In our previous post we reviewed the current search landscape and looked at the SEO initiatives Google still like and reward.

In this post we look at the search engine optimisation strategies that are less well regarded, the initiatives which, at best are viewed by Google as being ‘low value’.   In other words continuing doing these activities could not only do you no good, it could actually work against you.

Low Quality Link Building: – getting low quality one way links from sites/microsites that are merely used for that purpose. We all know what these sites look like and this is a complete ‘no-no’ for SEO today

Article Submissions: – many of the free article spinning sites are being targeted by Google, so you are better off publishing articles on your own site as unique content, either as a blog post or as a new page.   Again we are talking about the low quality article marketing websites, if you were on ehow.com, or high authority websites like that, articles marketing will still work and be worth doing.

Last year Google launched the ‘Disavow Tool’ in Google Webmaster Tools.

Why? Because now that links can hurt your search engine position there is nothing to stop any unscrupulous competitors sending low quality links to your website and harming your organic ranking.  With the Google Disavow Tool you can let Google know if this happens.  This data collected via the Disavow Tool is also helping Google to build a database of ‘spammy’ sites.  For example, if all these people report xyz.com Google will know if your site is getting a link from them that it is potentially bad for you.

Social Media: During the recent Google+ Hangout with Google we asked them “How important is Social Media, What social metrics/signals will help you rank higher?” Their answer was:
– Shares
– Reshares
– Links that are shared
– Repins
– Retweets
– +1’s

Other Ranking Factors: Google are determined to try and deliver a much better customer experience to their searchers.  The efficiency of your website is important.  Use your web analytics package to help you to make the visitor experience better.

Look at how you could improve the bounce rate, time spent on the site, and the social signals activity on the site.

Again coming from Google; they said “If you want your page to rank it has to focus on a topic, or it will not rank well.” They also went on to say that they are looking to see if someone clicks on your links in the search engine results page, goes to your website, leaves, and clicks on someone else’s page.

These are metrics they are tracking to see if the user got the information they wanted from within your website or whether they had to visit other websites to find the information they wanted.

Ask yourself how can you get your clients and prospects involved more on your social media networks to raise your social signals.

Good SEO requires good quality content. If you cannot produce a regular flow of good quality content that people will genuinely find to be of value and want to share, you need to appoint someone who fully understands what is needed to do it for you.

We have always known that the key to being good at SEO for our clients is for us to keep up to date with what is happening in our industry.  If you would like to know more about our SEO Services, please leave a comment below or use the contact form.