How many of these top 5 SEO mistakes are you unknowingly making? 

Search Engine Optimization can do wonders for companies small and large. Being at the top of search engine results can give your business a boost both from a social proof perspective and drive more traffic to your website, where you can impress them.

It’s even more critical in regulated industries where promotional prospects are limited.

Search Engine Optimization, or SEO, is a digital marketing tactic that can help new users interested in your niche in front of your website. It involves optimizing both the content and tags on your website and optimizing links pointing from other websites to yours, also called backlinks. These pieces, on-site and off-site SEO, are essential to achieve your search engine optimization goals.

But there are many mistakes to be made along the way.

Search Engine Optimization can be an expensive and time-consuming affair, but it doesn’t have to be. Yes, if you’re starting with a relatively new website, it will undoubtedly take time, but you will optimize your site for success by considering the points in this article.

Here are the top 5 SEO Mistakes a (legal) cannabis or psychedelics company can make.

1. Not doing anything about SEO in the first place

SEO isn’t the sexiest form of marketing out there, and optimizing your site may not provide instantaneous results. That’s why cannabis and psychedelics companies so often make the mistake of overlooking SEO. But in such a regulated environment, it’s critical. We know, we know – budgets can be tight for companies in the cannabis or psychedelics space. But it can pay off in the long-term since there is no paid ad spend with SEO, unlike banner ads and other ways you might try to get in front of potential customers.

2. Content is too thin or not lengthy enough

Studies continue to show that the pages making up top search results on Google tend to have higher word counts than other pages that don’t make the search results – even more than 1,000 words. But in addition to the length of the content, quality matters. It’s a delicate balance between providing relevant, fulsome information to help you rank on Google while not providing mindless filler content that is just going to make users leave or “bounce,” from the site right after landing on it.

3. Overlooking either on-site or off-site SEO

At its core, SEO has two main components: on-site SEO and off-site SEO. Both are important to ensure your website moves closer to the top of the search engine results. On-site SEO refers to optimizing the titles, tags, and content in a way that is both easily readable to your visitors and indicates to Google that you have rich and relevant content to share with the world. Off-site SEO is when you generate links from external websites, also called backlinks. An SEO strategy that focuses on one to the exclusion of the other may not.

4. Awful website = SEO disaster

When we say “bad” website, it could be one of several small things that can put a damper on your SEO efforts. First: Site speed. Internet connectivity has done leaps and bounds on speed since the dial-up age, and if your site speed just doesn’t cut it, potential customers will just lead. That in turn can lead to high “bounce rates” (remember that first word?), meaning the rate at which visitors leave your site right after landing on it. And Google does not like high bounce rates, which at least indirectly affects your ranking results.

Other causes of high bounce rates can include – frankly – ugly websites or websites that lack straightforward navigation and websites with too many distractions, such as pop-ups. You want to not only bring visitors to your website – you want them to stay there.

5. Not targeting long-tail keywords

Website owners use SEO to improve their search engine rankings and often have set their sights on one or two broad keywords or keyword phrases they want to target. For example, a sneaker store may be the biggest purveyor of red shoes in the city, and they might attempt to improve their rankings for the term “red shoe.” However, since this keyword is broad and returns many results, it may be challenging to rank on the first page, let alone in the top 3 results for that term. But owners often overlook “long-tail keywords,” which are more specific keywords with fewer results, but in turn, are easier to rank for.

One can make countless other mistakes with SEO, including over-optimizing your site, such as when your page’s content mentions your target keyword(s) too many times. it seems like a bit of an art and a science – that’s because it is. You want to ensure your website looks and reads naturally to visitors, maximum accessibility and readability while also providing all SEO principles are taken into account.

Call us. We can help you correct or avoid making SEO mistakes.

We have an SEO Audit tool on the Alan Aldous website, and we invite you to run your website through that. Also, if at any time you think you may need more assistance with SEO, don’t hesitate to call us at 1-647-696-0645