There are three “buckets” of website positioning, and getting the fundamentals proper on every will assist out vastly – and don’t require a full-on knowledgeable, however might require a while and a focus.
1. Technical: The web site itself – is it accessible by Google (do you might have Search Console arrange, have you ever submitted a website map to it – really very straightforward to do!), are there many error (404) pages? Are there many redirects? Is it accessible throughout completely different units?
This additionally covers UX points, like “does the navigation make sense” and what number of clicks wouldn’t it take for a consumer to get to the place they wish to go; as an example, you probably have a search bar, do folks have to make use of it to seek out the most-wanted content material on the positioning? They shouldn;’t should – that ought to be clickable from the homepage.
Basically, the individuals who make your website want to make sure that it’s usable, not simply fancy wanting. Additionally, if you’re doing a web site refresh that includes shifting content material (let’s say AAM was altering the positioning and all of the pages with a query on them had /query/ within the URL) have to have a redirect map and redirection plan, so examine in on that. Refreshes typically result in older content material being “orphaned”, so stray hyperlinks might exist onsite and throughout the net that go to 404 pages – these will be simply prevented with cautious planning.
2. Content material: Is the content material accessible – do you might have alt textual content on key photographs, is it readable, do you hyperlink between related content material? Is the content material related – I’ve gone to organisation’s house pages and been mystified by what they really do as a result of the homepage is all branding, no element. And, for Google and for folks, is your content material findable? Which will be so simple as checking that the meta knowledge is evident – meta knowledge covers issues just like the web page title (which on this web page is “information swap! share your experience with folks right here”), the title tag (what’s displayed on the browser tab, right here it’s “information swap! share your experience with folks right here – Ask a Supervisor”), in addition to any subheadings (H tags). You don’t have to cram these with key phrases, it’s essential make them clear and correct; for instance, if Alison had named this web page “AAM – KnowSwap Time – publish your finest data under” it would type of make sense to an everyday reader in context, however it’s gibberish to most individuals. To your org, presumably you might have content material on the who-what-where-how of what you do, make sure that, say, the employees data web page doesn’t have an insider-only identify like “Da Skwad” however known as one thing like “[Org Name] Folks – Workers Contact Data”. Google is sweet at picture studying, however nonetheless use captions and alt textual content on vital photographs.
And with content material, use frequent sense – keep away from churned-out AI slop or relying an excessive amount of on inventory imagery, photographs/movies which can be sized weirdly or introduced with out context.
If you’re an org with a bodily presence and site(s) are vital – e.g. should you’re a store or a neighborhood centre – be sure you have your location data simply findable (like within the footer of the web page) and a devoted location web page with contact data, and ideally full your Google Enterprise Profile, Apple Maps, and Bing Maps profiles.
If you’re promoting and have a number of merchandise with completely different variations, examine to see how Google is displaying these variations – Search Console is sweet for this.
Additionally, don’t fear about social share buttons, some CSS have them baked in nonetheless, even now, however disable them should you can – nobody clicks on them they usually take up further time to load on the positioning including to total load time.
3. Offsite – this basically is your web site’s “popularity” on-line, it’s footprint; it’s each exterior web site/on-line entity that connects to yours. That is a part of why redirections are vital, if the NY Occasions is linking to a web page in your web site and also you orphan it, that’s a nasty search for website positioning. There’s a complete world of “linkbuilding” actions, however as an alternative of worrying about that, if you’re doing a web site refresh the bottom line is to keep up your current hyperlink profile for a begin, and examine the place persons are linking to – Search Console is an efficient begin, it could additionally present any dodgy websites linking to yours (that mentioned, nowadays “poisonous” hyperlinks are much less of a problem than they was, thoughts you there was a Russian bot assault just lately that prompted havoc on a great deal of web sites, so that you do want to concentrate on what’s on the market). And examine your hygiene – do your social profiles hyperlink to the right homepage or contact web page? (Once more, so typically folks don’t! I had a shopper who spent half one million on a marketing campaign on social media and by no means as soon as added a hyperlink to any publish to the web site that they had constructed to help it. Or one other shopper who had a year-old promotional contest as their IG hyperlink, should you clicked it, 404 error). Are your listings on related directories correct (e.g. my native yoga trainer works out of a neighborhood centre, I acquired her to verify her web site is listed on their web site)?
Together with these issues, the opposite key factor to think about for a web site refresh is analytics. Google switched their analytics platform final yr, so presumably if you’re utilizing GA you might have already moved to GA4, however interested by what you wish to measure and the way, and that it;s correct, is vital in planning a web site change.
Take into consideration this stuff forward of a web site change, not after. First rate planning will save a lot time!
