Web development involves creating and maintaining websites. It covers everything from designing the website to even developing content and ensuring the site works as it should.
But did you know that good web development does more than make your site look good? It also makes your site more visible in search engine results pages.
In this article, you’ll learn about the impact of web development on SEO. You’ll also learn the key elements web developers like you should pay attention to in order to optimize your site for search engines like Google and ensure site success.
Impact of Web Development on SEO
Web development has a big impact on SEO. Reducing your loading times, making your site work well on mobile devices, and enhancing its accessibility will help you rank higher on search engines.
Let’s break this down.
Page speed is a direct ranking factor for mobile and desktop results. That means if your website loads quickly, it will likely appear high in mobile and desktop search engine results.
Why ensure your site works well on mobile phones for SEO? Well, Google primarily uses the mobile version of a site to crawl content for indexing and ranking. So, while having a mobile version of site pages isn’t required, Google says it is “strongly recommended.” In fact, it recommends creating a mobile-friendly site “so your users visiting your site through a mobile phone can have a stellar experience.” In other words, if your site has a mobile version and is mobile-friendly, Google is more likely to view your site favorably and rank it high in SERPs.
As for site accessibility, Google wants that, too. It says “everyone should be able to access and enjoy the web,” and is, in fact, “committed to making that a reality.” Besides, accessibility positively impacts the user experience. Google has said that “having a great page experience can contribute to success in Search..”
But why should you be concerned about enhancing your SEO anyway? Well, the higher your site ranking, the more people can find your site. That just means more potential customers for you. Ultimately, with good visibility, you can ensure business growth.
All this isn’t to say you should rely only on good web development to boost your SEO efforts. Consider other strategies for the best results, too. For instance, why not encourage visitors to share your content on Instagram, Facebook, and X through social sharing icons? This way, you can increase Facebook shares, X comments, and boost IG followers. The increase in social engagement can signal to search engines that your content is valuable, which might help improve your rankings.
Consider email marketing as well. Send emails to subscribers to reach a wider audience. These are people who might also be encouraged to search for your site on Google and access it. If they spend a lot of time on your website,(a.k.a. increased dwell time), Google might just rank it high in SERPs.
Elements of Web Development in SEO
That said, here are specific elements of web development you should pay attention to as a web developer for SEO:
1. Page Speed
As I mentioned above, page speed is a critical factor for user experience, which is key to SEO. Users expect web pages to load quickly, and pages that take longer to load can experience significant bounce rates.
So, what can developers do about this for SEO?
You can start by analyzing your website using the Google PageSpeed Insights tool. The tool will show your page speed for both mobile and desktop. It’ll also suggest various actions you can take to improve your site.
Now, to enhance page speed, you’ll need to shrink bulky files, use browser caching, and compress image sizes. You can also use lazy loading, where content only appears when needed.
Other strategies include limiting HTTP requests, minifying Javascript and CSS files, and limiting redirects and external scripts.
For the non-technical website owners, one of the easiest ways to ensure all this is by installing plugins like Nitropack and WP Rocket. These plugins will implement most of the strategies discussed above, e.g., caching content and compressing images for you.
Another strategy is to use web design templates that are optimized for performance.
2. Website Structure
A website with a clear layout improves user navigation, resulting in better user experiences. Moreover, it helps search engines understand your website hierarchy and the relationship between different content pieces. This makes it easier for search engines to crawl your site and serve it to the users.
Here’s what you can do to enhance your website structure for better SEO performance:
- Simple Navigation: See your website as a store. Use easy-to-use menus. These act like clear signs, guiding visitors to the right products (your content) without getting lost.
- Logical Organization: Group related content together like arranging similar items in a store aisle. This makes it intuitive for users to browse and find what they want.
This clothing website demonstrates good structure with a clear navigation bar. This user-friendly layout helps visitors browse categories efficiently, just like finding clothes in a well-organized shop.
- Clear Hierarchy: Think of your website as a family tree. The homepage is the parent, with main categories representing children and subcategories representing grandchildren. A clear hierarchy keeps things organized and easy to navigate.
Planning out your website’s structure before building it helps ensure organization in the final output. So, as part of your SEO and web development practices, use AI templates. They can help to build a framework for organizing content from the get-go, while also generating engaging SEO-friendly text down the line.
