Getting your website penalised by Google is now a lot more common than you think. A Google penalty is when your website has been singled out by Google for either non compliance issues or for spammy , inorganic SEO practices and this has resulted in your website loosing it’s ranking. It’s a horrible position to be in and when it happens to you the feeling you have is utter sickness.
If you are like the rest of us and rely on Google for your website rankings, then you MUST take necessary steps to avoid this ever happening to you. If you follow these then you should be fine for now. Remember Google is always updating it’s ranking algorithm so you need to always be on the look out for compliance issues. What is working today may not necessarily be working for you a year later. Unfortunately, the goal posts are forever shifting. This creates a massive challenge for SEO agencies like us that need to protect our client’s online position.
Lucky for those businesses that engage our services because we make sure we are always compliant and on top of any future algorithm updates.
Be on page compliant: make sure you have all the correct titles and descriptions and ensure page download times are kept to a minimum. Lengthy size load times will not only harm any rankings but it also aggravates people.
Write loads of content: Google loves content. You have to make certain that all your pages on the website are descriptive and quite lengthy. Short 2 sentence pages are really going to harm your rankings so be prepared to either write a lot or hire a copy writer.
Blog away: As per the above point, Google will index pages that are informative and are on topic. Blogging is a top way to get your message out there to prospective clients, plus it builds your websites authority. So make sure you post between 1-2 blogs per month. I know this may seem like a hassle but you have to do it. Either blog away or get someone to do it for you.
Unique content: You have to write copy and make certain that you have not plagiarised anything from any other website. Sure you can reference a website or link to it, BUT NEVER copy content. It will kill your rankings very quickly.
Make sure the site has no dead links that go no where. This can easily happen if you are migrating an old site to a new site. You would have to implement 301 redirects and if this is not done properly you can loose rankings.
Probably the last and most important tip in not getting a Google penalty and I really want to emphasise this point is that you cannot engage the services of SEO agencies that:
– offer any type of SEO guarantee – this is a complete scam and a fraudulent attempt to get your business. These operators are nothing short of con artists that are out there to rip you off. Guarantees cannot be given as you are trying to rank on Google and this makes it impossible to offer certainty as Google is not a constant. I cannot tell you how dangerous this is and to believe them is internet suicide. These are the companies that will end up getting your website penalised as they are there purely to make money for themselves. Roughly 40% of all the work we do is helping poor businesses get out of penalties because of shody SEO techniques.
– are not able to rank organically for themselves and have to spruik their services through Adwords. All you have to do is Google the words ‘SEO Sydney’ and you will see what I mean. There are heaps of ads up there all promoting guarantees and try before you buy – AVOID THESE AGENCIES LIKE THE PLAGUE!!! This is a massive warning. Why? Because SEO is all about organic rankings and if they are unable or incapable or ranking their own website for a service they are offering, how are they going to rank yours? See what I mean. It’s a big scam and the links these guys will give you are horrendous. Make sure you choose your future SEO partner wisely!
If you follow these tips (especially the last 2 points) you will be well on your way to staying out of Google cross hairs and less likely to incur any penalties. If you feel like you have been bad in the past and feel like you may be heading towards getting a penalty( you will know if you have done anything dodgy OR used a bad agency), then it’s time to take action and speak to the best SEO agency in Sydney – as of today the 2 March 2106 we are sitting at position # 1 for the keywords SEO and SEO Sydney. That is how good we are. So please get in touch with us to help preserve your rankings. But, if you have noticed a drop in business and think you’ve copped a penalty please give us a call on 02 9360 8514
