Web Design & SEO Blog

Like anything that achieves a certain level of popularity, the process of SEO is vulnerable to those who wish to cheat the system. Most companies practicing SEO do so in line with best practice guidelines, creating strong links through personal interaction, communication and great content. However, there are several link-building techniques which can lead to a site being blacklisted. [Read On]

The visual equivalent of a call to action, buttons are becoming increasingly popular on websites as the quickest and easiest way to convert potential clients’ interest. Whether it’s subscribe, buy, follow or friend, there are buttons for all actions and they provide a clear, simple visual indicator of how your visitor can achieve their (and your) aim. [Read On]

Yahoo! reached a key milestone in their search engine alliance with Microsoft last week as vital back-end functions of Yahoo! Search were transferred over to the Microsoft Bing platform. This is the first stage in Yahoo!’s long-term plan to improve the overall relevance of organic search results and attract a larger audience. [Read On]

Earlier this month, Google and mobile phone giant Verizon made a joint policy announcement that they believe will safeguard the future of the internet, possibly at the expense of the all-important issue of net neutrality. The stated aim of this policy, which it is hoped will be considered by congress, is to ‘establish a new and enforceable prohibition against discrimination in wireline Internet services." [Read On]

There are several different ways in which you can optimise your website and drive it up the rankings. You can optimise the text and images, including the correct density and frequency of keywords, or you can focus on building your online reputation through other people’s recommendations. On the Internet, that means achieving as many links to your site from other pages as possible. [Read On]

When optimising content for a website, there are three measures to apply to keywords: density, frequency and prominence. Although the three distinctly overlap, they are all treated differently by search engines and should be looked at individually when applying SEO to any text. [Read On]

Images are one of the most important, and trickiest, elements of web design. They are necessary to aid consumer engagement and create visual interest across a page, but they are indexed in very different ways to text. Until recently, overusing images on a site could negatively impact on its ranking, taking away essential space for robot-attracting content; however, all this has changed with the advent of Google Images, which has given pictorial content a place in SEO. [Read On]

Google has suffered a rare defeat in the world of social media this week, as it was announced development on its flagship social product, Wave, will be stopped at the end of the year due to lack of interest. [Read On]

Search Engine Optimisation is largely to do with the content of a website. It is here that you need to insert keywords, create meta-tags and ensure the right level of density and quality to attract higher rankings. That doesn’t mean, however, that SEO is unrelated to web design. On the contrary, a well-designed website can aid in gaining stronger rankings and every website design needs to be influenced by a working knowledge of SEO. [Read On]

With so many social media platforms now available, each targeting a slightly different audience, the first step in any successful campaign is to delineate your target audience and work out which platform is most likely to appeal to them. Only then can you set realistic goals for your campaign and work to achieve them. [Read On]