What happens when you neglect SEO?

It can be tempting for businesses to think that once SEO is set up it’s fine to take a break from updating SEO, or maybe stop all together. The mentality can often be once it’s done, it’s done.

However, nothing could be further from the truth with SEO. Even taking breaks can reverse momentum and regaining ground can be a difficult task.

Today we’re going to look at the 5 main reasons why keeping your SEO up to date is a vital part of your business.

1. What happens when you stop posting content correctly?

Once you stop adding new content to a site Google starts to view your website as no longer active and thus starts to consider it as less relevant than more recently updated sites. Here are the many reasons a steady flow of new content is important:

 Once you stop creating new pages the number of links you create also stops, and the links you earn naturally reduces.

• New content lets you generate new hub pages, or master pages, that link to all other content on your site relevant to a particular topic. These rank well and are an important part of any websites growth.
• Without new content you will stop targeting new terms which in turn leads to less new traffic and fewer new keyword rankings.
• New content attracts new visitors, without increasing an audience your remarketing, email and push notification lists risk going stale and in turn will stop generating business.
• New content encourages people to return to your site to keep up with your new posts. Without these crucial return visits your branded searches will reduce and your standing with Google will reduce.
• No new content means nothing new to share to social media platforms, and so traffic will naturally decrease from these sources, too.

2. What happens when you stop refreshing pages?

Refreshing a page regularly (and correctly) can increase traffic by anywhere between 10% and 30%, and sometimes even more.  This is because Google sees refreshed pages as current and relevant content, and in due course ranks it higher in search results.

There are many different ways to refresh an already existing page, and some changes can be small. Whether it’s simply updating facts and dates, rewording existing text, adding FAQS, links or a schema to the page, there are plenty of simple changes that will help with keeping your content fresh.

Which of these works best? Often performing a search relevant to your page can lead to vital information from other sites that will tell you what to focus on and lead to a solid strategy about how to refresh the page and move it higher up the rankings.

3. What happens if you don’t keep an eye on technical issues?

SEO is a complicated business, and even the best websites are often bereft with problems caused by the many technical issues SEO can present. Here a few of the main issues that are worth looking out for:

• Robots.txt is one of the most important files on any website. This one simple document directs Google to the parts of the site you want visitors to see, and which to stay away from. Without proper maintenance and management, it can be easy to see your entire website blocked by an improperly configured robots.txt file, so it’s definitely something to keep an eye on.
• Do you know your metatags from your iframes? There’s a lot of code that goes into building any website and it can only take one misplaced line of text to jeopardise an entire page. Keeping an eye on the way pages are constructed can help make sure everything is running as you expect it to.
• A small technical problem can easily blossom into something more serious. One small problem can lead to frustration for the end-user. For instance, a broken link or setting may lead to the mobile version of your site taking much, much longer to load. How many times have you clicked away from a website that didn’t load instantly? You don’t want potential customers to be giving up on your site before they even get a chance to see it!

So, how do we manage these problems? The key is to regularly maintain the website. Fixing one problem here or there is easy enough, but a website backend left for weeks or months can develop many problems and each concurrent issue is harder to fix. It’s much easier to identify one issue than try and wade through dozens to work out what has gone wrong. Likewise, if things get bad you need professional help the only solution may eventually be to break the whole thing down and start again from scratch.

4. What happens if you stop building new pages?

Adding new pages to any website is an important part of growing your website’s keyword imprint and keeping new customers visiting regularly. Creating new pages can be easier for some businesses than others, but there will usually be search terms and keywords that you will be able to target.

Segmenting these keywords is important, and creating new pages that target specific terms, such as locations or particular aspects of your business, are important steps for maintaining growth.

Whether creating new landing page or SEO targeted pages the key take away is that new pages need to be regularly added to maintain momentum and growth.

5. What happens if I stop looking for bad links and stolen content?

It’s not just your own website you need to worry about. There are thousands of new webpages each day and they can have negative effects on your own site.

• Bad links: Once you stop doing SEO the backlinks on your website can rapidly become outdated. This can lead to spam and worse, making your website potentially unusable and definitely less attractive to your audience.
• Stolen content: With so much new content being generated every day it’s inevitable that some less scrupulous website may steal your copy. A good test is to paste a paragraph of text from your page into Google and see if any hits come back that aren’t your page. This can lead to confusion for your customer, or in worse cases blatant theft of business. In these instances, you would need to rewrite the content, or possibly file a DMCA complaint or cease and desist to have the competing content taken down.

DON’T neglect your SEO!

It’s a daunting list of possible problems and pitfalls for your website, but luckily the solution is simple- you can’t afford to stop doing SEO. All of these problems if regularly addressed are simple fixes
Once you’ve stopped keeping on top of things it can be hard to reverse the slide and your website may never regain the momentum it once had. It’s simple- keep on top of your SEO and give your website the best chance to keep on growing.