Are we designers at heart?
-
A thought has crossed me. I've started to think about my relationships (uh oh...where is this going..?) with my web developer and designer and it seems design has become the core part of every SEO strategy I employ.
Every page layout, rich content on a page and behaviour my customer might do, I'm thinking about the design. Are we in a way, designers as well? We put on so many hats and is design one of them? I'm technical with my web developer but I'm also concerned with the delivery the customer sees.
How is your relationship with your web designer and developer? Are they core individuals in your SEO life?
-
If you are a smaller firm and you wear all the hats, here are instructions on how to give yourself a hug (yes--real instructions).
-
My approach is thumbs up with a smile. Universal and makes everyone feel epic! Including myself
-
did you get him a box of chocolates ? more on topic yes but SEO has always been a trade of many hats and im sure we will gain many more (e.g PR). It never hurts to be super best friends with the designer and web dev team. It can also be great o get advice on things e.g i may look at a site with my seo hat but miss an important design issue or web dev issue etc.
in short : Go give your web dev team a hug / high five depending on how comfortable you are with them.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Can the design still be considered adaptive if the URL is different?
I was under the impression our site had a mobile dedicated design, but my developers are telling me we have an adaptive design. The mobile site is set up different and has different content and the url is as follows: www.site.com/MobileView/MobileHome.aspx Can it still be considered adaptive if the URL is not the exact same? Hopefully this make sense and I appreciate anyone's input!
Web Design | | AliMac260 -
Any new tips on how to speed up re-listing after re-design?
A few things around re-designing an older but well performing site for search and retaining/ improving SEO value. Lots of effort has been put into content marketing and optimising individual pages on this site, it has a lot of links coming in from well-respected sites (but the domain name will remain the same so that shouldn't be an issue) so I'm very anxious about how the redesign will effect ranking, although the new site will be far more user friendly, beautiful, responsive where the old one is not and faster to load. Would really like to avoid the search engine drop when the site first goes live if at all possible- One idea on this was to make the new site live on another domain - .co.uk for example, whilst keeping the old site up on the .com for a month or so, then switching the records so the new site is then visible on .com and the .co.uk redirects to it. Does this sound at all sensible?! Also any more advice on how best to ensure the new site will do better, not worse for search is hugely appreciated. We have cut a lot of content to make it more user friendly and easy to find information. We will be making sure all old links are redirected to new site (but as there are fewer pages on new site, will it matter if 5 old URLS point to one new URL for instance?) Also what's the difference between 301 and 302 redirects! Thank you so much in advance, massively appreciated your time!
Web Design | | Emjmoz0 -
"Design by" footerlinks of webdevelopment firms
Hi Guys, Since our company does a lot of web development jobs next to our SEO work, we came across the topic of the “Design by” or “Webdesign by” links that our competitors are placing in the footer of clients websites. When I did some backlink analysis of our competitors these links make up the biggest part of their backlink profile. That way, I think they are important for the promotion and SEO of web development companies. I would love to have your opinion about how to use these links for SEO 1. Side wide vs homepage I think there are two ways here, going for a link at the bottom of every page or just one link at the bottom of the homepage. When you look at exposure the most ideal situation would be a side wide link (more eyeballs). From a SEO standpoint this might cause trouble. 2. Follow vs nofollow I think this is a very interesting one since there seems to be a lot of different opinions about if this is advertisement or not. A normal banner in a sidebar would get the nofollow tag to match Google’s guidelines but what about this “designed by” link? I know few designers and “putting a stamp” on their work is pretty common and more likely viewed as something that they deserve then an act of commerce. Besides this discussion adding the nofollow tag could prevent any issues with side wide links but reduces any SEO benefits to zero. Another option is adding the nofollow tag to all the links expect the one on the homepage. 3. Anchor text and descriptive text Since anchor texts play a big role in SEO (and in detecting spam) I’m interested in your opinion about the use of anchor texts with such links. Just the company name or the web address sounds like a safe choice (especially with side wide links) but it’s pretty attempting to link words like “Webdesign” instead of the company name. Do you think it’s safe to use this, or any other keywords in 0,5,10,15,20,25% of the times? And do you think the descriptive text “Webdesign and SEO by” got any value (or causes potential risks) when added before the link? 4. Alternatives or extra link opportunities Here are some other options I found and thought about considering getting links from client websites. Asking, or earning a link in their first blogpost. Yjpiieee our website is online, thanks guys of company X. Links in the disclaimer or legal parts of the website. Link in the main content of the about us. Most likely in the bottom a little section about the credits of the design etc. Links on partner / friend / links pages of the website. I saw all of these links in the backlink profiles of our competitors. Last but not least, my current standpoint: At this moment we ask our clients if we may place a small text and link in the footer of their website next to the copyright claim. We use texts like “Webdesign and SEO by Web Whales”. With only our brand name as anchor text (to avoid penalties). It’s a side wide follow link. Side wide because we want the exposure and follow because we want the SEO benefit. We considered just making the homepage link follow, but this kind of feels like manipulation so we just went for all follow since this is pretty normal on the web. Beside that we celebrate new websites with our clients to increase the change getting mentioned on the first blog or partner page. Occasionally we ask them for links on these pages. What’s your opinion about this topic?
Web Design | | Bob_van_Biezen0 -
Duplicate Content? Designing new site, but all content got indexed on developer's sandbox
An ecommerce I'm helping is getting a complete redesign. Their developer had a sandbox version of their new site for design & testing. Several thousand products were loaded into the sandbox site. Then Google/Bing crawled and indexed the site (because developer didn't have a robots.txt), picking up and caching about 7,200 pages. There were even 2-3 orders placed on the sandbox site, so people were finding it. So what happens now?
Web Design | | trafficmotion
When the sandbox site is transferred to the final version on the proper domain, is there a duplicate content issue?
How can the developer fix this?0 -
Responsive Web Design WordPress Template Suggestions
Does anyone have any RWD WP templates they would suggest? It's for a friend of mine that is starting a local solar panel installation company. For the beginning, he likely will not have more than a handful of categories and subcategories. I'd say no more than 50 total pages. Any suggestions would help. He doesn't want to spend more than $50 - $100, but he's not married to that figure if it's worth it. Thanks everyone, Ruben
Web Design | | KempRugeLawGroup0 -
For a web design firm, should i make a google plus local page or company page?
I have a web design firm located in India, At this moment we are focusing on local clients as the current competition in local market is very low. But in few months we will shift our focus to outsourcing. So I wanted to know if we should make a google plus local page and connect it with my google places account and website or should I make a google plus business page and connect it to website? Our major focus is on seo. Thanks
Web Design | | hard0 -
What do web designers consider to be SEO
I'm putting together an article about Web Designers and SEO. The basic crux is that most designers will at most (if you are lucky) add in title tags, maybe pretty URL's and HTML links and call it SEO friendly. (lot's who don't probably but also lot's who are even worse) Of course I want it to be a bit controversial so please feel free to let rip. My argument is clients who have previously had site's that have had "SEO on them", know think that all SEO is a waste of time as their previous experience didn't produce the traffic and sales they were expecting. I don't know many designers who independently consider a site marketing strategy and how a site is going to generate links in the long term. I'm sure most of us have read this post on SEO responsiblities but becasue the first port of call for most business owners are the web designers, our offering is undermined by their misunderstandings and in some cases mis-sellings. So under the working title, "Why Web Designers Are Bad For SEO", any care to share some imput.
Web Design | | FDC1