At the core of any successful website is content that audiences find useful or intriguing. Whether you provide products to the masses or your opinions to those who find them relevant, it is essential that your website contain plenty of proverbial meat that’ll attract visitors. All too often, content can make or break a website’s overall success.

Even though content remains king, there are many mistakes that can be made that not only diminish the content’s value, but potentially harm your website as well. In order to avoid making these mistakes, some research and understanding is crucial. Today, let’s look at some of the most common content mistakes that may be hurting your website’s performance in a variety of ways.

Too Many Assumptions

The great thing about targeting specific niches is the ability to really delve down deep into details. Unfortunately, not every visitor or potential customer will have an innate understanding of everything related to the topic.

All too often, brands start pinging users with jargon and overly-detailed descriptions of things they will not be able to comprehend. While a complete novice may not fully grasp even a simplified explanation, tutorial or concept, it is crucial to provide as many supplemental resources as possible – both in the content and via such things as an FAQs page.

No Calls to Action

Whether you’re selling a product, providing a service or asking for a contribution, you absolutely must be direct with your audience. One such way to do this is through calls to action. CTAs are vital in converting traffic and convincing them to do what you wish, as they make a direct pitch and help guide visitors in the right direction.

Unfortunately, many content creators fail to include calls to action in their blog posts, pages and other pitches. Because of this, the content doesn’t serve its full purpose. While it may attract initial visitors, it does not tap into the true power of content.

Bad Links (or None at All)

Another huge problem in the creation of quality content is how you create links – and who creates links back to you. Ultimately, content needs to contain links in order to both be relevant to audiences and relevant to search engines.

How do links help create better content? For starters, the associations between your website and other websites can help strengthen the legitimacy of your own. While backlinks are much more effective in this regard, merely linking to high-quality domains (assuming they are relevant to the content, of course) can provide meaningful benefit.

At the same time, pinging users with links to other sites in your content can help more effectively explain concepts, provide in-depth tutorials or simply cite where your information originates. Readers generally appreciate well-sourced content and are more likely to return in the future for additional information.

These three content mistakes are just a few examples of the many mishaps that can derail your long-term content strategy. By avoiding them, you’ll be better equipping your site for long-term success and creating better content simultaneously.