3. Other Technical SEO Elements
Technical SEO is about making your website easy for search engines to crawl and index. Without strong technical SEO, search bots won’t be able to find, understand, and store your content. How else will they be able to rank your site then?
Apart from enhancing technical SEO elements like page speed and site structure, use robots.txt files to guide search engines on what pages they should visit on your site. It’s useful for keeping these search engines away from pages you don’t want to be shown, like login areas.
Use meta descriptions and title tags as well as part of your SEO and web development practices. A meta description is a brief summary of what an article is about (see text enclosed in a blue rectangle below). A title tag, meanwhile, is an HTML element that provides the page’s, well, main title (see text enclosed in a red rectangle):
Fill these out with important keywords. You also want to make them clear to make people want to click on them.
Here are other elements you should pay attention to in order to enhance your website’s technical SEO:
- XML Sitemaps: A sitemap acts as a map for your website, listing all key pages. You can create an XML sitemap using a tool like Yoast and submit it to Google through your Google Search Console.
- Implement HTTPS: Google has stated that secure websites (using HTTPS) get a ranking boost over non-secure ones (HTTP). To implement HTTPS, you’ll need a SSL/TLS certificate installed on your site. You can obtain this from a trusted certificate authority.
- URL Structure: User-friendly URLs not only help search engines understand your content better but also improve click-through rates from search results. Opt for descriptive URLs.
- Hreflang Tags: For websites with content in multiple languages, using hreflang tags correctly can help search engines serve the appropriate language or regional version to users. You can use a hreflang tags generator to help you.
By implementing these technical SEO practices, you ultimately increase the chances of your site ranking in search engine results pages. .
4. On-Page SEO Considerations
Since some website developers also write website content, I included this element here.
On-page SEO involves optimizing a website’s content.
An important part of on-page SEO is using keywords wisely. Use keywords naturally throughout your website copy. You can perform research with tools such as Ahrefs to help you determine the best keywords to use.
Remember, too, that search engines prefer content valuable to users. Do in-depth research before writing. Include statistics wherever applicable. Also, write easy-to-read content with headings and lists.
Lastly, make sure to add internal links within your content. These help pass link equity to different pages, allowing them to rank better in the search results. They also help search engine crawlers discover and reach all your important posts.
Also, they improve the user experience. A best practice most SaaS marketing agencies use is linking to content within the same topic cluster. This allows readers to explore the main topic of the site content even further.
5. Website Accessibility
Website accessibility means designing websites usable for everyone, including people with impairments and disabilities. We’ve already explained above why accessible websites rank higher on search engines. But just to emphasize the importance of website accessibility to SEO, here’s a study worth mentioning. SEMRush, Builtwith, and Accessibility Checker analyzed the organic traffic of 847 web domains before and after plugging in accessibility software.
The results? Well, for those domains studied:
- 73.4% of domains saw growth in organic traffic.
- 66.1% of domains experienced up to 50% growth in organic traffic.
- An average increase of 12% in overall traffic was observed for all domains.
The study concluded that improving website accessibility enhances site visibility, which results from an improvement in search engine rankings.
Apart from using accessibility software like accessiBe and UserWay, you can make your website accessible by doing the following:
- Add Image ALT Text– The text should be optimized and should accurately describe the content. This is also part of on-page SEO.
- Enable Keyboard Navigation – Allow users to navigate with the keyboard, not just a mouse. For instance, if you have a pop-up calendar on your site users can use to schedule an appointment, give them the option to type in the date they prefer for the appointment, too.
- Provide Transcripts of Audio Content – These can help people who can’t hear well. There are audio transcription services you can leverage for this.
Following guidelines like the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) can help ensure your site is accessed not just by a few but by many. That’s why for Google, it’s one of the most important SEO and web development practices you should follow.
Conclusion
If done right, web development can help improve your SEO.
You learned what web development elements to focus on to enhance your site’s search rankings. Pay attention to your page speed, website structure, accessibility, and other technical SEO elements when developing your site. If you’re writing content for the site you’re building as well, don’t forget on-page considerations.
With this understanding of good SEO and web development practices, you can create websites that don’t only look great but are also optimized for search engines and visibility. Good luck!
