How to Build a Search Friendly Site

One of the most important things to know about a building a search engine friendly site is that just because it is search engine friendly that doesn’t mean it is search engine optimized. Being search engine friendly and search engine optimized are two entirely different notions that consist of different skills and experts to manage. Below we provide you with some tips on what it takes to build a search engine friendly site.

1. Think of the search engines as your visitors.

   If you have a website that your visitors find easy to navigate, uncluttered and keeps them interested, chances are it will be just as easy for a search engine to crawl and index.

2. Drop-down navigation menus are not a good idea

   Search engines cannot find the pages located in drop-down menus, as well as any visitors using screen readers. If you are using drop-down menus, make sure that you include accompanying text links on the page. This will reduce the chance of the search engines missing those pages.

3. Avoid building your website using Flash

   Again, search engines and visitors using screen readers will not be able to read any content that is done in Flash. If having a Flash site is a must, you may want to build a second site in HTML. Ensure that you inform the robots to index the HTML site and not the Flash site by using your Robots.txt.file. This way the robots will be able to view your site as well as any visitors using screen readers.

4. Work with an SEO expert from beginning to end

   Having your site done right the first time is what everyone wants. Having an SEO expert working with you from start to finish will ensure that your site is as search engine friendly as possible. This will reduce any possible post-production costs that you would have had to shell out to make your site more search engine friendly.

5. Images are similar to Flash

   Search engines can’t read content located in images just as with Flash so keep them to a minimal. Use text content as much as possible.

6. Everyone likes fresh content

   Include an area on your site that is dedicated to new content. Search engines will have a reason to come back to your site and so will potential clients. This will keep your site relevant to spiders.

This entry was posted on Monday, August 17th, 2009 at 12:15 PM and is filed under Search Engine Optimization. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.