The success of your digital marketing campaigns rely heavily on your website design. The organic traffic you generate will ultimately lead to your website, and its design will determine your conversion rate.

Undoubtedly, paid traffic matters, but you just can’t survive without organic traffic, so you have to invest your money and efforts into an SEO-friendly website.

Ideally, you need to consider search engine optimization while your website is still in the planning stage. In fact, you need a joined-up site plan and SEO strategy to enjoy online success.

But how do you design such a website? Here is how you should proceed:

Understand More about Core Web Vitals

Core Web Vitals (CWV) combines different metrics that Google considers when deciding how user-friendly your website is. User experience is one of the most important ranking factors, so you just can’t afford to ignore CWV.

The good thing is that you can check the initial state of your website simply by using SEO services and paid software solutions. Many tools are now available to get you started. However, to make a choice, you can read some reviews offering an SEO platform comparison. Compare different options and pick one that suits your business needs and budget.

Here are some of the performance indicators to check:

· Largest Contentful Paint (LCP): Largest Contentful Paint or LCP is a performance metric by Google that measures the speed of page loading, specifically in how long the largest piece of content (picture, text, etc.) becomes visible on the page clicked. 2.5 seconds or less are considered good LCP, which ensures a positive user experience.

· First Input Delay (FID): The response time between the first time a user clicks on something on a website and the opening of that page is measured and noticed by FID.

· Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS): CLS analyzes how much of the page layout is displaced while the page is loading. A CLS of 0.1 or less is considered a good CLS, which means that the page was stable and not distracting for the user.

Once you know the metrics to track, you need a toolkit to monitor their performance. Again, using well-rounded SEO software is the way to go, but here are some other ways to keep track of things:

· PageSpeed Insights: This tool offers suggestions for areas of improvement after analyzing LCP, FID, and CLS. PageSpeed Insights is essential to identify and keep track of any issues.

· Google Search Console: The Google Search Console analyzes data of real users, and based on user interaction, it provides perspective into where optimization is required.

· Content Delivery Networks (CDNs): This solution helps improve LCP by providing faster loading options by using different servers nearer to the user.

· Image Optimization: LCP can be improved significantly by reducing the size of images or compressing them into WebP formats.

Moreover, you can also improve core web vitals by minifying files and defining media dimensions. Minifying means simplifying the codes and file sizes to ensure improved LCP and FID. Similarly, defining the size of the images, videos, and text content can help enhance CLS.

2. Focus on Mobile-First Design

Since Google introduced the mobile-first ranking parameter, website ranking has changed drastically.

Mobile optimization has become a priority because mobile versions are indexed first, as people find it more convenient to use their mobiles for searches. Websites that do not offer a smooth user experience on mobile are often at risk of not being visible to mobile users.

A mobile-optimized website needs to offer a responsive, seamless user experience. Here are a few SEO website design tips that can help achieve that.

· Breakpoints: Intelligent breakpoints mean the page doesn’t break at a set pattern. The more modern designs are intelligent enough to adapt based on the device. For example, the screen sizes differ for a phone and a tablet, and a thoughtful design knows how to adapt to both.

· Typography: The text needs to be readable. It’s important to stick with responsive typography techniques, and factors such as different fonts and fluid typography make a big difference, making the text readable and adaptable to the screen.

· Lazy Loading: On mobile-friendly sites, lazy loading helps prioritize content. This reduces the page load time significantly, giving users a positive experience.

In addition to the adaptive design, which covers the UX part of the customer journey, the mobile site also needs to be technically optimized. It involves paying attention to:

· Flow of Content

· Touch and Clicks Optimization

· Utilize features designed for mobiles, such as camera, push notification, location, etc.

· Accelerated Mobile Pages to enhance load time

3. Improve User Experience (UX) Design

Essentially, SEO for websites and UX are correlated, as B2C and B2B User Experience play important roles in indexing and ranking.

Google’s algorithm prioritizes performance indicators such as page load speed, mobile optimization, and relevancy. The Core Web Vitals by Google directly affect the rankings because user experience is essential.

Enhancing Usability with Functional Design and Easy Navigation

Usability will always remain the cornerstone of your website’s success. Therefore, the UX needs to be positive for it to impact SEO. A site with all the relevant information in the correct flow allows users to find the requested details easily.

