Website Optimization For Search Engines (SEO)

How and why to have your website designed with search engine optmization built in.

There is a simple answer to why you need your website design to incorporate SEO, it is  so search engines know how to find your website and the products or services you are offering..

You can have the most beautiful graphic design in the world, and having the fastest webhosting your money can buy - all on top of streaming video, flash animations, and all the bells and whistles possible.  But if search engines can't read or understand your website  - they won't know how to rank it in their listings. If they don't rank it, potential customers and clients won't be able to find it..

So at the end of the day this all means - you need your website to show up on Google and other search engines when someone types in a search looking for your product or service.

Web Design Aspects For Optimization

It starts with good code design.  Code that is clean and free of extra fluff that isn't necessary.  This ensures the keyword density (the percentage of how many times your keywords show up vs. the other codes and text).  Too little and the search engines don't think your page is about the subject you are trying to get across.  Too high of a keyword density rating and you may be penalized for trying to spam the search engines.  So it is a balance.

Key Elements of Good Web Design For SEO are:

• Page Titles
• Link Text
• Proper Navigation
• Image Tags
• Filenames of the Pages Themselves
• Page Content - Which should change on a regular basis.
• Good behind the scenes code that doesn't add extra characters that aren't needed.

Your web design should consider all these elements  and must be created with the proper % of keywords (that keyword density we talked about) you are trying to rank for.  If you rank for these keywords, then when a potential customer is looking for a product of service like yours, you can appear on Google or other search engine.  They click and arrive on your website ready to do business.

A delicate balance of all these things should all consider conversions, or turning your website traffic into new customers.  It is a delicate balance to design websites for search engines and attract new customers.

You need to work with a company that understands these elements of web design to have a successful website.  A beautiful website which doesn't rank is like a beautifully designed store which is in some remote location where people can't find. No traffic equals no sales.

That's why you optimize your site.