Optimizing Your Online Presence for Business Growth
In a May 2023 blog post, we discussed three search engine optimization (SEO) best practices that help websites attract users.
In today’s blog post, we’ll broach three more SEO best practices that’ll improve your chances of being ranked higher in search engine results pages (SERPs) and enhance the experience users have while interacting with your site. First, let’s discuss user experience (UX) and why it is essential from an enterprise outlook.
What is User Experience (UX)?
- Includes all aspects of website users’ experience with a company, its products, and services.
- UX is an often forgotten factor of on-page SEO.
- It is also the overarching gratifying feeling a user may experience when interacting with a digital tool, such as your website!
Leverage the Power of User Experience and Search Engine Optimization
You may wonder why the term “user experience” is so prevalent online. You may also wonder how user experience ties into best practices in search engine optimization.
Contrary to popular belief, SEO is about more than keywords and content. Search engines started comprehending users’ needs and considering them in how they rank the results that appear once a specific query is searched. Therefore, it makes sense how SEO and UX influence one another. The main takeaway is that if your website is more challenging to navigate than your competitors, for instance, it will probably be ranked behind them.
Three More Best Practices
As mentioned at the beginning of this post, the first three best practices for optimizing your website we expanded on back in May were Coordinate Web Page Content with User Intent, Write Engaging Title Tags and Meta Descriptions, and Optimize Your Site’s Loading Speed.
Here are three more best practices to boost your website’s user experience that you can start thinking about today:
Clear Navigation
Google states, “The navigation of a website is important in helping visitors quickly find the content they want. It can also help search engines understand what content the website owner thinks is important.” When a user arrives at your website, it’s usually only sometimes the homepage that they land on. The significance here is in making sure your website is easy to navigate, no matter the page on which a user—or search engine crawler—lands.
Furthermore, how you structure the information on your website helps Google understand the relative importance of each page. By simplifying your site’s navigation, you can communicate to Google how the separate pages relate to one another as well as your website’s current business direction.
Lastly, clean navigation and organized content structure can create site links in Google Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs). The advantage here is that by having site links, the amount of space you take up on results pages is inherently larger, leaving less digital space for your competitors.
Tips for easy navigation
- Every page of your website should be 3 to 4 clicks away from your homepage.
- Every page should have an internal link navigating the user back to the homepage.
Mobile Friendliness
To show the value of having a mobile responsive website most effectively, here are some of the most compelling data compiled by the Forbes Advisor.
- 88% of online visitors won’t return to a site after a poor interaction.
- 46% of people with disruptive mobile experiences choose not to buy from the brand again.
- 74% of online users will return to a website that is mobile-friendly.
Most online visitors access the information they search for through their mobile devices across various situations. Thus, it is critical to optimize your website for mobile so that your intended audience can find the content, service, or product they look for when they want.
Not only should you have a mobile-friendly website because it is one of Google’s priority ranking factors, but because your users or customers generate satisfaction from positive experiences with a company. According to Spiralytics, “72% of customers will tell people about a good experience”. On the other hand, “13% will tell fifteen or more people about a poor experience.” Imagine an interaction between friends looking for a restaurant might go if your website is hard to read and the menu is difficult to find. They won’t consider your establishment for more than a second.
Tips for mobile-friendly websites
Create a User-Friendly Web Page Layout
Once more, ensuring straightforward navigation paths creates easily accessible content. To support this aim, you’ll want a layout with the same simplicity and visibility as your navigation. If you genuinely want to get the most out of your website, consider working with 360 WEB DESIGNS. We keep user experience and search engine optimization practices at the front of our design process because they will continue to be immensely important for a successful business.
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