{"id":4165,"date":"2023-05-17T08:11:39","date_gmt":"2023-05-17T14:11:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/orcadigitalagency.com\/?p=4165"},"modified":"2024-04-15T14:18:55","modified_gmt":"2024-04-15T20:18:55","slug":"building-search-engine-friendly-b2b-websites-the-intersection-of-seo-and-website-design","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/orcadigitalagency.com\/building-search-engine-friendly-b2b-websites-the-intersection-of-seo-and-website-design\/","title":{"rendered":"Building Search Engine-Friendly B2B Websites: The Intersection of SEO and Website Design"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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If you are a manufacturing company looking to improve your online presence, then you need to consider search engine optimization (SEO) when designing your website. SEO is critical in today’s digital marketing world because organic search traffic is usually the most significant source of website visitors. Unfortunately, many companies don’t fully integrate SEO into the design of their websites, and often, it’s only an afterthought. This can cause problems for businesses because it can lead to lost traffic and potential customers.<\/span><\/p>\n

When building a new website, it’s essential to include SEO considerations in the planning stages. This way, you can build a site that’s optimized for search marketing and lead generation. My team and I have helped many businesses design and build sites that take their SEO and marketing efforts to the next level. Unfortunately, we’ve also helped many businesses recover lost SEO traffic due to poor website redesigns that failed to consider SEO.<\/span><\/p>\n

In this article, we’ll discuss the key areas to consider when building a truly optimized website. These include domains, hosting, and CMS fundamentals, as well as crawling, information architecture, mobile optimization, page speed, and usability. We’ll also delve into common pitfalls that manufacturing companies may encounter when designing a new website and maintaining their SEO traffic.<\/span><\/p>\n

SEO Web Design Fundamentals<\/h2>\n

Creating an SEO-friendly website requires careful consideration of various factors, including the domain, hosting, content management system (CMS), crawling, information architecture, mobile optimization, page speed, and usability. <\/span><\/p>\n

Domain & Hosting<\/h3>\n

To optimize website design, there are several key components that must be considered. First, a website’s domain name should be singular and easily recognizable, with all variations redirecting to the main URL. A brand-led domain is typically preferable to one crammed with keywords, which can negatively affect search engine rankings.<\/span><\/p>\n

Secondly, website hosting is essential and should be of high quality to ensure a fast and reliable user experience. The hosting location should be close to the intended audience, and ideally specific to the platform used, such as WordPress hosting for WordPress-based sites.<\/span><\/p>\n

CMS (Content Management System)<\/h3>\n

The content management system (CMS) used to manage website content can significantly impact a site’s success. Popular CMS platforms like WordPress are generally a safe choice, as they are technically sound and easy to optimize. However, it’s essential to choose a CMS based on unique requirements and not just rely on a web agency’s preference.<\/span><\/p>\n

When it comes to CMS, go with the platform that works best for your business needs, whether it’s WordPress or another popular option.<\/span><\/p>\n

The first step in ensuring a search engine can crawl your website is by ensuring that it can understand what your website is about. Ensure that your site’s content is text-based, and that it’s well-written and sensibly optimized. Images, videos, PDFs, and content are also crucial elements that can be a source of search engine traffic, so ensure that they are well-named, organized, and discoverable for indexing (yet not overdone or slowing down page load speeds).<\/span><\/p>\n

Website Crawling & Accessibility<\/h2>\n

The first crucial step to make your website accessible to search engines is to ensure that it can be effectively crawled and comprehended. This entails allowing search engines to easily navigate your site and understand the nature and location of your business.<\/span><\/p>\n

Indexing<\/h3>\n

To index your content beyond the home page, you need <\/span>internal links <\/span>that search engines can crawl. Your primary navigation, search engine directives, and tools like XML sitemaps can help search engines crawl your site and discover new pages. In terms of information architecture, think of your website as a filing cabinet, where your site is the filing cabinet, high-level categories are the drawers, subcategories are the folders, and individual documents\/pages are the files.<\/span><\/p>\n

