| People often start the website development process by looking for a web designer. While this is all well and good, there's a question that should be asked first: "Are you looking for a website design, or are you looking for someone who can build you a functioning website?"Unless the answer is "we already have a functioning website," chances are you aren't' looking for simply a web designer. Instead, you're looking for someone that can help you build a good website that will market your business.An important aspect of marketing any business online is search engine optimization, or SEO. SEO has many different aspects, many of which are very much dependent on the proper type of website design and structure. For example, good on-site SEO includes: Site URLs that contain keywords Traditional hierarchical structure on each page (i.e. H1 tag is the most important title tag, followed by H2, etc.) Consideration for unique and meta description tags on each page. A 'flat' site structure that keeps important content from getting buried. Smart use of menu and footer links so that they contain good anchor text Integration of an HTML and XML sitemap and Robots.txt file Staying away from Flash and Javascript dependent site structures.If you think that's a long list, you're right - it is. While there are quite a few web designers that know about all the items on the list above, the vast majority of designers simply don't have the comprehension of these items that an SEO expert holds. After all, SEO experts work on SEO, web designers work on design, right?If a web designer doesn't understand these items or doesn't follow established guidelines, they can create SEO problems for your site and inadvertently limit your ability to market your website online.Before hiring a web designer, consider contacting an SEO firm (or an SEO firm that offers web design services). Not only can they give you some advice on choosing the right site structure, they can also help make certain your web designer follows good SEO guidelines. |
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