How can low quality SEO content harm your website?

Creating content for your website can be an integral part of your Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) strategy. SEO is all about securing visitors to your website by increasing your website’s visibility online, through securing top rankings on the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs), and improving click through rates to your website. As part of this, optimising your website for keywords relevant to your industry, products or services is essential, and content can help you do this. However, it’s essential to note that search engines like Google use algorithms to rank and judge websites in accordance with their own standards. The quality of the content is one such ranking factor, and as such, it’s important for your website content to be high quality, original and authentic. But how can low quality SEO content harm your website? And how can your business avoid low quality content?

What is low quality SEO content?

So first of all, what is low quality SEO content? Well, this is a broad umbrella that can include a number of different aspects, including:

• Using negative SEO practices- keyword stuffing, spam content and low level AI content can all be used to carry out negative SEO practices and to create SEO spam. This can initially drive a website through the rankings, but will be penalised in the long run.
• Plagiarised content- content that is copied directly from another source counts as low quality SEO. While the content might fit for your website, and include the right keywords, the content will not rank as highly as the original, and your website will suffer.
• Content that is not informative or relevant- filling your website with as much content as possible is not a good option for your SEO. If your website ranks for keywords that are not relevant to your business, this can cause a negative user experience, an increased bounce rate, and penalisation in the future.

How can low quality SEO content harm your website?

So, how exactly does low quality SEO content harm your website or your brand online? Well, there can be a number of different consequences for content that is low quality, including:

• A negative user experience 
• Search engine penalisation
• Damage to company brand and reputation

Low quality SEO content can result in a negative user experience

One of the biggest problems that low quality SEO content can cause is a negative user experience. If your content is stuffed with keywords, errors, misinformation and irrelevant details, not only will it not help your potential customers or clients find the information they need, this will also fail to engage your users. As a result, they are more likely to simply leave your website and turn to a competitor. 

Low quality SEO content will be penalised by Google

As outlined earlier, search engines use a range of algorithms to determine where to rank a website or company on the index, and will actively penalise websites that use low quality SEO content. This will reduce the visibility of the website on the SERP, and as such, your website will receive less traffic.

Low quality SEO content causes damage to company brand and reputation

Finally, using low quality SEO content can have a detrimental impact on the reputation of your business and this can make it much harder for your business to succeed in future. 

How can your company avoid low quality SEO content?

There are a number of ways that businesses can avoid low quality SEO content, including:

• Developing a thorough SEO strategy
• Investigating and researching keywords 
• Providing valuable content to website users
• Working with a professional SEO team

Here at Pumpkin Web Design. We are Preston’s leading web design and web marketing professionals, and we provide a wide range of website solutions and SEO services across Preston and the North West, from Southport to Wigan, and even Manchester. We work with a wide range of companies and businesses, in a variety of sectors, so why not get in touch today?