Quick Links
Are you worried about the future of SEO?
A lot of people are.
Every time Google changes their algorithm, or releases a new “animal” update, the industry panics and it can seem like the world of SEO is doomed forever.
Let me tell you a secret — It’s not over. And it will never be. But I’m going to show you how you can stay safe while doing SEO.
In fact, Google recently announced they are no longer going to penalize algorithmically for links!
With that said, there are still a few things you will want to look out for and best practices to follow.
Let’s get into it…
The History Of Google Updates
One way to predict the future of SEO is to reflect on the past:
When Panda came out in 2011, the industry got together, figured it out and bounced back better than ever.
When Penguin came out in 2012 , the industry banded together again, figured it out and bounced back better than ever.
Every time there has been an update, we as an SEO community have grown stronger and safer.
The job of Google is to try and combat spam. But with 3+ billion pages of content out there, they have to use fairly large strokes and go after the “big” mistakes that SEOs are abusing.
If they get too aggressive, they will get too many false-positives and wipe out a bunch of “good” sites. This still happens from time to time, so Google has to be cautious.
It is very easy to stay safe in a post-Panda, post-Penguin world.
Why Right Now is the Best Time for SEO EVER
- Google has already come up with their major broad strokes to eliminate old school tactics (this means less competition for the rest of us).
- Google has successfully scared many other SEOs out of business.
- As an SEO community, we’ve sat down, looked at the data and came up with strategies that are going to help you establish long term rankings safely.
Currently we’re ranking sites safer and smarter than ever before.
How We’re Preparing For The Future:
There are lots of no-name, fly-by-night SEO services out there with all kinds of screenshots of crazy rankings. Yes, anyone with Photoshop can make those.
But how many of these companies stick around over the years?
You see, we’ve been HOTHing since before 2010, and in the world of SEO, that’s a lifetime!
We’ve not only survived the biggest updates in Google history (Panda & Penguin), but we’ve actually grown.
We stay up to date on EVERYTHING Google and tweak our products ahead of the curve so you know exactly what’s going on. (Check out our massive Guide To Google Update History ).
Over the last few years, Google has basically gone after 3 things that only purely SEOs would do.
If you avoid these mistakes correctly, you will be in the clear:
Avoid These 3 SEO Basics to Stay Safe While Doing SEO
1. On-Site Over Optimization
This used to just mean keyword stuffing, but that ended a long time ago. Now the focus is making sure that your keywords fit naturally onto your page and are not unnaturally used.
How to avoid this: Don’t repeat your main keywords over and over. Use natural language, use lots of variation and synonyms.
2. Off-Site Over Optimization
The Penguin algorithm update targeted off-site over-optimization. To avoid this, make sure to diversify your anchor text as much as possible.
Google keeps tweaking the dial on what is acceptable in terms of anchor text ratios, but essentially you want to make sure you are not building too many exact-match anchors.
How to avoid this: Build links with diverse anchor text to keep your profile looking natural. Check out our article on anchor text diversity here .
*The good thing is that the HOTH gives you lots of opportunities to diversify your anchors. You don’t even have to use any exact match anchors with us – many of our customers use our link building services for anchor text diversity.
3. Outted Blog Networks
Google goes after big blog networks and de-indexes them, like My Blog Guest, PostJoint, and a few others over the past few years.
How to avoid this: Simple. Don’t use big blog networks to link directly to your money site. The good thing is, 体育娱乐十大平台 does not use any blog network, and none of our products rely on a PBN.
Instead, consider investing in safer link strategies like blogger outreach .
So there you have it, the 3 things that Google is going after. If you can avoid these things, you’ll be in a very good place for massive SEO growth.
Questions? Let us know in the comments!
Good Read! Thanks guys
Hey Guys,
Great article. I read a lot of material from so-called “SEO Experts” and you really made me feel good about your company with this single article. I mix with some pretty awesome SEOs and we all agree on the exact 3 topics you’ve dropped to the masses right here. You’re right on the money and this article proves to me that you guys are Pros. Keep up the great work!
