Three Things you must stop doing for SEO in 2015

As search engine optimizers have learned over the years it is crucial to stay up to date on Google’s periodic upgrades to its search engine ranking algorithm, as it can mean the difference between penalization and validation. Google’s most recent ‘Penguin 3.0’ update of October 2014 is no exception. Let’s examine some of the key things to not be dong in 2015 in the world of SEO which would have been acceptable earlier.

Anchor Text

Google is cracking down on optimized anchor text and now encourages users to not put their keyword phrases in links pointing to their site, but to use either: their product name, their brand name, their company name, their domain name, or their full URL spelled out with ‘http’ backslashes etc.

Although you can still of course have some links to your site which have keyword phrases in the anchor text, the majority should not. Percentages are hard to come by but SEO’s have assumed that over 90% should be in the new under-optimized fashion.

Google’s rational for this is understandable, in that the overwhelming majority of normal web users (not SEOs) link to sites by directly copying and pasting the URL, domain, or in some cases the company/product name. And for one to deliberately put keywords in the link makes it seem like he’s trying to influence the search engines, which he obviously is.

Keyword Density

SEOs are encouraged to go EVEN lighter on the keyword density. How much? Exact numbers are of course not available but it should be sparing. “natural” is the most definitive measuring stick for keyword density. This would mean then, having your page’s main keyword phrase in the Title tag, H1 tag, every H2 and H3 tag, and then peppered into the paragraph text could be considered a bit too aggressive.

Minimally your keyword phrase should be in your H1, Title tag and lightly peppered throughout your page, in a natural fashion.

No Social Signals

Likes, shares, followers, etc do not influence your rank in Google. They do however help to drive more traffic in which is what you want, but it is important to know that getting 100,000 facebook likes is not going to change your site’s value in the algorithm.

Use social media to get the word out, create buzz, and traffic to your site. As a consequence you will get many natural links to your site which WILL indeed assist with your site’s value in the algorithm. While you certainly won’t be penalized for investing heavily in social media you must know what it will and will not do for you.