Search engine optimization (SEO) is an important part of any web development project, no matter the size. SEO best practices ensure that your website is found and indexed by search engines, and that it stands out to potential customers. Without SEO, web developers can struggle to make their projects visible to the target audience.
Here are the eight must-know SEO best practices to ensure your development project has the best possible outcome:
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Pay Attention to Site Structure: Proper website structure is key when building a properly optimized website. Structuring your website with a clear hierarchy helps both search engine crawlers and users alike to quickly understand what topics are available on your site. This includes making sure there is an easy “breadcrumb” trail for users to traverse through your website.
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Use Semantic Markup: For search engines to understand what your website is all about, they need to be able to read and interpret the content. This is where semantic markups come in. Semantic markups provide extra context, hinting at the intended meaning and purpose of certain web page elements. Adding this data makes it easier for search engine crawlers to accurately parse and index the page, allowing for more accurate search result ranking.
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Clean Up HTML: Search engine crawlers will have a hard time understanding the content of your website if you have littered HTML code. As a developer, make sure all your HTML code is properly formatted – using the correct tags and eliminating duplicates. This can help search engine crawlers to more accurately index your site and improve your ranking on the SERPs.
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Optimize Page Load Times: The performance of your website is essential for both users and search engines. Slow loading pages provide a negative user experience, which can impact your rankings on the SERPs. Utilize techniques such as minification and caching to improve page load times and ensure your ranking remains competitive.
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Utilize Internal Links: Internal linking is an important SEO best practice as it helps search engine crawlers to understand your website and better assess the relevance of specific pages. Make sure to take advantage of internal linking to maximize indexation and improve the crawling of your website.
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Leverage Do-Follows: The ‘rel’ attribute is an important part of SEO best practices. This attribute helps search engine crawlers distinguish which links are “Do-Follows” and which are “No-Follows”. While ‘no-follow’ links are important in directing user traffic, ‘do-follow’ links are essential for providing search engine bots with appropriate links to crawl.
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Pay Attention to Metadata: Metadata on your website is important for search engine crawlers, but it is also great for giving potential customers an overview of what you’re about without having to click through to the website. As a developer, it’s important to take advantage of metadata opportunities such as meta description tags and social media tags to make sure your website stands out on the SERPs.
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Monitor & Analyze: An important part of any SEO project is the ability to monitor and analyze performance. To ensure your website is performing at the highest possible level, you need to keep track of how your website is doing in terms of search engine indexation, page views, keyword rankings and more.
By paying attention to these eight SEO best practices, developers can ensure their projects are properly optimized before launching. Doing so can help to make sure your project is seen, indexed and ranked on the SERPs.