Rank’em.
~Jim
In short, add value to the search query and you will be fine. For example, I have PBN’s that are ranking quite regularly on page 1. Why? Because they have great content, don’t look half bad, and people can get their query answered. The fact that they power up money sites make them a win-win for me and the visitor.
Love this post and good to know about the pbn. The problem is how can I tell if a link is from PBN? By the way I enjoy the newsletter and always click the link to read more. Hoth rocks!
Sam
Great to know the Hoth is here to keep us up-to-date with all things SEO .. thanks guys
Makes a lot of sense. Is it also important to make sure you are building something of value to your customers to stay safe long term?
Yes
I am not a techno. I have worked on a website creating content without knowing anything about this important stuff or how to do it. I am beginning to understand the importance of keywords and the need for links because the language of Hoth is understandable – not technical terms that mean something simple. More power to your arm Hoth. Thanks
Personly I love this post and other post int this blog, so much articles that open my mind what’s really to do in SEO specially for 2017.
I can implement this strategy for my own blog and my clients.
Thank for all of your posts.
I’m new to blogging and this might be a stupid question, but what is “PBN?”
It stands for Private Blog Network, a network of blogs owned by someone.
Hi. Great post and great web site. Can I ask. Would a multi page directory be considered as a PBN.
Thanks and looking forward to your next email.
Thanks for putting the info out there. I feel like the top organic ecommerce rankers are the top advertisers in google. Could this be true? And if my ad budget is not in the millions will I never rank for ecommerce products? I currently bottom feed on ad strategies. Would love to hear more on this as it relates to product SEO. How do you get products to rank?
Running Adwords doesn’t influence Google organic rankings.
Its a competitive age of blogging and in which you are just superb. Keep going. Also we are the Men’s Clothing Manufacturer. Our Online Store name is Zobello. Please visit once. Thanks…
We still use some guest blogging. I realize that some guest posting sites are not good, but does anyone have thought on guest posting in general? Good or Bad?
We use guest posting all the time and it works great.
Great aarticle
My blog is 8 months old with over 90 unique, quality articles of 1500+ words each. For the last 3 months, I’ve had 0 growth and been stuck at 4k unique visitors per month. What the heck is going on?
Hi Dave, there are a handful of different variables that could be causing the stagnant growth. Best thing to do is to schedule a meeting with one of our SEO account managers and they might be able to point you in the right direction.
Well said Hoth, Thanks for the tips.. How can i start using your services?
Glad your excited for our services! Simply sign up for a HOTH account. Once your in your member portal you’ll be able to purchase any product you’d like.
What percentage of exact anchors do you guys use? Or do you leave that up to your client to decide?
If we get the opportunity we do mostly benign or branded to keep the diversity high. The best thing to do is look at what the anchor text ratios of your top competitors look like per that keyword and model it.
Thank you for the clean, concise list. TL;DR for longterm success – Create natural, user-friendly content and promote it in a natural way 🙂
Great post guys!
I am a small business owner and have become disillusioned with SEO companies that claim to get you results and never deliver. I have tried 6 companies and have been happy to take my hard earned money but none have delivered results.So i gave up and giving it a crack myself even though its all still way over my head. I find your articles insightful and helpful..thanks!
Thanks for the on site & off site 3 SEO tips , really helpful for my website .
Now I got real things about SEO. Thank You guys you provide latest SEO strategies. All other site write that repeat your main keywords over and over for ranking and Hoth write that avoid this. I think Hoth is right. Thanks again.
Absolutely. Keyword stuffing may have worked in the past but today it’s a way to get penalized. Too many people still do it though.
I agree that this is definitely the best time to be in SEO as Google has weeded out the companies that don’t really know what they’re doing just buying Fiverr gigs and getting sites deindexed with foreign spammy links that have nothing to do with the intended site. See what the big boys are doing and model it, good advice…good article.
Fantastic, thanks a lot for your comment Levi!
