When I first started out doing web design work I only focused on the design. I did not think ahead how to prepare the site for promotion until I had finished the actual design.
I think a lot of web designers still think and act this way…they build the site first then think about the marketing aspect later.
This is a big mistake!
A web designer should build elements within the design making it easier to attract search engine traffic.
16 elements web site designers should include in their designs:
1. Create search engine friendly pages
Each web page should contain your targeted keyword phrases. Your search engine rankings will increase in proportion to the number of content pages. Other factors that contribute to search engine friendly pages are included below.
2. Include a site map
Creating a sitemap allows search engine spiders to index your whole website from one page. Make sure your site map page links to all your internal pages and update it whenever you add a new page.
Sitemaps will also help visitors navigate your site because they can view all the pages from one source.
3. Redirect non www pages to www pages.
Non www pages (ie http://domain.com, domain.com) should be redirected to www pages (ie http://www.domain.com).
Search engines will view your site as having duplicate pages if this is not done. Learn how to correct this by reading my article titled:
How to Avoid Duplicate Content
4. Link all internal pages to home page using absolute URLs
Using absolute URLS in all your web pages will help create back links to your web site. Increasing the number of back links both from within your site and from other sites will help boost your search engine rankings. Search engines such as Goggle rank web sites based on how many links are pointing to your site.
5. Place content near the top of the page
Search engines spider the content that comes first in your source code. This can easily be done using cascading style sheets.
Read my article titled:
Web Page Accessibility – Placing Content First With CSS
Be sure to also place your web copy at the top or first on the page. Don’t insert your images first and web copy after it because search engines don’t spider images.
7. Design with the latest technologies
Web designers need to constantly update the technologies they use to design web sites. Most modern designs now use xhtml and css because it cuts down on the amount of code to build the web site. This reduces the load times and also allows search engines spiders to easily index your site.
8. Validate all pages for correct html/xhtml/css
Correctly coded web pages have better chances of being spidered because they are following correct the web standards. Run all your web pages through an html validator. All web pages should include the doc type tag so they render properly.
Thousands of new web sites appear online everyday. Search engines are getting smarter so creating a cleanly coded web site will protect yourself for the future.
Very helpful. Thanks.
Being that we already happen to be talking about things in the ball park of
16 Elements Web Site Designers Should Include, Almost every web creation software spins out reams of junk code. This really clutters up your web pages and makes them slow to load. When a search engine spider visits your website, it has to navigate through all that clutter – and that might affect your rankings.
Great post. I’m dealing with some of these issues as well..