SEO (Search Engine Optimization) plays a key role in the successful online presence of any website. However, SEO is often considered only after the site has been developed, which can lead to serious problems. Proper SEO during the development stage is the foundation for its long-term success. In this article, we'll cover the key aspects to consider when designing a website for SEO.
Website Architecture: Fundamental Principles
Just like building a house, where the first steps lay the foundation for the entire process, website development begins with careful planning and information structure. This stage plays a crucial role and significantly impacts the success of the entire project.
Creating an information structure is not just the first step, but a fundamental stage of an SEO specialist's work. This is the moment when the main directions of a website's development and its future effectiveness in search engines are determined.
Niche and competitor analysis
Before creating a website structure, it's essential to conduct a thorough analysis of all available information. This includes examining the company's core business areas, priority products, promotion regions, and key competitors in the market.
If a company already has an existing website, it's important to analyze its statistics and results. This will help you form a clear understanding of the desired outcome and develop a promotion strategy, avoiding unexpected changes and revisions during the development process.
Semantic Mining: The Key to Understanding Needs
Compiling a semantic core is one of the key stages in creating a website structure. Based on niche and competitor analysis, it's necessary to compile a wide range of queries that are most relevant to your business.
These queries are grouped into categories and subcategories based on the most popular queries. The SEO specialist's job is to build a query tree that will help optimize navigation and highlight key pages.
The semantic core also serves as the basis for creating website content. Understanding user queries will help develop information that best meets their needs.
Proper planning and information structure are fundamental principles of successful SEO during the website development stage. Analyzing the niche and competitors, and collecting semantic data, allows you to create a website that best meets user needs and competes effectively in search results.
Website structure development
One of the key aspects of successful SEO is a proper website structure, which should not only be logical but also user-friendly. A common mistake is developing a website structure in a vacuum, without considering the actual demand and needs of the audience. This can lead to significant website promotion costs, as subsequent changes and refinements will be necessary to meet market demands.
To avoid such problems, it is necessary to determine a proper structure at the development stage, based on an analysis of demand, competitors, and semantics.
To do this, an SEO specialist creates a mental map of the future website using clustered queries from the compiled semantic core. They then build a directory structure, taking into account the frequency and profitability of queries, to ensure optimal navigation and user experience. This will allow for the creation of a website that not only meets audience needs but also performs well in search engines.
Internal Optimization: Key Aspects During the Development Phase
During the website development stage, on-page optimization involves many important steps that determine successful search engine promotion. Let's look at the main ones.
Checking the robots.txt file
The robots.txt file plays a crucial role in determining which pages and files on a website should or should not be indexed by search engine robots. Configuring this file requires careful consideration, and the following requirements must be met:
- The file must be located in the root directory of the site (site.ru/robots.txt).
- The file size must not exceed 32 kB.
- It is necessary to exclude service and unnecessary sections.
- For various robots, including Yandex, the corresponding User-Agent must be specified.
- It is necessary to specify the host directive for Yandex.
- Pages with dynamic parameters must be closed with the Clean-param directive.
- The sitemap link must be correct.
Checking the Sitemap.xml file
The Sitemap.xml file provides search engines with information about the site's structure and updates. It not only helps discover content but also provides additional metadata. It's important to consider the following requirements:
- All links in the sitemap must return a 200 response code.
- The sitemap should be up-to-date and, if possible, automatically updated.
Checking 301 redirect
Search engines react negatively to duplicate content, so it's important to ensure proper redirects are in place. Duplicate pages should be eliminated:
- Versions with and without www must be merged www.
- Links with and without a slash at the end of the URL.
- Different versions of index.php, index.html, etc. should be redirected to one main page.
Checking the 404 error page
A 404 error page is important for the user experience and requires the following:
- Providing the user with the ability to interact with the site.
- Tracking via Google Analytics.
- Sending a "404" response code to prevent search engines from indexing your website.
Error checking 5**
Server errors 5** are unacceptable on the site and require immediate resolution, as they indicate server problems and negatively impact user experience.
Using all of the above measures will help ensure reliable and effective internal website optimization in the early stages of its development.
Checking the layout
One of the most important stages of website development is layout testing, which must comply with standards and pass validation. It's important to note that layout testing results should not contain any critical errors that could negatively impact the website's performance and appearance.
An example of a layout error might be incorrectly closed tags, which can lead to unpredictable content display on different devices or in different browsers.
HTTP/HTTPS Check: Ensuring Security
When migrating a website to HTTPS or creating one using it from the start, ensure that it is accessible only via one of the protocols. It's important to avoid pages with mixed content, as this can create confusion and degrade the user experience.
