People can’t choose and be pleased with your business if they can’t find it, and “finding” businesses today starts online. But SEO isn’t a one-time project. It is a long-term process that requires monitoring, tracking and keeping up with announced changes in search engine algorithms.

Fortunately, you don’t have to be an SEO expert to know how to address some of the most common SEO mistakes. Here are a few of them most common SEO mistakes that businesses make and how you can avoid or fix them.

Mistake #1: Failing to Optimize Your Google My Business Listing

If you don’t claim and optimize your Google My Business listing, you could be leaving money on the table.

Your Google My Business listing is one of the most important “advertisements” your business can have. Not only does it help your business stand out in Google search results, it gives you a tool for connecting and interacting with customers.

Google already aggregates information about your company and compiles it into a knowledge graph. When you ensure your Google My Business listing is up to date, accurate and complete, you help to positively influence Google’s estimation of your business and your website.

Mistake #2: Ignoring Title Tags and Meta Descriptions

Don’t take title tags and meta descriptions for granted. Title tags must be unique on every page and should be around 60 characters long. Don’t include your website name in every title tag – only include it in the title tags for your homepage, “about” page, contact page and other generic web pages.

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Meta description tags should be unique and concisely sum up the content on the page. Don’t stuff meta descriptions with keywords, and make them about 25 words long for best results.

Website nuts and bolts such as title tags make a difference to your SEO.

Mistake #3: Not Regularly Posting Original High-Quality Content

Regularly posting new, original high-quality content provides actual value to your website visitors – your customers and potential customers. Develop a strategy to ensure you cover blog topics with a healthy balance of keywords and topics of interest to your visitors.

But don’t stuff content with keywords hoping it will help your SEO; it won’t. By adding new content regularly, you will keep visitors coming back. Also, Google indexes all of the pages on your site, so more is better – it helps raise your position in search engine results.

Mistake #4: Failing to Track SEO Performance

You have to monitor and fine-tune SEO over the long term.

What works today for optimizing your SEO may not work six months from now. Search engine algorithms change and other websites in your industry come and go. Readily available tools such as Google Analytics can help you learn where your SEO efforts fall short and where they perform best, but you have to use these tools and act on what the data tells you to make progress.

Your online reputation depends on multiple factors, including customer reviews, social media and your responsiveness to customers online. SEO is another critical factor in your online reputation, and ignoring SEO it will damage it. Strong search engine performance is what helps people find and choose your business. If you are ready to improve your online reputation, download our free “5-Step Guide to Improving Your Online Reputation” eBook.