Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is an integral aspect of digital marketing that helps improve website rankings in search engine result pages (SERPs). SEO leads to Page 1 rankings on Google, however, not all SEO techniques work equally, as some that once worked well may now harm a site's reputation and search engine ranking; this article will outline six SEO techniques to avoid at all costs.

The keyword stuffing technique is an SEO tactic characterized by purposely overusing keywords in your website content as well as in metadata on websites to manipulate rankings in search engines. Keyword stuffing was extremely popular and worked well in the early SEO days, but search engines now penalize this tactic that was once so widely employed.

EXAMPLES

Excessive repetition of the same keywords within the website content writing.

Excessively repeating the same keywords in your Meta Title and Meta Description.

CONCLUSION

Search engines have becoming incredible advanced in detecting keyword stuffing and manipulation. It must be avoided at all costs. It’s important that websites should create high-quality content with keywords integrated organically throughout it.

Hidden text is when search engines only can see hidden text; while website visitors are not able to view it. Hidden text contains keywords which have been strategically placed there to manipulate search engine ranking results. Avoiding hidden text is another strategy to ensure high and safe search engine rankings.

EXAMPLES

Using White text on a White Background will render the text invisible to the browsing user.

CONCLUSION

Search engines view hidden text as spammy, and websites which resort to this tactic risk having their website red flagged and penalized. As an alternative, website operators’ should strive to create valuable content which caters both visitors and search engines alike.

Avoiding paid links is another SEO tactic to consider when seeking to increase search engine rankings. Intentionally purchasing these links to boost their position violates search engine guidelines by manipulating them to increase their position in results pages. The reason search engines dislike paid links is because the link is accepted due to payment, and not because it offers value to the reader.

EXAMPLES

Paying a website to place your website link on it.

CONCLUSION

Search engines view paid links as spammy techniques, and websites employing them risk having their search engine rankings penalized. Instead of purchasing links, website owners should instead focus on building high-quality backlinks via organic outreach and content production.

Another SEO technique involves avoiding Noindex links. Noindex links are codes displayed on websites to inform search engines NOT to index certain pages - often low-quality content or duplicate pages that search engines should avoid indexing. This strategy helps search engines avoid indexing low-quality webpages and appearing on search engines.

EXAMPLES

Informing search engines not to crawl and index your webpage on the Robots.txt file.

CONCLUSION

Noindex banners are considered spam by search engines and those using them risk having their rankings penalized.

SEO professionals should avoid flash movies as a marketing platform. Flash movies are videos or animations created using Adobe Flash that were once widely popular online but have since been phased out as HTML5 and other technologies that have overtaken it.

CONCLUSION

Search engines cannot index Flash movies and websites that employ them may face lower search engine rankings as a result. Instead of Flash movies, website owners should focus on creating relevant and optimized content instead.

Cloaking is an SEO technique in which different content is shown to search engines and visitors; this strategy is used to influence search engine rankings by showing search engines optimized content while providing visitors with completely different information.

CONCLUSION

Search engines view cloaking as a spam technique and websites using this tactic could risk having their search engine rankings penalized. Its vital to focus on quality, instead of trying to manipulate and trick search engines.