thousands of extremely smart people working at Google trying to prevent people from cheating it, so the idea that you could pay someone or cheat your way to the top is a guaranteed way to fail hard.<\/p><p><img src=\"https:\/\/images.teemill.com\/5eccd24b7201a0.17190900.jpeg.jpg?w=1140&amp;h=auto\" alt=\"\" title=\"52035748\"><br><em>- Using genuine descriptions written by genuine people are much more likely to show up in search results. Ecosia like to use keywords about their tree planting activities and action to fight climate change to gain like-minded customers.<\/em><\/p><h3><strong>5. Giving up<\/strong><\/h3><p>Another way to fail at search engine optimisation is to give up. Sometimes with SEO, people can think that it happens overnight and that it's something that you only need to do once. In reality, search engine algorithms often change and people's behaviours and technology changes too.<\/p><p>SEO is more like a process. It's something that is a long-term investment and it's something that builds over time too. It's not one thing that makes your site rank at the top of Google, it's a mixture of having really high quality, relevant content, and building lots of trust and credibility.<\/p><p>You might have to start a blog and post lots of really helpful, interesting and relevant content over a long period of time before you start building up your traffic. Once you've built up a high quality website that's really trusted, you know it's something that you can rely on to bring in regular traffic each month.<\/p><p>So one of the ways that you can fail hard at SEO is to try one thing, not get results and then give up. You want to try and put out some different content, measure it and see if your traffic goes up. Then you can change and respond based on what you have learnt.<\/p><h3><strong>6. Link spamming<\/strong><\/h3><p>Another way that you can fail hard with SEO is to build lots of links to your website to try to boost your trust score artificially, especially if those links are not really high-quality websites.<\/p><p>We talked in our first <u><a href=\"https:\/\/teemill.com\/blog\/the-principles-of-seo\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">SEO principles blog<\/a><\/u> about how Google makes an assessment about your website's <strong>relevance, quality and trust. <\/strong>Part of trust is about other websites endorsing your brand and linking to your store (you can learn more about this in our <a href=\"https:\/\/teemill.com\/blog\/how-to-build-trust-and-credibility\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">trust and credibility blog<\/a>).<\/p><p>Some people at the start of their SEO journey might think that finding lots of websites where you can put a link to your site in the comments or using a free link directory is a good idea to boost endorsements and increase your trust score. The problem is, the Google algorithm already knows this method and takes into account the quality of these links, not the quantity, to build the trustworthiness of your site.<\/p><p>The quality and the relevance of those endorsements is more important than having lots of them, and actually having lots of links from low quality, untrustworthy websites could harm your trust rating rather than increase it. So if you're trying to build links and endorsement, one great link from a credible news source, like the BBC for example, is going to be worth far more than lots of links from link spamming directories.<\/p><p><img src=\"https:\/\/images.teemill.com\/5eccd2550a7e32.08967073.jpeg.jpg?w=1140&amp;h=auto\" alt=\"\" title=\"52035763\"><br><em>- Teemill powered BBC Earth store increased their trust score by getting their Sustainable Me Circular T-shirt featured in lots of news articles which linked back to their store.<\/em><\/p><h3><strong>7. It's not about you<\/strong><\/h3><p>The one way to fail the hardest at SEO is to misunderstand that search engine optimisation is about you - it isn't, it's about the customer. It's all about helping somebody out there on the internet who's typing something into Google because they really need some help and Google wants to help them find it. Google only gives the top spot to people who have genuine products which is the genuine answer to a genuine question.<\/p><p>Here's the summary:<\/p><ul><li><p>Don't use key phrase stuffing. Write naturally, speak naturally and type naturally.<br><\/p><\/li><li><p>Don't try to hide or duplicate content, just be honest and be precise. <br><\/p><\/li><li><p>Don't inflate and dilute your website with lots of similar content. It's okay to have a smaller website with more compact, useful information that's really high quality.<br><\/p><\/li><li><p>Don't try and cheat Google. It's about being fair because the customer is looking for an answer and Google rewards sites that do that fairly.<br><\/p><\/li><li><p>Don't quit. Persevere. <br><\/p><\/li><li><p>Don't use lots of link directories, they're not credible and it could reduce your overall trust score.<br><\/p><\/li><li><p>Don't use SEO just to benefit your website. SEO should benefit your customer and your website should genuinely help them. Google wants to help you help your customer.<\/p><\/li><\/ul><p>You should start from the customer in everything that you do and if you do that, it is likely that your search traffic will thrive. If you only get as far as seeing what's in it for you, it's likely that your search traffic will not increase because it doesn't help the most important person in this three-way relationship - the customer.<\/p><p>Thanks for tuning in, you can check out the next blog in the Learn SEO series<a href=\"https:\/\/teemill.com\/blog\/how-to-fix-404-errors\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">here<\/a>. And remember to keep up to date with the latest Teemill tutorials and videos by<a href=\"https:\/\/youtube.com\/teemillstore?sub_confirmation=1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">subscribingto us on YouTube<\/a>.<\/p>","urlTitle":"7-ways-to-fail-at-seo","url":"\/blog\/7-ways-to-fail-at-seo\/","editListUrl":"\/my-blogs","editUrl":"\/my-blogs\/edit\/7-ways-to-fail-at-seo\/","fullUrl":"https:\/\/teemill.com\/blog\/7-ways-to-fail-at-seo\/","featured":false,"published":true,"showOnSitemap":true,"hidden":false,"visibility":null,"createdAt":1589986221,"updatedAt":1724825036,"publishedAt":1724750311,"lastReadAt":null,"division":{"id":12,"name":"Teemill"},"tags":[{"id":30,"code":"marketing","name":"marketing","url":"\/blog\/tagged\/marketing\/"},{"id":457,"code":"video","name":"video","url":"\/blog\/tagged\/video\/"},{"id":654,"code":"s-e-o","name":"SEO","url":"\/blog\/tagged\/s-e-o\/"}],"metaImage":{"original":"https:\/\/images.podos.io\/5edfbed317b3f0.63791563.jpeg","thumbnail":"https:\/\/images.podos.io\/5edfbed317b3f0.63791563.jpeg.jpg?w=1140&h=855","banner":"https:\/\/images.podos.io\/5edfbed317b3f0.63791563.jpeg.jpg?w=1920&h=1440"},"metaTitle":"","metaDescription":"As part of our SEO series, this tutorial takes you through 7 common mistakes made with SEO to avoid when building your online store.","keyPhraseCampaignId":4256,"series":[{"id":5,"title":"SEO","description":"Learn how to get your Teemill store to the top of Google using SEO","createdAt":"2020-06-09T18:29:40.000000Z","updatedAt":"2020-06-10T09:35:36.000000Z","published":0,"urlTitle":"online-course-seo-learn-basics","url":"\/blog\/series\/online-course-seo-learn-basics","editUrl":"\/blogs\/series\/edit\/online-course-seo-learn-basics\/","fullUrl":"https:\/\/teemill.com\/blog\/series\/online-course-seo-learn-basics\/","division":12,"image":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/images.podos.io\/5edfc704425343.34974177.jpeg.jpg?w=640&h=auto","banner":"https:\/\/images.podos.io\/5edfc704425343.34974177.jpeg.jpg?w=1920&h=auto"}}],"similarReads":[{"id":40,"title":"Streetwear photography inspiration from Nocturnal Creature","url":"\/blog\/streetwear-photography-inspiration\/","urlTitle":"streetwear-photography-inspiration","division":12,"description":"Instantly recognisable by their unique and edgy style, Nocturnal Creature's photography is fresh, fun and real. 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