Overview | Download Speed | Web Page graphics | Search Engine Optimization | Scanning and Skimming
Text Copy | Navigation | Frames | Scripts
Search Engine Optimization:
Is important for surfers to be able to find your web site readily on the Internet, especially in the areas of your expertise or market niche. This effort would be helped tremendously if your web site appears early on in the search results of various search engines when someone does a search for a keyword phrase relevant to your web site. The process of making your web site search engine friendly is called SEO, the acronym for Search Engine Optimization. This deals with your treatment of various web page HTML elements such as the title tag, different meta tags, image alt tags, and page copy. The idea is to announce to the search engine indexing spiders what your web site is about, so that it can be indexed favourably within the search engine databases.
SEO is an ever-changing process due to the fact that the indexing algorithms of search engines are continuously changing to combat spamming and unfair manipulation of search results. Additionally, different search engines will apply different weight to the same SEO elements of your web site Before the domination of web search by Google, meta tags were the primary element used by search engines to index web sites. Now most search engines will analyze the body text (text that is visible to the web surfer) and linkages to and from your web site to determine its relevance and popularity. The web designer has to exercise best efforts to keep abreast of such changing trends and adapt his/her SEO efforts accordingly.
Scanning and Skimming:
Scanning and skimming is what visitors tend to do when they first access a web site.
Scanning refers to the activity of quickly glancing over the elements of the landing page to decide if it is where he/she wants to be. Skimming is a cursory reading of available text to confirm that decision.
Page layout and graphics elements affect the first decision by providing subliminal cues or direct announcements of what the web site is about. Use of bulleted text lines, different text colors and font sizes reinforce the second decision by allowing the visitor to easily pick out the key phrases and unique features of your web site.
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