The Internet is full of content written primarily with search engines in mind as opposed to readers. Although some of this content may rank favourably on search results, search engine algorithms have become much better at identifying and penalising content written purely to promote better ranking. Moreover, any traffic received as a result is likely to be of poor quality and visitors are not likely to remain on your website long enough to take an action such as buy a product or register for your newsletter. In fact it can be damaging to your website in the long run. On the contrary, if you create content on your website with your customers in mind, it may take slightly longer to rank but resulting traffic will be of a higher quality and will lead to more conversions and build customer loyalty. .

Content is one of the most powerful assets for a website today and the driving forces behind the success of many websites and blogs. It is thus important to focus on quality and build brand loyalty.

Listed below are some 12 reasons why writing content for SEO can kill your website:

1. Unnatural language

Emphasis on SEO reduces the flow of content. Keyword heavy language lacks fluidity and may not make as much sense to the reader. Writing for humans on the other hand, the language will appear more natural and words will flow.

2. Poor quality of content

Content written for search engines tends to lower the quality of your content. It usually contains too many occurrences of keywords and may be treated as spam by users.

3. Less value for Readers

If you write content with your customers in mind, the content will offer more value as it addresses the user’s needs. On the other hand content written for search engines in mind offers little or no value to users.

4. Bad for branding

It can be negative for branding and reduces the overall quality of your website. Poor quality content affects how your brand is perceived by users. Content is the most important real estate for your website and there is nothing worse for your brand that poor quality content stuffed with keywords.

5. Negative impact on Website quality

Too many poor quality pages along with poor brand perception can in-turn reduce the overall quality of your website.

6. High Bounce Rate

Some of the content written primarily for Search engines may enjoy a high click through rate due to their ranking. However visitors are just as likely to leave your website fast without exploring further. Poor content quality is likely to promote poor retention and high bounce rates.

7. Low conversions

Websites that publish a lot of content to attract search engines may eventually end up with a high rank and may even be able to drive initial traffic to the website. However users may perceive the content as spam and are likely to refrain from purchasing any products or services or sign up for your newsletter.

8. Poor customer loyalty

If your website primarily consists of content written for search engines, users are less likely to boomark your site or visit again. The number of customers who visit again is likely to be low as compared to sites where content is written primarily with readers in mind. Similarly, fewer readers are likely to subscribe to your RSS feeds or email subscriptions.

9. Search engine penalties

Search engines frown upon content written primarily to attract higher ranking on search engines. Over optimisation can often lead to penalties. If this happens you risk a reduction in the ranking of your pages.

10. Higher risks in future

Search engines algorithms are constantly updated. Over the years the algorithms have become much smarter in locating content written mainly to attract higher ranking on search results. With each algorithm update, such sites are either devalued or penalised. If your content is written to target search engines only, your sites risks being penalised in future algorithm updates even if it has been overlook until now.

11. Reduced Authority and Reputation

Building your reputation and establishing your website’s authority in your niche is vital if you are serious about building a successful web presence. Publishing quality content regularly is one of the best methods to achieve this over time. Content written purely to attract search engines is often of low quality and does not contribute towards building website authority.

12. Less likely to go viral

The popularity of social media in recent years has made it essential to encourage your visitors to share your content with others. This offers many benefits including increased exposure for your website and additional back-links if visitors bookmark or share your content. Content written primarily to attract search engines is less likely to be shared or social bookmarked.

The author K.Singh is a London based Internet Consultant & Web Development Consultant with over 10 years of experience working with established multi national businesses. He is currently Director of London based Company providing  SME’s with  Web Design, Internet Marketing and Joomla Development services.