We are human, we make mistakes, it’s unavoidable. It is however possible to avoid certain mistakes, by practicing and refining your skills to eliminate the big ones. There will still be problems that occasionally arise, but you want to make these issues a minute possibility.

SEO is always changing, with each new search engine, with new updates and more optimization techniques and occasionally scratching the ones that worked for so long. There is nearly always a better way to do something, it just takes a bit for the improvement to come out, and in the meantime we have to stay educated and up-to-date.

Here are some things to always remember:

If there is a splash page to the website, be sure to optimize it as much as possible. Search engines generally don’t think there is any content on this page and will discard it.

Always remember the ALT tag for images. This not only helps the search engines but the visually impaired with their usability.

Using an SEO program is generally a bad idea. These can damage you in the end because many of them use old strategies, including Black Hat SEO.

Though you can make an entirely Flash website, it is still not recommended. Engines can crawl these now, but they still prefer HTML.

Of course you should know by now that you should not be Spamming websites with your links.

Use text for headings and titles absolutely as much as possible. Search engines love text over images.

Try to avoid duplicate content as much as possible. Ecommerce websites are known for their duplicate content because other sites will be selling either the same thing or something similar. If your site is content-based, there is no reason for duplicate content.

Use the Meta information for you website, but don’t overdo it with keyword stuffing, you will be penalized in your search engine ranking.

Give people just enough options to get around a site efficiently. Too many options will only confuse and frustrate.

One of the most important things to keep in mind is Google. Even if you hate that they kind of run the show, never ever ignore what they have to say about SEO. They are after all the biggest search engine out there right now, and brushing them off is SEO-suicide. However, it is important to keep guidelines in mind for everyone else as well. You don’t have to follow Google word-for-word, but you should pay attention to when they change their algorithms and such. These are the times that your strategies may become obsolete.