02. SEO ARTICLES

Top Ten SEO Blunders

1. Frames
   Some search engines have difficultly indexing sites that are created using frames. Sites created with frames may also have general accessibility problems and individual pages cannot be properly bookmarked. Although it is possible to use the noframes tag to alleviate some of these problems, as a rule of thumb it is best to avoid using frames altogether.
2. Flash, javascript and dynamic pages
   Just as the use of frames can be problematic for search engines, Flash, javascript and dynamic pages can also cause difficulties. These problems can be particulary acute where Flash or overly-complex DHTML menus are employed for site navigation. If this is the case on your site, consider providing alternatives using standard html and text links. Also, try adding a simple site map in a prominent position which can be easily found and indexed.
3. Manipulating the search engines
   A great deal of time and effort is spent by search engine optimisers trying to beat the search engines at their own game. In recent times we have seen the introduction of keyword spamming, free-for-all sites, link farms, hidden links and other techniques for manipulating the search engine results. These and other so called "black-hat" techniques may work for a while but search engines are always on the look out for underhand practices and sooner or later will reverse the tables. Thus, many sites that have employed such techniques have later suffered penalties as a consequence. In extreme cases, your site could be dropped altogether from the major search engines.
4. Search engine spamming
   Don't make pages just for the search engines. Web pages should first and foremost be created for the customer and only then optimised for the search engines.
5. Cloaking
   A technique in which the web page presented to the search engine for indexing is different from that presented to the site visitor.
6. Doorway pages
   Doorway pages are a now outdated technique formerly used by some search engine optimisers. Doorway pages are typically designed purely for the search engines and are not normally part of the website. Visitors clicking on a doorway page are normally redirected to another page on the client's website. Doorway pages that redirect visitors without their knowledge use some form of cloaking. If you click through to a typical doorway page from a search engine result page, in most cases you will be redirected with a fast Meta refresh command to another page.
7. Invisible text
   Do not use hidden or invisible text (where your text is the same color as the page background) to cram your pages full of keywords. The search engines can detect this trick and may penalise you for adopting this method.
8. Keyword stuffing
   Creating pages that repeat or over use your keywords is not a good idea. Keyword stuffing includes the use of invisible text, the hidden input tag and the meta keyword tag as well as the over use of keywords in the page content. Not only is this undesirable from the visitors point of view, it is highly likely to trigger suspicions that you are "spamming" the search engines.
9. Site submission services
   Some companies will offer to submit your site to hundreds or even thousands of search engines using automatic submission software. While at first sight this may look like a good idea, these services are almost always a waste of time. Over submitting your site may actually harm your position on some search engines, so it is best to steer clear of such services. Look instead for companies who offer to hand submit your site to a careful selection of search engines, and web directories as part of a wider search engine optimisation service.
10. The meta refresh tag
    There are times when you may wish to redirect one page on your website to another page, for example if the information is no longer relevant or the page no longer exists. You can do this very easily by using the meta refresh tag in your HTML. However, because this technique has been abused in the past to redirect visitors to often irrelevant web pages that they have not requested, use of the meta refresh tag is now frowned upon by the search engines and can incur a penalty. A better way to redirect pages is by using server side HTTP redirects instead.