A clear, easy-to-read layout with a menu and categories make it an SEO-friendly web design. For example, on Amazon, an order can be placed with one simple click, reducing complicated steps and encouraging more traffic.

Make Web Design Accessible

The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) state that websites need to be POUR–perceivable, Operable, Understandable, and Robust. This means that images must have alternate text, captions for videos, etc.

A considerable percentage of adults in the U.S. may need assistance with technology to connect online due to disabilities. Hence, designing with accessibility in mind fulfills the ADA laws, makes your site inclusive, and enhances your user base. An example of inclusive website design for SEO may involve using larger fonts and easy-to-read color combinations.

4. Focus on Generating Quality Content

Many elements determine the quality of content, and here’s what you should always pay attention to.

Focus on EAT – Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness

Google’s algorithm in 2024 focuses on EAT, which requires that the content be created by experts, such as medical content created by people from the healthcare sector.

Google has updated its protocols to give preference to content that reflects an expert opinion, authority, and trust, more so for health, safety, and finance topics.

Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness can be achieved if the content has some credentials of the authors mentioned or links to some serious sources. For example, a post about a recent medical achievement should be backed by quotes from senior doctors or reputable research journals and studies.

User-Centric Content Creation

To make sure your content aids in ranking, understand what the user expects from your site.

The intent of the user to visit your site can be in the categories of information, navigation, and transactions.

If the user is searching for “how to design an SEO-friendly website” or “how to start ecommerce marketing, there should be a step-by-step, easy-to-understand, and follow set of instructions in your content.

Incorporating Relevant Multimedia Elements

Images, infographics, videos, gifs, etc., are all forms of visual storytelling and help improve SEO rankings as users are more engaged.

Video content can ensure that users spend more time on the site as they watch the video. A site with relatable images and content generally has a 94% higher chance of being visited.

You can add high-quality images with alternate text to enhance visibility and SEO. Moreover, infographics are an excellent visual element for your informative site.

5. Focus on On-Page SEO

On-page SEO needs to be carefully considered to successfully create an SEO-friendly website in 2024.

Title and Meta Tags

Title tags are headings seen in search results and browser tabs. They should be short and sweet, between 50 and 60 characters, explaining what the page is about.

Meta Descriptions don’t directly affect ranking; however, they do influence the click-through rates. These should include main keywords, be descriptive and convincing, and should not have more than 150-160 characters.

Content Structure with Header Tags (H1, H2, H3)

Header Tags can help with both UX and search engine optimization. The content needs to be structured properly, with H1 being the topic title with a primary keyword in it, followed by H2 and H3 for sections and subheadings.

Alternate Text for Images and File Names

Use images with proper descriptive names instead of “image 1” as these can also help visibility in search engines.

6. Refine Website Layout and Navigation

Both search engine optimization and a good experience for the user require the website to have a structured layout. Here’s how that can be achieved:

Make it Simple Yet Logical

A logical site makes it easier for search engines to index your site as they evaluate the relevancy of different pages of your website.

When creating your site’s layout:

· Keep hierarchy in mind, the main pages near the root domain

· Simple, self-explanatory URLs reflecting the content

· Avoid complicating with subfolders or unnecessary steps

Use Breadcrumb Navigation

Breadcrumbs are essentially “links” found near the top of a web page. Breadcrumb navigation is more like a trail of text links, clearly highlighting the user’s location on a website. It makes it easier for users to move to higher pages, significantly improving user experience

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Indeed, breadcrumbs navigation may not be as crucial for small or flat sites, but you just can’t do without it for sites with deep site architecture. But, in any case, implementing breadcrumbs can offer SEO benefits to all types of sites

The most efficient way to execute breadcrumb navigation is:

· Be consistent throughout all site pages

· The labels should be relevant to the content

· Structure the data properly so that search engines can also pick up on the context

Execute XML Sitemap and Robots.txt File to Index

An XML sitemap offers a complete peek into your site for search engines, including pages, metadata, latest dates of modifications, etc., which in turn helps search engines index the content easily.

On the other hand, the robots.txt file is a supplement to the XML sitemap, which directs search engine crawlers regarding which pages to index and which to disregard.

Conclusion

Designing a search engine-friendly website can be easy if you follow a few basic rules. Many factors, such as the Core Web Vitals, quality content generation, etc., can help your site get indexed on Google and other search engines. But be sure to use a tool to monitor your performance and learn what changes can help achieve better results.