If your website doesn’t appear in Google search results, the problem doesn’t lie in algorithms or competition. The problem lies in mistakes you make every day without even knowing it. Website SEO is not magic, but a precise process where every mistake costs you customers, traffic, and search engine position. In 2025, Google is more demanding than ever, and strategies from two years ago can now do more harm than good. Below you’ll find seven critical mistakes that destroy your website’s visibility and specific instructions on how to fix them.

1. Lack of a well-thought-out keyword strategy

The most common positioning mistakes start at the phrase selection stage. Many entrepreneurs choose keywords intuitively without conducting any analysis. Typical situation: you run a construction company and optimize your site for the general phrase “construction services,” ignoring long phrases like “renovation company Bydgoszcz center” or “construction crew for attic conversion.” Meanwhile, it’s precisely these detailed queries that generate traffic with high purchase intent.

The second problem is ignoring user intent. Someone typing “how much does a bathroom renovation cost” is looking for information, not a sales offer. If you direct them to a sales page without any educational content, the bounce rate will be high, and Google will interpret this as a signal that your site doesn’t meet user needs.

How to fix this? Start with tools like Google Keyword Planner, Ahrefs, or Senuto. Analyze search volume, phrase competitiveness, and their intent. Focus on long-tail keywords that have less competition but higher conversion. If you operate locally, include geographic phrases – positioning in Bydgoszcz requires optimization for phrases containing the city name and districts. Create a keyword map assigned to specific subpages: product categories, blog articles, service pages. Each subpage should be optimized for one main phrase and several of its semantic variants.

2. Page loads slower than competition

Loading speed is one of Google’s direct ranking factors. If your site loads longer than three seconds, you lose half of users before they even see the content. Core Web Vitals – metrics measuring the speed of displaying the largest element, interactivity, and visual stability – directly affect position in search results.

A common problem is unoptimized images. Many companies upload heavy graphics straight from the camera to their site. Another performance killer is excess plugins in WordPress that load scripts on every subpage, even when not needed there. Added to this are uncompressed CSS and JavaScript files and lack of cache mechanisms.

How to fix this? Start with a test in Google PageSpeed Insights. The tool will point out specific problems and give recommendations. Compress all images to WebP format, which while maintaining quality weighs significantly less than JPG or PNG. Use lazy loading, so images load only when the user scrolls the page to that section. Limit the number of plugins to minimum and disable those that aren’t crucial. Implement browser cache and consider using CDN, a network of geographically distributed servers that speeds up content delivery. If you don’t have technical knowledge, invest in hosting optimized for speed – the difference between standard hosting and a dedicated server can be colossal.

3. Ignoring mobile optimization

Over 60% of internet traffic comes from mobile devices, and Google has been using mobile-first indexing for years, which means your site’s mobile version is the basis for evaluation. If the site displays poorly on a smartphone, it doesn’t matter how well it works on a computer – your position will drop.

Typical problems are buttons too small to tap with a finger, text requiring zooming, elements overlapping each other, and menus that don’t work properly on small screens. It also often happens that contact forms are illegible or require horizontal scrolling, which irritates users and leads to high bounce rates.

How to fix this? Test your site in Google Mobile-Friendly Test. The tool will show whether the site is responsive and point out specific problems. Make sure all interface elements are large enough – the minimum size of a clickable area is 48×48 pixels. Check if text is readable without zooming – the recommended font size is minimum 16 pixels. Optimize the menu for mobile devices, preferably using a so-called hamburger menu that doesn’t take up the entire screen. Check how forms work – fields should automatically switch the keyboard to the appropriate type (e.g., numeric for phone number). Remember that mobile users are impatient – every additional step in the form filling process increases the risk of abandoning the site.

4. Chaotic content structure and lack of headings

Google analyzes your content structure to understand its hierarchy and subject matter. If you publish long articles without division into sections, without H2 and H3 headings, you make it difficult for search engine robots to understand what you’re writing about. Users also won’t read a wall of text – they’ll scan the page with their eyes and if they don’t quickly find what they’re looking for, they’ll leave.

A common mistake is using headings only for visual formatting, without logical structure. You see text bolded in a larger font and think it’s a heading, but in HTML code it’s not marked as H2 or H3, just as a regular paragraph with CSS. For Google, this doesn’t exist as a heading. Another problem is omitting keywords in headings – it’s precisely they that signal to the search engine what a given text fragment is about.

