SEO Tips for Website Developers & Designers

10 SEO Tips Web Developers &
Designers Should Know

Daniel Bianchini
Senior SEO Consultant
@danielbianchini

Site Architecture

 Keep website as flat as possible.
 Keep ALL content within a maximum of 4
clicks from the homepage.
 Ensure cross linking between pages.

Benefits
 Improved indexing
 Improved Page & Domain Authority
(PageRank)
 Improves long tail keywords and phrases.

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http://twitter.com/danielbianchini

URLs, Files & Folder Naming Conventions

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URL Structure

URLs
Keyword rich.
Static.
Remove file extension.
Hyphen not underscore.
Lowercase.
URL length.

Bad URL: www.example.com/index.php?category=2&page=tents&sortBy=price
Good URL: www.example.com/camping/tents/

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Files, Image & Folder Naming Conventions

Files & Folders
Keyword Rich.
Relevant.
Concise.

Images
Descriptive filenames.
Keyword rich filenames.
JPEG or PNG.
Well optimised Images can help improve visibility within the Image Search results.

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Semantic HTML
Using W3C compliant code is not an SEO must have, but validated code makes crawling
the site easier. HTML tags & attributes you should have.

<title> - Essential.
<Meta Description> - CTR, limited SEO benefit.
<h1> - 1 Per Page, primary keywords.
<h2> - Secondary keywords.
<a title=“”> <img alt=“”> - Descriptive & keyword rich.
Use CSS for Layout.
Remove ALL CSS & JS to minimise number of external files.

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Duplicate Content Issues

 URL Parameters
www.example.com/jackets.html?colour=red
 Printer friendly pages
www.example.com/print/jackets.html
 Session IDs
www.example.com/jackets.html?sid=123

 Solutions
– 301 redirects.
– Rel=“canonical”.
– Parameter handling in GWT.

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Canonical Issues

 Decide on www. Vs non-www; make sure one is 301 redirected to the other:
oxondigital.co.uk  www.oxondigital.co.uk
www.oxondigital.co.uk  oxondigital.co.uk

 Canonicalise URLs by removing file extension.
www.oxondigital.co.uk/index.html --> www.oxondigital.co.uk
www.oxondigital.co.uk/events.html --> www.oxondigital.co.uk/events

 Link to canonicalised URL throughout the website.

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Meta Directives

Rel=“canonical”
<link rel="canonical" href="http://www.example.com/jackets/" />
<meta name=“robots” content=“index, nofollow”>
– Index page, don’t follow the links.
<meta name=“robots” content=“noindex, follow”>
– Don’t index the page, follow the links.
– To remove duplicate content but allow the search engine to follow the links.
<meta name=“robots” content=“noindex, nofollow”>
– Don’t index, don’t follow links.
– Used for print pages.

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HTTP Status

301 Redirects - permanent redirect.
Use for everything – expired pages, deleted content, canonicalised URLs, etc.
90% SEO benefit passed.

302 Redirects - temporary redirect.
No SEO benefit passed.

404 Page – error page.
Always use 404 pages for errors & not standard website pages.
Do not automatically 302 redirect an error page to homepage.
Customise the 404 page to make it user friendly.

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Sitemaps

Benefits
Helps improve site indexation & speed of indexing.
Webmaster controls the pages in the sitemap.
XML Sitemap
50,000 URLs.
Use sitemap Index for large websites.
HTML Sitemap
100 links per page.
– +100 links split by category – e.g. ecommerce.
Link from every page to help speed up indexation.

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Content

 Do not embed content in images.
 Do not make core pages image based.
 Provide room for HTML text on every page.
– Minimum of 350 words per page.
 Allow ability to create landing pages.
 Provide UGC ability.
– Customer Reviews.
– Forums.

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Thank You

Daniel Bianchini
http://www.oxondigital.co.uk

http://twitter.com/oxondigital

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Image Credits

 HTML & H Tags - http://www.demonslounge.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/matrix_17.jpg
 Site Architecture - http://christine.americasfoundation.net/construction/West%20Elevation
%20Colegio%20La%20Esperanza%20High%20School.jpg
 File & Folder Names - http://drdeclutterblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/pile-of-folders-
proj-1.JPG
 Duplicate Content - http://www.flickr.com/photos/emilley/3796489073/
 Content - http://brogdencastle.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/king_john-11.jpg

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