Disadvantages of Search Engine Optimisation
25/07/2008
Are there any disadvantages with Search Engine Optimisation?
Yes, and they are not often considered. This may be because in general a search engine optimised website is good marketing asset for any organisation, but there are disadvantages with search engine optimisation,
What are the disadvantages with getting your website Search Engine Optimised?
There are two different issues here.
Firstly there are many risks with poor search engine optimisation work (black-hat search engine optimisation), or short term search engine optimisation or over-optimisation of your website causing it to be blacklisted and actually disappear or fall in search engine visibility. There is a great risk to any website when poor search engine optimisation work is undertaken, but this is not the subject here.
The second issue are the disadvantages which come from having a highly visible website that appears near the top of the search results for many different searches. Cornish WebServices have had highly ranked website since 2003, and have firsthand experience of some of the disadvantages of having a website consistently near the top of the search engines.
List of disadvantages of search engine optimisation
1. Highly optimised websites can generate too many website visitors
High search engine rakings for keywords people search on means more visitors and a higher bandwidth which can increase hosting costs. Unless you deal with large downloads this should not be a major issue. If it is, then the real issue is more likely to be you are with an old expensive hosting contract.
This should not be a real disadvantage.
2. Highly optimised websites generate huge quantities of spam and sales calls
High search engine rakings for keywords people search on means more unwelcome visitors. Any contact forms of forum will have robots crawling them trying to auto fill them in, and the contact form must be robust to this. But the website will still receive large amounts of manually generated spam emails or sales calls.
Handling this large volume of spam and sales calls takes time and adds an admin cost to the business. This is a very real disadvantage to having a highly search engine optimised website
3. Highly optimised websites generate too many website leads or sales
This can be a major problem for highly search engine optimised websites.
There is a cost involved in handling unwanted leads - and Cornish WebServices think this is the major disadvantage of a highly search engine optimised website.
Search engine optimisation advantages
Despite the disadvantages of search engine optimisation outlined above, overall search engine optimisation is very beneficial and will usually give the highest long term return on investment. Cornish WebServices have never advertised their search engine optimisation work through paid Internet advertising - we believe that a good search engine optimisation agency should not have to!
Looking for help with Search Engine Optimisation?
Cornish WebServices have been successfully marketing websites on the Internet since 2002 (before search engine optimisation became popular). Contact us for a realistic quotation to naturally optimise your website for increased visibility in the search engines.