Although search engines are equipped with AI technology, the written word remains the cornerstone of search engine optimization. So, it is important to create well-written and sensibly optimized content that can be easily indexed by search engines.<\/span><\/p>\n

Images, videos, PDFs, and other forms of content are also important, and can be a potential source of traffic from search engines. However, they must be appropriately named, categorized, and easily discoverable to be effectively indexed.<\/span><\/p>\n

Link Structure<\/h3>\n

Link structure<\/b> is a crucial aspect of making sure search engines can index all of the content on your website, not just the home page. Internal links within your website allow search engines to crawl through all of the pages and discover new ones.<\/span><\/p>\n

There are several tools that can help with this process. Your primary navigation, for example, should be designed in a way that allows search engines to easily access all pages on your site. Search engine directives, such as meta tags, also provide guidance to search engines on which pages to crawl and how often to crawl them. Additionally, XML sitemaps can be used to provide search engines with a roadmap of all the pages on your site, helping to ensure that they are all indexed and available in search results.<\/span><\/p>\n

Information Architecture and Structuring Your Website<\/h2>\n

Organizing your <\/span>website’s information architecture<\/b> is essential to ensure that users and search engines can easily navigate your site and find relevant content.<\/span><\/p>\n

One way to think about this is to use the analogy of a filing cabinet. Just as a filing cabinet has drawers, folders, and files, your website has high-level categories, subcategories, and individual pages.<\/span><\/p>\n

For instance, if you have a section on your website for services, then that section would be a drawer, and each type of service you offer would be a folder within that drawer. The individual pages describing each service would be the files within those folders.<\/span><\/p>\n

By structuring your site in this way, you can provide additional contextual information about the content on any given page. This not only helps Google understand what your site is about but also helps your users find what they’re looking for quickly and easily.<\/span><\/p>\n

It’s important to keep in mind that your website’s structure should be organized in a way that makes sense and simplifies navigation and discovery. A three- to four-level approach is often the most effective, as it ensures that most content can be accessed within three to four clicks.<\/span><\/p>\n

Ultimately, the goal is to structure the information about your business in a way that is understandable to both people and search engines. This applies to all types of content on your site, including blog posts, articles, FAQ content, services, locations, and anything else that’s relevant to your business.<\/span><\/p>\n

URLS<\/h3>\n

The <\/span>URL<\/b> of a webpage provides important context to search engines and human users. A well-thought-out naming convention for your URLs can help provide even more context and information about the content of your page.<\/span><\/p>\n

For example, let’s say you have a webpage that falls under the <\/span>Services > SEO > SEO audit category.<\/b> The URLs for this page can be structured in two ways: one that makes sense, and another that does not.<\/span><\/p>\n

In this example, the URLs follow a logical naming convention and provide clear context. The URLs look like this: <\/span>www.example.com\/services\/seo\/audits<\/b>\/. This URL structure can help search engines and users understand that the page falls under the Services category, specifically the SEO subcategory, and the SEO audit subcategory within that.<\/span><\/p>\n

In this second example, the URLs are haphazardly named and do not provide any useful context. The URLs look like this: <\/span>www.example.com\/s123\/s1\/75\/.<\/b> This URL structure does not help search engines or users understand what the content of the page is about.<\/span><\/p>\n

Having a logical and sensible URL structure further enhances the contextual signals provided by your website’s information architecture. It makes it easier for search engines to crawl and understand your content, and it helps users navigate your site more efficiently.<\/span><\/p>\n

Navigation<\/h3>\n

Designing an SEO-friendly website navigation is crucial to indicate the importance of a page within the set of pages and provide more context. A text-based navigation system is preferred to help send signals about the keywords that a specific page should rank for.<\/span><\/p>\n

To explain website navigation, the analogy of a signpost is often used. A user needs to find the information they are looking for quickly, and your website should provide clear signposts to guide them.<\/span><\/p>\n

However, it’s essential to avoid overcomplicating navigation with too many links and irrelevant pages. The goal is to keep the navigation simple and user-friendly.<\/span><\/p>\n