Waooo… It was a great article. Yes, I know previously one used to stuff keywords in meta details as well as in content. But now this practice doesn’t work.
It was done by most people once upon a time…but now we all have way better content to read 😉
I get so much spam from vendors and other companies in the business. 体育娱乐十大平台 emails are the only ones I actually read, and I don’t even mind multiple emails from you guys on the daily. Thanks for good info on a consistent basis.
That’s so awesome to hear Heath, thanks a ton for reading our posts and giving us your feedback! We love knowing that the info that we put out is helping.
Nicely summarized, guys! Well Done!
Thanks!
Yeah, that was a great concise and to the point article, thanks loved it!
Good article. One question though – in a “Non-Seo” world, or according to how Google would say things should be – all of your links would be coming from other websites – NOT link building. If that were the case, you would have no control over the anchor text of those links – you would be at the mercy of every person who linked to your site – and what anchor text they used.
Why does anchor text matter so much if theoretically you would have no control over what anchor text was in those links? Thanks for any insight!
Great question. The anchor text guidelines that exist are based in 1. What actually works for ranking and 2. What is seen as a “natural” anchor text profile by Google.
So what can we do? We can ask, “How do people naturally select anchor text?” The answer is: a wide variety of text will be used, but a portion of anchors will likely contain one or more of the words in the target keyword.
So, we advise that anchor text from authority sites to yours contain the target keyword, while anchor text from lower authority sites contain a variety of less optimized text. That way, you avoid being over-optimized, and you indicate to Google that the authority sites are linking to you because your site’s topic matches the target keyword in the anchor text.
Hope that answers your question! Cheers.
I’m glad you guys stay on top of things and actually test things out. I try to stay current on Google updates, but it can be hard to keep up sometimes.
Hey Steve, thanks for the kind words. We are always here to help!
Just follow their rules and do the best you can for your audience. In long run you never get headache or penalize by Google. For short plan, get traffic from social networks which work best for your niche like Facebook, Instagram, Quora, Reddit, Youtube.
Great article Steve, thanks for the concise insight. Question, do you use the disavow tool at all anymore?
Thank you for the concise insight Clayton… Question, do you use the disavow tool at all anymore?
Thanks for sharing what actually IS STILL POSSIBLE.
While many german online marketers are declaring SEO as dead and constantly pronouncing what is NOT working, i am honestly smiling at what every USA based SEO like you guys have to say. This luckily is the truth. Thanks for your spirit and sharing how to crush the game nowadays and in the future. Cheers from Munich, Timo
I completly agree with Timo above. Iam from Germany aswell and its nice to read what still works and how you can crush every competitor, especially in Germany. Doing SEO myself for local companies i always find great success in ranking their websites by following some of the strategies you mentioned above.
Greetings,
Andre
Thanks for that great article! I am doing seo for many customers so i also check to stay safe and looking in the future and the next possible google updates. I have some projects in which i got negative spam links from outside. So anyone built spam links on some customers site and the rankings dropped down. What can i do against it if i got bad links from someone else?
Thank you very much!
It was good that the update punished the blog networks. The update has forced a big change for many SEOs. But I think white-hat-seo is the better and longer-term method.
Thanks for that great insides! I am doing seo for many customers so i also check to stay safe and looking in the future and the next possible google updates. I have some projects in which i got negative spam links from outside. So anyone built spam links on some customers site and the rankings dropped down. What can i do against it if i got bad links from someone else?
White-hat SEO is simply the more sustainable SEO. With some black-hat tactics, you may be able to boost your ranking quickly, but the chance of being penalised is definitely much higher. That’s why it’s also good that the blog networks were punished. Thanks for the good contribution.
I regularly work a lot with SEO and for this reason I read this interesting technical article. I read this article with enthusiasm. Thanks to https://www.thehoth.com/ . Keep up the good work.
Espespecially over-optimization Turns Out to be a Problem as what worked Last year now seems to hurt. Like Keywords in headings and Alt-tags. Has someone Else also Problems after inserting too much Images with Keywords alt Tags?