Search engine optimization is critical to websites performance. However, many US businesses concentrate more on design than search engine optimization. SEO creates a less imperfect website than the competition; hence, a better chance of ranking higher in search engines than the competition.

Combining SEO and design is the best way to rank better on the search engine results page(SERPS). A poor bad graphic design squander the organic equity.

Importance of Web Design in SEO website navigation

You may wonder: why is design important? User experience is a critical factor in search engine ranking. Your website's design and how visitors interact with different aspects affect that website ranking in SERPs.

A navigation structure guides users through the brand experience. It affects significant metrics such as bounce rate, average page on time, conversion rate, and engagement rate. These factors can also increase revenue and profits.

Through clear navigation, search engine crawlers find and crawl the content.Besides, a navigation system helps the search engines to understand the most critical pages on your website. This helps shape page authority.

It's hard for web crawlers to locate important pages on incomplete and overcrowded navigation systems. Similarly, poor navigation systems dilute link equity.

Also, broken links result in 404-error, meaning the page is non-existent. Visitors cannot stay on such a page. So, design attention-grabbing 404 pages instead of using generic designs. Also, you can list essential web pages on the 404 pages.

Ideally, the design choice can alter how visitors view your website. Ensure that a navigation design fits well with the rest of the website design.

Tips to Achieve Clear navigation on Your Site

A website is insignificant if visitors cannot find the solution to their problem. So, the navigation design of your website must make sense not only to your internal team and your visitors. Build better relationships with your visitors and reduce bounce rates by creating an easy-to-use website.

The website navigation is like your visitor's roadmap. Typically, you are providing direction on where to go. How do you achieve clear navigation?

  • Put your navigation menu at the top of the page, and it should lead in the right direction.
  • Make the menu very simple, i.e., limit the number of items. Include only top-level pages like About Us, Why Us, and Products/Services pages.
  • Use simple terminologies in the main menu, i.e., avoid technical jargons
  • Use Subpages/Sub-navigation to breakdown navigation choices. Use SEO
  • Add a search bar for visitors to quickly locate a page of interest
  • Ensure each page URL is clear, concise, and descriptive
  • The main menu must be accessible to smaller mobile devices

However, a practical navigation menu that also supports SEO strategy comes with some tradeoffs. For instance, you may forego some creativity for user-friendliness and intuitiveness. For ways better navigate the a website, professional website design service can help you fix it.

Which Content Strategy? is Less More, or is More Better?

Less content grabs attention, but a longer message informs the reader.

Less is More.

The attention span for website users is about 7 seconds. When web pages take a long time to load, the bounce rate is higher.

Shorter is preferable when:

  • Your target is the general public
  • Your audience is familiar with a service/product
  • Your service/product is straightforward

So, focus on publishing high-quality and rich content, i.e., show industry expertise via your content. Google focuses more on ranking premium quality content.

500-word blog posts, 30-second video ads, and micro-content, e.g., tweets and status updates,perform well on smartphones.

Sadly, short content has a short life span. Therefore, you need to produce them constantly.

Shorter is beneficial in:

  • Generating traffic
  • Increasing click-through rates
  • Generating qualified leads.
  • Previewing long-form content

Long-Form content

Macro content works well when you break it into digestible form. Besides, intersperse it with images. Search engines prefer longer content. Why? People who know more about a subject say more, i.e., offermore knowledge. According to BackLinko, longer articles have more social media shares than shorter articles.

Use long-form content when dealing with unique, more expensive, and technical products/services. Such products/services require in-depth explanations. But the content must be authoritative, giving more scope and engaging.

Indexable Pages Appear on SERPs

Sites not on a search engines index are not discoverable. Search engines use the index (database)as they contain all data that search engines find. Therefore, the data in the search engines index determines the value of different keywords and search terms.

The index includes URLs, content (texts, images, videos), and everything within the URL's HTML code. Search engine algorithms apply data and measure the frequency of different aspects under the various circumstance to index web pages.

Gathered information from web crawlers flows back to the search engines offering more knowledge about the index data. The evaluation is the analysis of the subject covered alongside an attempt to understand the content that best meets a particular user intent. When a user types your keyword or link, it will be indexed.

Therefore, indexable content will make your web page rank on search engines. Ensure that the content is available and up to date. If a web crawler encounters404 error pages, it may cease indexing your pages. Similarly, avoid orphan pages as they may interrupt bots from crawling your website. Note that these pages aren't connected with the rest of your website with internal links, and you can't access them through incoming links.

Optimize Product and Website Images for Better Ranking

Images are a bigger part of the design and visual communications. They add value and increase user engagement and website accessibility. Therefore, they can generate a lot of web traffic from image-based search engines such as Google.

Over 85%of all US web searches happen on Google. Therefore, optimizing your site photos and images is a way of capturing your visitor's attention. Here are a few ways to optimize the pictures to allow web crawlers to spot them:

  • Scaling images - this improves page load speed. Size your images into proper width, height, and resolution quality. Too large images affect load times, while fuzzy images degrade website quality.
  • Use the proper format. JPEG and PNG are the major formats. PNG has better quality images, but files are larger. JPEG isn't top quality but allows you to adjust the quality level to find a good balance.
  • Create SEO-Friendly Alt Text. Alt tags describe the image content, and a browser uses them if it cannot render images correctly. With appropriate alt tags, your website can achieve better ranking – search engines associates keywords with images.
  • Image file names – name the files using words that describe them accurately and clearly, e.g., running shoes and not image 01.

Conclusion

The worlds of web design and SEO are merging closer each day. The various design-specific elements produce a positive impact on SEO for sites that use them.The idea is to have a well-balanced website. Such a site strikes a perfect balance between attraction, functionality, and SEO. If a web page doesn’t load properly, the website only shows text. Here, functionality is hampered. Visitors must always find the information they want, including visuals. So, make the information available and easy to find.A good user design influences longer visitor sessions, thus, lower bounce rates. It is aesthetically appealing, and general navigation across the website is much easier.