For instance, consider a signpost in a local home improvement store that leads to either the car park or deliveries entrance. Confusing and unclear signposts can frustrate users and result in a negative experience. Therefore, navigation should be straightforward and logical, allowing users to find what they’re looking for easily.<\/span><\/p>\n

Make the most out of your website navigation by providing a user-friendly experience that meets people’s expectations, avoids confusion, and ultimately prevents them from leaving and turning to your competitors. This can be achieved by keeping the navigation simple and easy to use, highlighting your most important pages, and minimizing the need for users to think too much when navigating your website.<\/span><\/p>\n

It’s important to ensure that your website’s content is easily discoverable and understandable by both users and search engines. Common problems that can hinder this include orphaned content that can’t be found, content that’s only available via site search, Flash or Java programs, audio or video files, AJAX and flashy site effects, frames, and subdomains. These issues can make it difficult for users to find and understand your content, which can ultimately hurt your search engine rankings and drive traffic to your competitors.<\/span><\/p>\n

Common Pitfalls<\/h3>\n

To avoid these problems, it’s important to ensure that important content is easily discoverable and sits within the overall structure of your site in a way that makes sense. This includes creating a clear information architecture and site structure, using a sensible naming convention for URLs, and building an SEO-friendly navigation that promotes your most important pages and makes it easy for users to find what they’re looking for.<\/span><\/p>\n

By following these best practices and avoiding common mistakes, you can help ensure that both humans and search engines have a clear understanding of what your site is about and can easily find and navigate your content. This lays a solid foundation for your SEO efforts, allowing you to build on this foundation to drive more traffic and achieve better search engine rankings.<\/span><\/p>\n

Mobile Friendliness<\/h3>\n

In today’s mobile-centric world, having a mobile-friendly design is a crucial consideration for businesses to attract and retain customers. Many users interact with businesses primarily through their mobile devices, making it essential to ensure that websites are optimized for mobile browsing. It is not enough to simply have a responsive design. Creating truly mobile-friendly websites involves several key factors that go beyond simple responsive design. Mobile-friendliness is a confirmed ranking factor for mobile search, and the mobile version of your site is the one that search engines will use to rank your site.<\/span><\/p>\n

Page Speed<\/h3>\n

Page speed is another important consideration in mobile SEO-friendly website design. In today’s fast-paced world, users are often impatient and want websites to load quickly, particularly on mobile devices where data connections may be less reliable. Google’s mobile-friendly test is an excellent tool for providing feedback on mobile speed and desktop speed, as well as suggestions for how to speed up website loading times.<\/span><\/p>\n

Usability<\/h3>\n

Usability is another vital consideration in creating SEO-friendly websites. It involves several factors, including device-specific design, page speed, intuitive site navigation, and form entry. Web usability should be tailored to each site’s specific needs and target audience. Design elements such as page layout, visual hierarchy, home page and site navigation, site search, and form entry can greatly impact usability and contribute to a positive user experience.<\/span><\/p>\n

To create a more user-friendly website, resources such as Steve Krug’s book, <\/span>“Don’t Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability,”<\/b> and mobile optimization checklists can be useful tools. Ultimately, creating an SEO-friendly website that meets the needs and expectations of its users is critical to success in today’s mobile-centric world.<\/span><\/p>\n

Keyword Research<\/h2>\n

Keyword research is an essential aspect & guiding light of any successful content strategy. It helps identify the terms and phrases that your target audience is using to search for your products or services as a prerequisite to building out the content map. Integrating keyword research into your content strategy can help you create content that is optimized for search engines, relevant to your audience, and provides value to your customers.<\/span><\/p>\n

However, it is important to remember that Google is increasingly focused on ranking content based on its ability to <\/span>provide helpful and relevant information to users<\/i><\/b>, not just based on the presence of keywords. Therefore, while keyword research is important, it should not be the sole focus of your content strategy.<\/span><\/p>\n

Here are some tips for integrating keyword research into your content strategy:<\/b><\/p>\n