diff --git a/crawl4ai/utils.py b/crawl4ai/utils.py
index 61d1e333..b5736ad8 100644
--- a/crawl4ai/utils.py
+++ b/crawl4ai/utils.py
@@ -441,6 +441,10 @@ def get_content_of_website_optimized(url: str, html: str, word_count_threshold:
     
     image_description_min_word_threshold = kwargs.get('image_description_min_word_threshold', IMAGE_DESCRIPTION_MIN_WORD_THRESHOLD)
 
+    for tag in kwargs.get('excluded_tags', []) or []:
+        for el in body.select(tag):
+            el.decompose()
+        
     if css_selector:
         selected_elements = body.select(css_selector)
         if not selected_elements: