The modern internet is now about twenty years old. The internet certain goes back longer than that, but the web, the graphical HTML-based internet of which we are all familiar is about twenty years old.
I have been building websites and doing online market for about 17 of those years. Like everyone, the one consistent thing has been change. What we used to do to get a website noticed will now get your website relegated to obscurity. Every few months brings incremental changes in best practices.
Here are some old ideas that are just plain bad practices now. If you are doing them, stop. If someone suggests them as viable online marketing strategies run, don’t walk away.
“It’s all about tags” Tags are basically hidden website code, visible only at the code level of your website. Some tags, like alt tags for graphics are essential. Other tags like the Meta Keyword tags are useless these days. As things considered, however, and you’re efforts are better spent working on your content.
“Link farms or automated linking software” Links to your website are still very important. That said, buying them, trading them or creating them using automated software are sure to get you noticed—in a bad way. I always tell my clients that Google has 60,000 or so very smart people working to make sure that website searches and online content is relevant, appropriate and safe. Don’t for an instance imagine than a small software company or agency can outsmart Google for very long.
“I have some secret software / information.” Mhmm. So, if I had some awesome software or information that was only available to me, why would I share it. I’d go ahead and make mountains of money for myself. It just doesn’t make any sense. Sure, there are great online marketing software packages, many costing several hundred dollars. That said, there is a huge amount of garbage of very suspicious value. If you start to hear words like “exclusive”, “secret”, “revolutionary” or “limited” put on your thinking cap as there is likely to be a scam for you to discover!Watch movie online The Transporter Refueled (2015)
“There is nothing you can do.” This is perhaps the worst advice you will ever receive. Almost without exception a lack of effort equals failure. At Kona Impact we have taken neglected websites with almost no visibility and made them top five for many important key words. It can be done. It’s not magic. Effort is essential.
Online marketing takes effort and perseverance. If you don’t have time to learn, then plan on hiring some help. Gone are the days when you could ignore your online presence or rely on an old, outdated website. It’s much more complex than that. For those who do well, their business will grow.