Eight Steps to Design a Surfer Friendly Website That Search Engines Love

By Venkata Ramana

1) Crystal Clear Source Code (HTML/CSS)

Many web-designers give far too much importance to the look and the graphics of the website while ignoring the clarity of the source code. Clean and well-written source code is the first step to website design success. If a spider cannot find your keywords, you might just as well forget about search engine optimization.

2) Keywords in Title Tags.

Keywords in the title tags are one of the most important factors for optimization. Search engines display your title tags in the search results. This tells surfers what your page is about.

3) Easy Navigation Links.

While preparing the layout of your website, remember the navigation links. They must be clearly visible. Hidden
links must be removed. Navigation links embedded with key words are an asset in search engine ranking. But beware --
stuffing your navigation links with too many keywords may land you in trouble!

4) Keyword Rich

Pages BUT Understandable Content. Yes - search engines love keyword rich content. This does not mean you have to stuff your articles with meaningless sentences. A keyword rich article can contain a keyword density of five to seven percent. Your articles must also be well edited to make them both search engine and user friendly. Invisible
keywords and keyword-spamming are a no-no.

5) Using Heading Tags (

, etc.) For Ease of Reading and Search Engine Friendliness.

Using

and

heading tags will help the user read your articles more easily.

is used for the headline;

and

are used for section heads and subheads. The lower the number, the larger the font size (assuming you haven't modified them differently). Using

,

fonts
will help the search engines easily understand the importance of the content in your pages. Keywords in header tags are also given more weight.

6) Fast Loading Images That Trigger Emotions

Fast loading images, are very important in designing your website. Using Flash and heavy images will increase the
loading time of your website. The faster your site loads, the easier it becomes for your visitor to understand your content.

7) Use Alt-Tags for Text ONLY Browsers.

Using alt tags for all your images will help your surfers who use text only browsers. Here is an example of alt tag:
Many search engies use alt tags to determine the keyword
relevancy.

8) Site Maps

A site map lists all the pages you feel are important for the search engines to index. SiteMaps are very important if
you want search engine spiders to index each and every page of your site. A site map also provides a guide to your
entire website content and helps your visitor navigate your
site easily.