Google may be penitalizing you.
Building a website may seem easy, but there are many factors and strategies behind the scenes that result in Googles likeliness for your website. If you have built your website with a “free” builder like WIX or Squarespace, you may want to reconsider. In the long run, it’s going to cost you more than you realize. If Google is not displaying your website in search, consider that lost leads and revenue. Building a great website requires much more than sliding some images and text into a template.
Below are our three most common mistakes we see with websites, and the fact that a lot of these sites were built by “professional website agencies” is alarming to say the least.
1
Not Mobile Responsive
Every tried to access a website on a mobile device or tablet and it takes WAY longer to find the information you are looking for? That is if you even were able to find it. If you are like me, I exited the website before I even tried. There is nothing more frustrating than not being able to read or navigate a website because its no responsive. It’s not uncommon to stumble across websites like this. In fact, many companies that are multi-million dollar operations are still paying website agencies to run these almost worthless websites. Why? Good question. Maybe it’s the fact that they will have to pay for a redesign, or search for another web agency, or simple because no one has thought of the issue their website is presenting to its consumers.
Not only is it presenting a terrible user experience, Google does not like it. Nope, not one bit! In fact – they are penalizing you in search.
Having an outdated website is probably the worst thing you can have for the sake of online growth and being buddy buddy with Google.
If you want to know more ways Google is penalizing your website, we created a page dedicated to why Google doesn’t like you. You can view it here.
Poor User Experience
Many factors come into play when it comes to user experience. This could be things like how well someone can navigate your website, responsiveness (which we discussed above) and overall how well the user can find the information they are looking for on your website. Google has its eye on websites and user experience plays a major role in how your website is ranked by Google.
For instance, when you visit a website you expect it to be easy to read, navigate, and find what you are looking for. Key word, easy!
2
3
Missing Sitemap
A sitemap allows Google to understand how your website is put together. Google uses XML sitemap to access your site. Time and time again we see websites with no submitted sitemap to Google.
The problem with a missing sitemap most defiantly leads to the site being penalized or not crawled at all. When a site isn’t crawled, the content isn’t available on search.
