8 Critical SEO Checklist Items for Website Design
Having a beautiful website with a fantastic design is great since the website is the gateway through which anyone can know more about the brand. That said, it is pointless to build a great website with a poor SEO score. Would you like your website to be well-designed and optimized for search engines? If the answer is yes, it would be helpful to seek the services of a web design agency. They will help your website to get more credits on its SEO score. Now let us consider 8 critical SEO checklist items for website design.
1. Opening speed and responsiveness to mobile devices
This is one very important item on this checklist. It can be termed as the backbone of the entire website’s functionality and it can determine how effective every other item on this checklist will work. Website designers need to ensure that the website not only opens fast but that it opens well on all major web browsers and that it is responsive to any mobile device. Websites that are able to successfully fulfil these two criteria will get a lot of attention from web crawlers responsible for indexing relevant website for search engines.
2. Create a proper website structure with suitable internal links
Just as architecture is important to any building project, a website’s architecture is also important to the success of the website. Websites need to be properly structured to ensure the smooth running and flow of all pages on the website. If a website is structured in a way that confuses the viewer, this is the beginning of failure. In addition to that, the website needs to be suitably populated with internal links that will make it easy for visitors to navigate.
Making the website easy for anyone to use and navigate will most definitely boost the SEO of the website because it will reduce bounce rate and increase the average time a visitor spends on the website. This would require that the website designer focuses on both the UI (user interface) and the UX (user experience) of the website. Also, after designing, all site files should be well formatted and kept clean to make it easy for web crawlers.
3. Use relevant plugins, extensions and add-ons
Plugins, extensions and add-ons are very handy elements that should be used when designing a website to improve the SEO. Note that some plugins, extensions or add-ons might interfere with aspects of the website causing it to load slowly. If after the website designer has worked on the opening speed of the website and it still loads slowly, consider removing/replacing plugins and add-ons and look for the ones that will work well with the website.
4. Research and use relevant keywords
Research is also important when designing a website that will be SEO compliant. Website designers must have a clear understanding of the brand, its services or products as well as the target audience. All these will help when researching the secondary and primary keywords that are relevant to the brand and its target audience. These keywords should also be properly used by the website designer for the HTML tags of every page created on the website.
5. Make use of all HTML tags available
The HTML tags are also an important SEO booster for any website. The website designer is encouraged to use all available HTML tags to increase the chances of achieving a higher SEO score. There are some very popular HTML tags that must be used on the website, and the designer should try to exhaust all. The meta description helps give brands great visibility and organic traffic as well as good leads when used appropriately.
The content on the meta description area must be very unique and very attractive on its own. It should incorporate a good call-to-action in order to get those organic leads and conversions. The title helps search engines know the kind of information that is on the website. It is this title that the search engine will display on search engine results page (SERP) so be sure that it is catchy enough in addition to having the right keywords.
Meta robots help guide the web crawlers of search engines to a page that you want it to index and other pages that you may not want to be indexed. The reason for this is that search engines are always keen on quality content for certain keywords, especially the popular ones within the brand’s industry. So you want to ensure that your brand puts its best foot forward.
6. Use image and video optimisation tools
Always make use of an image or video optimization tool when designing the website in order to improve the speed at which pages or other contents with heavy images load. For brands incorporating a lot of video content, images or other heavier file formats, they should ensure that the website designer fully optimizes the website. This way, all the content can open faster when people click on the relevant pages.
7. Sort out error pages and redirection pages
The possibility of not having redirection issues or error issues is very slim. That’s why website designers must be mindful about resolving all kinds of error issues (like 301, 302, 404) before the website goes public. If the company bought some new domain names or rebranded its old domain name to a new one, it is a requirement for all old domains to be redirected to the active one. If there is an issue with redirecting visitors to the active website URL, they may not be able to get to the real website and this could drop the SEO score a higher bounce rate would be recorded.
8. Ensure that the website is bug-free and secure
Website designers must ensure that the website is free from errors caused by bugs that could interfere with the user experience. Again these errors cause an increase in the bounce rate which is not good for the website’s SEO score. Businesses must prioritize their website’s security protocol. Ensure that the processes required to implement the SSL certificate for the website are performed correctly. This way, web browsers would stop issuing security warnings that make visitors take to their heels.