Let’s say you’re baking banana bread. You’ve got the wet ingredients mixed in one bowl and the dry ingredients in the other, just like the recipe calls for. Unfortunately, you were distracted by the telephone and accidentally skipped adding the baking powder. You gently mix the dry into the wet, spread it in the pan and pop it into the oven. But when it comes out, it’s all flat, dense and gooey. You have to start over. What does this have to do with integrating SEO into website design, you ask? A lot, actually.
Planning Is Everything
You need to include all of the necessary ingredients, in their correct ratios, ready to add to your new website. This is when it really pays to have a certified SEO expert from the very beginning. They will know how SEO integrates into website design and how it will leaven the website so that it rises closer to the top of any search engine queries, and doesn’t end up flat at the bottom of page 3, where no customers ever look. Without this SEO expertise in the beginning, you end up having to backtrack to add elements later, some of which will not be as effective as they could have been if incorporated correctly from the start.
Research Is Critical
Not all websites (or loaves bread) are the same. You need to do extensive market research to find the right keywords to use during the design phase of website development. A certified SEO firm can help you with this research so that, from the beginning stages, your website will be developed with visibility over your competitors in mind. This includes planning the use of keywords for your products and services and geographical locators that are important for people looking for your services. Maybe your banana bread has chocolate chips in it, or you’re baking at 6000 feet instead of at sea level—so the ingredients (and website keywords) will have to be carefully researched to get the right result that sets you apart from your competition and enables your website to rise pleasingly to the top of a Google, Bing or Yahoo search.
Building SEO Into the Website Architecture Is Paramount
The architecture of your website dictates how users will encounter various pages on your website; how easily they can hop from one page to the next, find what they want and get what they need. Integrating SEO into website design is critical as the site map, wireframes and overall structure is laid out so that it actually helps you boost your SEO success. The way keywords are used in menus, links, title text and any other text on the website will significantly impact whether or not search engines find you when a potential customer types in their query for your product or service. This is why SEO is important from the very beginning; site architecture is the framework for your entire website and if you have to go in and change it later, it can cost a lot of extra time, money and customers who went elsewhere because Google didn’t find you the first time.
How SEO Integrates Into Website Design From a Graphics Perspective
Graphic elements on a website perform many functions. They are supposed to look nice and present a pleasing experience for the user. They help with brand identity and image. But a lot of companies fail to take advantage of graphic elements as big-time SEO boosters. For example, carousel content or roll-over menus or graphics can actually be designed to be searchable and to enhance link authority within the website, which makes search engines sit up and take notice.
So if you are starting to think of designing a new website, redesigning an older website, or if your website is not getting the attention you want from qualified leads, don’t make another move until you consult with a certified SEO expert.
Contact Affordable Web Design today and our SEO team will show you how SEO integrates into website design from the get go, saving you time, money, hassle and flat, tasteless results on search engines! Call now: (703) 335-1819!