SEO and Successful Site Architecture

thewebmarketing@gmail.com (Shari Thurow) — Wed, 20 Sep 2006 00:38:14 GMT

by Shari Thurow
Wednesday, September 20, 2006

A Web site's information architecture can greatly affect a site's search engine visibility. Specific page elements, such as the site navigation scheme, and design technologies, such as CSS and JavaScript, can interfere with a search engine's ability to spider a site.

Site architecture has been poorly addressed by search engine marketers (SEMs). Many of them have limited knowledge about information architecture and site usability. Some only specialize in search advertising, focusing on the media buy and the bidding process. Many SEO firms specialize in cloaking Nowhere in this skill set is information architecture.

A top Google position is useless if visitors aren't converting into buyers. That's where usability and site architecture become important. This column looks at the six building blocks of a successful site architecture that addresses the needs of both search engines and visitors.

How Directories Are Set Up on Servers
As a general rule, pages closest to the root directory are considered the most important pages on your site. The two most important documents that should be in the root directory are the home page, commonly named index.html, and the Robots Exclusion Protocol, commonly named robots.txt.

Site Navigation Scheme
Another element of site architecture is a site's navigation scheme. Some site navigation schemes are more spider-friendly than others. For example, a set of navigation buttons is often more spider-friendly than a DHTML pull-down menu. And a set of hypertext links is often more spider-friendly than a set of navigation buttons.

Subdirectories, File Names, and URL Structure
Many Web developers like to divide different site sections into subdirectories to keep related pages close to each other (on a Web server). On a larger site (250-plus pages), this site architecture makes sense. On a smaller site, this so-called SEO strategy may confuse site visitors.

Page Layout and Structure
Since there are different page types, it naturally follows the layout strategies for one page type, such as a product page, may not work for a different page type, such as a press release (news page). Likewise, the keyword phrases on a category page may be more general than the keyword phrases on a product page. Yet there might be some overlap.

Conclusion
Successful site architecture is a must for any Web site. Not only can it improve the ability of a search engine to access keyword-rich content on a site, it can increase site conversions as well.

Read full article at thewebmarketingblog.com

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