Here are 10 old SEO methods that I've seen come across my desk in the past two weeks and how you can do better. 1. Article Submissions If the word "EzineArticles" falls out of your mouth when you start talking about your SEO, you should just stop right there. Even before the Panda update, this really wasn't the best use of your time and essentially was just a way to get some quick links back to your site. Instead of going after easy links, why not work on building relationships with bloggers and work on writing guest posts that can add value to their site and community while benefitting you with exposure to their audience and possibly building a quality reference from an authoritative site. 2. Press Releases without News Press release is the way to tell people about new product or news. Do not publish a press release just for links without any new news to audience. Kinda sounds like link building, doesn't it? Press releases for the sake of links alone is probably just as close to a waste of time as article submissions. Remember, no quick fixes. Do something newsworthy and good. You'll be helping someone else at that, in turn can help you with effective media relations and the links will follow. 3. Reciprical Linking & Link Exchanges What is this, 2004? Link exchanges are just another way to try to take the work out of gaining links and earning trust by swapping links with another site. Can you think of a more easily detectible signal that you could throw at a search engine to let them know you're trying to get cheap, useless links? Think of a link as an endorsement of sorts. A link should mostly be used when it makes sense and can help the visitor by pointing them to additional resources or related material. 4. Creating Thin Content This bad SEO technique just doesn't want to die. I get it, old habits die hard. But friends, it's time to move on. We already know that great content can drive great links. Here are a few questions to ask yourself when looking at your content creation: 5. Losing Your Voice through Automation I'm not going to dive face first into the automated tools debate that constantly seems to circulate through the social media sphere. A tool to help streamline, disseminate content, and balance time can be just that, a tool. Tools all have their purpose and can all be useful given the right circumstances. That said, you don't saw a board with a hammer. Learn your tools. Use them, but use them wisely. Social media, including your blog, is a way for you to build relationships. It can help you gain and keep customers or open new doors for the future. Automation is often seen as an easy way out for companies that know they're supposed to "be social" but they don't want to be, they just know it's "important" for some reason. You're not fooling anyone. Social media gives you a voice. Trying to take the easy way out is like putting your company on mute. 6. Ignoring Social Signals Thankfully most blogs and websites nowadays have social sharing buttons of some sort. Unfortunately, many site owners aren't paying attention to these social signals, what they mean, or their potential. Let's turn to Google's CEO, Larry Page, to help me tell you to stop ignoring this: In a recent Google earnings call, he was asked, “If you think of the future of Internet search three or four years out, how important will the social signal be and how important (will) personalization be?†He responded by explaining how he might search for one of his friends who had a common name. 7. Implementing Tactics without a Strategy Truth be told #1-6 above all fit into this but I felt like this should have its own little mention. Why? Because this is a pattern by which a lot of people set out into SEO and it's why old SEO methods are still being used. It's also why so many people fail at marketing in general. 8. Focus on Rankings I was handed a ranking report by an SEO the other day which they had run for their client of five years. It was 30 pages long and tracked hundreds of keyphrases. I asked how this correlated to their analytics and how the traffic behaved since the client had felt that their sales were down. The SEO looked at me and said, "Umm. I don't know if they have analytics on their site. Maybe I looked at it once… I'm not sure. But I've run ranking reports for them every month and they like that." I know how alluring those ranking reports can be. I know you do work, and this is a nice little report that you can show your client or your boss that says "We're number 1 in Google for 'Blue Spandex Widgets For Sales in Wichita, KS'!!" However it's our job as an SEO to steer the conversation from the old way into a more meaningful one. If we don't, we're taking the path of least resistance and we truly aren't helping ourselves or our clients. 9. Focusing on Google Only You may have a problem that you're not aware of yet because maybe everything is going along swimmingly. Go look at your stats, right now. How much of your organic traffic comes from Google? What percentage? I know you wouldn't put all of your retirement plan in one stock so why would you put so much at risk in your current life by keeping all your eggs in one basket. Create a diverse traffic portfolio. 10. Ignoring Design I have one last bone to pick with something that a lot of people don't think of when it comes to SEO, but it fits and I'm tired of running into it. You know that website that you have? Oh, you helped design it? Yes, I see how that menu looks all cool. Flash, you don't say? Your website can say a lot about you and your brand. I know a lot of people pay a lot of good money for a site, only to have it be ugly as sin, non-functional, or not search engine friendly. This has been going on since I started working online and it's not bound to stop anytime soon but I'm pleading with you to save yourself the time and money and headache: Don't settle for or ignore your website design. Your customers aren't. Hope it will help all SEO members to create new strategy for their websites
Directory Submission is no longer work, So I think we need to stop this work, and we can do article submission and press release submission with quality work submit fresh content not copy.
Hey Friends, I want to ask for article submissions, Are they not useful today? But today almost all people concentrating on content so why this method is not useful?
Thanks for this great article now I'm waiting for your tips if you're have on top link building methods.
Thank you! I wold say that all the methods of off-page activities work, you need to be more creative and provide manual and natural works which is helpful to the society, it would help your business too.
I am completely agreed with press release informative information; by the way overall your post is too good, Thanks for sharing to all.
it is useful but we need to unique article(each content publish in only 1 article site) submission with quality content.
Focus on social media become good option for seo. Too much link building may affect your site. But try to make high PR backlinks.
Some of these things still work kinds good (Article writing/PR) buy ONLY if you release really good content and bring attention to it. I agree on many things like the link exchange and such. After all, if you're not putting our QUALITY there's no point in search engines ranking your site high. Also, you said: I think you forgot to add the things.
These are pretty impressive points that you have mentioned but I would like to add some more like Directory submission, except Yahoo directory and Dmoz, I don't think that other directory submission sites work.
I still wonder why there are so many article submissions still, but if you are writing them naturally and select where to post them, it is not old and bad practise. Select the best art directories and place properly your link and information, and that is enough to do with article submissions. And of course the press release needs news, it is pseudo news article. If you do not include any kind of news into it it simply an article. And it must reflect currently happened event.
I think Article Submission is still useful, but only if you write high quality articles for your back-link articles as well. Don't just focus on DOFOLLOW links either. Make sure you have a good balance between DOFOLLOW and NOFOLLOW.
For example, I write high quality articles on Hubpages with proper keyword research. Not only do I get a good backlink, I also get a decent amount of traffic from that Hubpages article.
I do not advertise my articles. For sites like Hubpages and Squidoo, I think the key to getting people to check out your articles is to add as many relevant tags as possible.