An example of an error would be not properly setting up a redirect from HTTP to HTTPS, which would result in the site being accessible via both protocols, which is not only unsafe but also has a negative impact on SEO.
CHPU Check: Creating User-Friendly URLs
Human-readable URLs (HWUs) play a crucial role in user orientation on a website. They should be clear and informative to help visitors navigate the site easily. Furthermore, using HWUs improves search engine rankings, which can improve your site's performance.
An example of a human-readable URL error might be a long, confusing URL, which not only makes the page's content difficult to understand but also impacts the site's SEO performance.
Checking tags and meta tags
Tags and meta tags play a crucial role in SEO, as they help search engines understand the content and structure of your website pages. It's important to avoid duplicating tags on a single page, such as Title, H1, and Description, and to ensure that meta tags are unique for each page. This will help provide search engines with an accurate understanding of your website's content and improve its visibility in search results.
An example of a tag error is the absence of a meta description tag on a page, which makes it less attractive to search engines and users, and also worsens its SEO performance.
Micro-markup Checker: Improving Data Structuring
Semantic markup is a specialized markup language that helps structure your website's data for search engines. It's important to implement separate micro-markup for different types of pages:
- It is recommended to use the Organization scheme for the contact page.
- For breadcrumbs, it is recommended to use the BreadcrumbList scheme.
- For images, it is recommended to use the ImageObject scheme.
- For video recordings, it is recommended to use the VideoObject scheme.
- For products, it is recommended to use the Product scheme.
However, depending on the specifics of your site, other micro-markup schemes may be used.
Checking canonical and pagination pages:
To prevent search engines from indexing junk pages with dynamic parameters, duplicates, and pagination pages, the following measures must be taken:
- Using the rel=canonical tag for duplicates and pages with filters.
- Setting rel=»prev» and rel=»next» tags for pagination pages.
Download Speed Test: Optimizing Performance
Page loading speed is a key search engine ranking factor. Slow websites dissatisfy users and lead to lower conversion rates. To speed up your website, follow these Google Page Speed recommendations:
- Image optimization.
- Using browser caching.
- Minimization and removal of styles and scripts to the bottom of the page.
- Optimizing server response time.
Improving SEO performance
Image optimization is essential for improving your website's SEO. In addition to image compression, it's important to:
- Make sure there are no broken images on the website.
- Fill in alt tags with image descriptions.
- Avoid over-compression of images while maintaining their quality.
Mobile Adaptability Testing: Improving Usability
Responsive design plays a key role in ensuring a website's usability across various devices. Responsive design requirements include:
- Correct display of the website on various devices.
- Presence of viewport tag.
- Lack of horizontal scrolling.
- Avoid using Flash, Java applets and Silverlight plugins.
- Easy-to-read text for users.
Cross-browser compatibility check: Guarantee of correct display
It's important that your website displays correctly not only on different devices but also in different browsers. To check this, you can use a service like browsershots.org.
Checking for broken links
Every page on your site should return a 200 response code. You can use the free program Xenu to check for broken links.
Installation of meters and confirmation of rights
Before launching your website, you need to install analytics counters and confirm your rights in the webmaster control panel:
- Make sure Yandex.Metrica is installed.
- Install Google Analytics.
- Verify your rights in Yandex.Webmaster and Google Search Console.
Additionally, you can install Google Tag Manager and other search engine counters for more comprehensive tracking.
Setting up goals in analytics systems
Tracking targeted visits and website conversions is made easier by properly setting up goals in Yandex.Metrica and Google Analytics. The sooner these goals are set up, the more accurately you can evaluate your website's effectiveness as a sales tool.
Properly setting up goals in analytics systems is one of the most important steps an SEO specialist must take before launching a website.
In conclusion, proper SEO during the website development stage is a key factor for its successful promotion and achieving high search engine rankings. The entire process begins with a thorough analysis of the niche, competitors, and keywords, which allows for the creation of an effective website information structure.
Website architecture must be logical and user-friendly, and internal optimization, including checking various aspects such as layout, cross-browser compatibility, broken links, and analytics installation, plays a crucial role in the successful development of the project.
Content management and optimization, including micro-markup, responsiveness, and loading speed, are also crucial for increasing website visibility and attracting your target audience.
Finally, setting goals in analytics systems allows you to track your website's performance and make adjustments to achieve your goals.
Following all these SEO principles and rules during the website development stage will help create a solid foundation for the long-term success of your online project, attracting targeted traffic, and increasing conversions.
