Search Engine Optimization

When Effective Web Design takes on a new project we work closely with our clients to optimize their text and images. Our goal is to produce a search engine friendly site so they don't have to pay someone to do it later. That being said we don't normally take on existing websites for search engine optimization. Valid HTML or XHTML code is a critical aspect to search engine Optimization. Most existing sites require a complete re-design in order to see any real benefits.

When search engine spiders crawl your website they need to properly interpret your HTML. The page may look fine in forgiving web browsers like Internet Explorer or Netscape but thats not what the spiders are looking at. Messy syntax (HTML) can affect the way a search engine spider indexes your site. It could prevent you from acheiving the search engine results you were hoping for. Valid code by itself does not guarantee first page results but it is definately one of the most important aspects of making your site search engine friendly.

Free Tips

Good Keywords are how users of search engines like google find your site. You should assess your business carefully and think of all the words that relate to your company or product.

Emphasis of your keywords by making them bold or italics can really help. If you thought they were important enough to highlight, they're more likely to be seen that way by the search engines as well.

Your HTML Title tag describes the contents of your web page in just a few words. Most likely this tag will appear in search engine results and bookmarks. Search engine spiders also see this first since it is at the top of your page. Its very important that you choose this carefully since your title is seen by both readers and search engines