Give Your Website a Super Sweet and Spooky SEO Costume

To clarify right outta the gate, if you’re looking for tips on how to dress like an SEO professional for Halloween, this ain’t that kind of post. To access that information you can follow this link or this link.

But I don’t suggest you dress like an SEO professional for Halloween anyway. Not unless the party’s in Blahtown and they’re having a Lame theme. Remember how you dressed in college? Yeah, that’s what I look like on the reg. You can do better.

So what’s this post actually about then?

You’re right, let’s get to the task at hand. It’s Halloween so naturally your top priority is finding that show-stopping costume for the big party. Everyone’s gonna be there. Your boss. Your friends. That sexy co-worker you’ve been scouting for a few months now.

So you wanna look good. Real good. It’s understandable.

But all this thinking about costumes has distracted you from your small business. And what your small business needs is to generate more web traffic so potential customers and clients can learn about your products and services. Otherwise that small business becomes a tiny business. And then your tiny business becomes a memory.

Luckily, that hasn’t happened yet. But it could. So to generate more web traffic for your still healthy small business you’ve been studying search engine optimization tips. As you’re a pretty quick learner, you’re confident you can skip hiring an SEO expert and just do it yourself.

You’re not alone there. Nor will you be alone in wondering what’s under-optimizing it, what’s over-optimizing it, and what’s optimizing it just right.

We’re here to help you with that. And we might even give you a few things to consider as you put the finishing touches on that super sweet and spooky Halloween costume of yours. Party on, small business owner!

Knowing when you’re under-optimizing your website

No matter what Halloween party you attend, it’s inevitable that at least one slacker will be there. You know who I’m talking about – the dude who looks like he came straight from work. The dude who insists that he’s dressed like an SEO professional.

But he’s fooling no one. Not even your friend’s cousin Tina, the notorious drunk who believes just about anything. You see, everyone else spent countless hours and dollars piecing together a costume worthy of the runway, and this inconsiderate clown showed up in jeans and immediately asked where the drinks were at, before shifting his attention to trying out lines on Tina.

Not cool. And it’s not cool if your website looks like that either.

How do you know if your website is dressed like an SEO pro? Do you have the same optimized page title for every page? Then you’re no different than the SEO pro who wears the same sneakers and jeans to work everyday. Is your site lacking optimized web content that describes your products or services? Then you’re just like the SEO pro who’s never heard of socks. Do you even have a sitemap? Well, the SEO pro doesn’t have a car.

Knowing when you’re over-optimizing your website

Sure, you’ll get mad props from the crew for showing up in a dazzling costume. But you don’t wanna be the one who looks like they’ve been plotting their costume since August. Nor do you want to look like you took Friday off work to get your hair, makeup, and nails did up by a professional.

Indeed, you’re better off dressing up like an SEO pro. So how do you know when you’ve gone over-board? Did you stuff every keyword imaginable in your metadata? Is your optimized web content just senseless streams of those same keywords? And are 76 percent of those keywords linking internally to other pages? Did you give 50 bills to some shady link farm for 2500 inbound links?

Then I hate to break it to you, but your costume isn’t that sweet. In fact, the same people you aimed to impress (Mr. Google and Mrs. Bing) are actually laughing at you in the corner. So tone it down some.

Knowing when your website is optimized just right

Many times the difference between a super sweet costume and a flop is negligible. A great costume takes some creativity and thoughtful consideration, but it’s immediately clear that its creator didn’t obsess over it for months. Similarly, it looks like some money went into, though it wasn’t so great an investment that credit cards were maxed out. It just looks and feels right.

The same is true for a well-optimized website. The metadata is clean and succinct, aiming more to aid human users than to persuade search engines. The optimized web copy is also clean, compelling and informational. (For more tips on that, here’s a guide to writing optimized web content.) And while it contains some targeted keywords, they are sprinkled about naturally and never disrupt the overall flow. Similarly, there is some keyword rich anchor text, but it too is there to enhance the user experience, not to fool search engines.

So now you know. And because your website has such a super sweet and spooky SEO costume, everyone else at the party loves it. In fact, they like it so much they even link to it. And it quickly becomes clear that yours is the best costume at the party. Yup, you’re officially No. 1 in the rankings. And that’s always a good thing. So party on, small business owner. You deserve it.