How to fix this? Every article or subpage must have one H1 heading that contains the main keyword and precisely defines the topic. Then divide the text into logical sections marked with H2 headings that describe individual issues. If a section is more complex, use H3 for further division. Example: an article about renovations can have H1 “Comprehensive renovation guide for apartment owners,” H2 “How to plan a bathroom renovation,” H3 “Choosing materials,” H3 “Estimating costs.” Remember that headings should naturally contain keywords and their synonyms, but without artificial stuffing. Users should be able to scan just the table of headings and understand what the entire text is about.

5. Poor internal linking or its complete absence

Internal linking is the foundation of a site’s information architecture. It helps Google understand which subpages are most important and how they’re related to each other. If you publish articles that don’t link to each other or to service pages, you’re wasting huge SEO potential. Every published piece of content should strengthen other subpages through thoughtful links.

SEO mistakes regarding internal linking are primarily using general anchor texts like “click here” or “read more.” Such anchors give Google no information about where the link leads. Another problem is lack of logical structure – you link randomly, without thinking about which pages need positioning support.

How to fix this? In each article, include at least three to five internal links leading to thematically related content. Use descriptive anchor texts containing keywords – instead of “click here” write “check our guide on choosing a renovation company.” Focus on strengthening pages that are most important to you business-wise – if you want to sell a specific service, link to it from many blog articles. Create a silo structure, meaning group thematically related articles and link them together, creating cohesive thematic centers. Regularly audit your internal link structure using tools like Screaming Frog, which will show you which subpages are “orphaned” and have no links leading to them from other places in the site.

6. Content duplication and keyword cannibalization

Content duplication is a situation where identical or very similar texts appear on several subpages of your site or are copied from other sources. Google then doesn’t know which version to promote and often doesn’t index such pages at all. A particularly common problem is online stores where product descriptions are copied from manufacturers and repeated on dozens of stores online.

Keyword cannibalization, on the other hand, is a situation where several of your subpages compete for the same key phrase. Google doesn’t know which one to promote, so both achieve worse positions than one well-optimized page could achieve. Example: you have two articles about bathroom renovations, both optimized for “bathroom renovation Bydgoszcz” – instead of two strong positions you have two weak ones.

How to improve site visibility in such a case? First check if you have duplication problems using tools like Copyscape or Siteliner. If you find duplicated content, rewrite it completely or use the canonical tag, which will indicate to Google which version is original. In the case of online stores, ensure unique product descriptions – don’t copy from manufacturers, write your own, taking into account the specifics of your offer and customer needs. To detect cannibalization, analyze in Google Search Console which pages display for the same phrases. If you discover cannibalization, decide which page is most important and consolidate content – combine weaker articles into one strong material, setting 301 redirects from old URLs. Alternatively, you can differentiate keywords so that each subpage targets a different phrase or its long-tail variant.

7. Neglecting local SEO for brick-and-mortar businesses

If you run a business that serves customers in a specific location and don’t have an optimized Google Business Profile, you’re losing a huge portion of potential traffic. Google increasingly promotes local results, displaying them at the very top of the results page – above organic links. Lack of presence in this place means your competitors are taking customers who are looking for services nearby.

SEO 2025 mistakes in the local context are primarily an incomplete business profile, lack of current photos, irregular responses to reviews, and ignoring local key phrases in site content. If your business appears in Maps but doesn’t have current opening hours or photos, users will choose competition that looks more professional.

How to fix this? Create and fully complete your Google Business Profile – add exact address, opening hours, phone number, website, and service categories. Regularly publish photos of your office, team, completed projects – Google promotes active profiles. Collect reviews from customers and definitely respond to them, both positive and negative. This is a signal to the algorithm that the company is active and cares about customer relationships. In site content, weave in natural local phrases – instead of “we offer renovation services” write “we offer comprehensive renovation services in Bydgoszcz and surrounding areas.” Create dedicated subpages for individual districts or nearby towns if you also operate there. Ensure NAP (Name, Address, Phone) consistency – your contact details must be identical everywhere: on the site, in Google Business Profile, in business directories. Any discrepancies can lower your visibility in local results.

Do you need help fixing SEO mistakes?

Positioning is not a list of tricks, but systematic work on every element of the site. If you see that you’re making any of the described mistakes and don’t know where to start fixing them, contact me. I’ll conduct a detailed audit of your site, point out all problems blocking visibility, and propose a specific action plan that will restore your site to the top of search results.