Design has a large impact on content visibility — so does SEO. However, there are some key SEO concepts that experts in the field struggle to communicate clearly to designers. This can create friction and the impression that most well-designed websites are very poorly optimized for SEO.
Here is an overview of what we will be covering in this article:
- Design mobile first for Google,
- Structure content for organic visibility,
- Focus on user intent (not keywords),
- Send the right signals with internal linking,
- A crash course on image SEO,
- Penalties for pop-ups,
- Say it like you mean it: voice search and assistants.
Design Mobile First For Google
This year, Google plans on indexing websites mobile first:
Our algorithms will eventually primarily use the mobile version of a site’s content to rank pages from that site, to understand structured data, and to show snippets from those pages in our results.
SO, HOW DOES THIS AFFECT WEBSITES IN TERMS OF DESIGN?
Well, it means that your website should be responsive. Responsive design isn’t about making elements fit on various screens. It is about usability. This requires shifting your thinking towards designing a consistent, high-quality experience across multiple devices.
Here are a few things that users care about when it comes to a website:
- Flexible texts and images.
People should be able to view images and read texts. No one likes looking at pixels hoping they morph into something readable or into an image. - Defined breakpoints for design changes (you can do that via CSS media queries).
- Being able to use your website on all devices.
This can mean being able to use your website in portrait or landscape mode without losing half of the features or having buttons that do not work. - A fluid site grid that aims to maintain proportions.
We won’t go into details about how to create a remarkable responsive website as this is not the main topic. However, if you want to take a deep dive into this fascinating subject, may I recommend a Smashing Book 5?
Do you need a concrete visual to help you understand why you must think about the mobile side of things from the get-go? Stéphanie Walter provided a great visual to get the point across:
