What is the Difference Between Website Design and SEO Website Design?

The difference between website design and SEO website design is the approach to each element of design. Many sites can look good but do they meet the expectations of search engines like Google. Pages make up a website. So each page needs to be optimized to meet search engine optimization (SEO) requirements.

The structure and navigation of a site is part of the SEO process. Any user or users who land on a page will follow the design flow as well as the content navigation, this is an example of great design. The marketing SEO of that page or pages, will have a user, make a decision meaning take action also referred to as a call to action (CTA).

A good looking website is awesome, however, a SEO web design from the right digital marketing professional would look awesome and increase the traffic on mobile, tablets, and desktops

What is Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Web Design?

Search engine optimization (SEO) are distinct services offered side by side as an approach for professional designers to follow when designing.

Digital Marketing Elements in an SEO website are:

Easy on the Eyes

Have you ever seen a site that actually bothers your eyes to read? Maybe the background is hot pink and the font color is white – this is hard to read. The goal is easy on the eyes, great SEO design includes the elements of color – color choices, color choices for the content, background, and all design aspects. The elements of font – size of font, the font type are also very important in all areas including content on the page. The length of paragraphs, use of white space, as well as considering diabled individuals and how a site would communicate with the disabled are vital to make a seamless design with SEO services.

Easy on the Eyes | Premazon Inc

Meta Tags

Meta Tags elements will help behind the scenes explain to a search engine like Google exactly what you want them to display about your web page or pages. In addition, this SEO procedure is vital to determining the title of your each page.

Meta Tags | Premazon Inc

Sitemaps

Google and every search engine will “crawl” your site to index your content within their database. A site map guides the “crawler” by directing them through your navigation to every page or group of pages you want in the search engine database. SEO will come into play by choosing what page or pages are the most important. The elements are for the backend crawler and front facing for a user. Having a site map is crucial to directing the search engines behind the scene, while having a forward facing sitemap can aid and help a user visiting your website.

Sitemaps | Premazon Inc
Content | Premazon Inc

Content

Valuable, quality content is one of the most surefire ways to improve your website’s ranking and attract organic traffic. As such, populating your site with optimized content is one of our top priorities.

To manage that, we have a powerful in-house team of optimization experts and creative writers able to put out quality optimized pieces on any relevant topic to your industry.

To that end, we make sure to:

Create a sensible keyword strategy to target the areas where you’ll benefit the most.

Add carefully written, keyword-rich content to under performing landing pages to improve their performance.

Create effective landing pages and progression funnels designed to convert more potential users.

Remove or rewrite duplicated content, as well as refresh outdated pieces.

Schema

Schema elements direct the search engines to understand exactly the meaning of the data you place on your site. The SEO part of writing the exact schema is to thoroughly research the ultimate way to explain the data to a search engine and in the results will help your users.

Schema | Premazon Inc
Mobile and Tablet Friendly | Premazon Inc

Mobile and Tablet Friendly

Google has optimization best practices and “mobile-first indexing” is huge. Believe it or not, there are still many websites that do not have fluent navigation on mobile, only on a desktop computer. You have probably seen an example of this by searching on your mobile and landing on a website that looks out of sorts. The content is squished and the navigation is almost impossible to see. When you see a mobile page like this, it is not a mobile friendly design.

Users search on a mobile phone now more than ever before, and desktop users browsing is becoming less daily.  From a design standpoint, most web designers today design a site that works for users on both mobile and desktop, the mobile SEO aspect is how things are “stacked” on the mobile version. An important item within any SEO website design and content is the call to action or “CTA”. The CTA and all content must be quickly loaded and accessible to users.

Navigation

Navigation elements are the way a user can access a web page or web pages of the website design. Most SEO web designers will create a menu and even sub menus to direct a user on how to move through the content and navigation of a development site. A SEO web design will include menus and may include pages not in the navigation menu, but rather, linked strategically to support SEO content.

Navigation | Premazon Inc
Structure | Premazon Inc

Structure

The structure of a website goes back to the sitemap. This is where every single page on your website design is shown and will direct Google, Bing, and others through the navigation to index every single page.

Website Speed

Google has the need for speed and so does most users. Google wants your website to load licky split fast for users on mobile and desktop. This factor is important from a website design, redesign and SEO aspect. Knowing the varying sizes of screens, the largest image possible would be the best to use. Having image formats being optimized is part of the services of SEO web design for mobile and desktop. Checking your work using Google services like Google Lightroom and Google Search Console make the perfect mix for the structure of SEO design and digital marketing.
Website Speed | Premazon Inc

5 SEO Web Design Tips and Process

Before beginning the actual services of SEO design, we suggest starting from a new and transparent point of view. The information gleaned from many various companies and business owners will help in the web development and management of website design and SEO services.

Understand Company Goals

The web design process begins with the need to understand the exact goals of the company. We need to get answers to following questions:

  • Who is the target audience?
  • What is the call to action?
  • Who will write the content?
  • How will images be obtained?

Clean Design

The design services must be clean and grab attention so a user takes the action we need them to take. We will agree upon browser friendly fonts and basic structure for mobile and desktop at this stage.

Trust Factors

Showing in the development or redesign of a website marketing trust factors will help us separate one website from another. Memberships, certifications, and partnerships are the best ways to show users you are an authority on the subject.

Development Environment

The development environment is where a web designer can begin the process of design services and navigation then share via private access as things are completed. Having this development accessible on mobile and desktop will make it easy to see the structure of the content from both aspects. The benefit of a development environment is to see the new progress of services, the strategy coming alive, redesign can be measured, changes can happen or pivot if not to the management or business owners liking, and it is not indexed in a search engine meaning it is private not public.

Know Your Competitors

Knowing the competitors of a business – other companies in the same niche – prior to web development services, will aid SEO teams by comparing design, structure, navigation, and content features that work and do not work.

Hosting

Where will the website live after it is completed. This is beneficial to iron out so the business owner can understand the many features and benefits the hosting company offers and determine what they will need when the developer is finished with the new project.

SEO Marketing and Design

A business owners website is the first impression of a SEO and digital marketing strategy on the Internet. Your online presence will be an example users will see about your business. Your website is your best marketing calling card for online users. Your domain name will need to be remembered. Your domain is what is purchased at a registrar like GoDaddy. In the US most companies use the .com if they are for profit companies. Non-profit organizations and foundations use .org. Although new domain extensions like .co, .biz, and .net might be available, if you can get a .com this is best domain choice and searched more often by users. The average pricing for a domain is 10.99 in the US.

Your website has the hardest job over marketing teams or sales channels in your business. Your website must rank on a search engine, show the professionalism of your company, imprint your brand into the mind of the user and lastly, engage the user and solve their need, then convert them into a customer. To top it all off, this needs to happen in under 3 seconds.

The whole purpose of SEO marketing services is to enhance a website to make it rank as high as possible during a mobile or desktop search. To achieve this ranking it is important to understand competitors in the space of the business. Once this is established from a SEO and marketing perspective, a SEO website developer can ascertain how to best make the strategy to layout the website structure, navigation, and content. A great web designer that is entrenched in SEO will approach your website with the gusto and need to beat your competitors.

SEO digital marketing looks at the development process, the structure, and the layout.  This would also include the content and backend. All with the purpose to not just be on the web but to make your marketing efforts catapult your new SEO strategy and your business as a leader on the web.

Content Guide

Your website we hope is at the center of your digital marketing strategy. All your services, everything you do from printing cards, to email signatures, to brochures, to boots on the ground sales should all lead back to the center – your website. This is not to say sales and marketing are not a need off of the web, it is to say that the web is the largest force and your marketing strategy will be a businesses best ally.

A content guide is part of building your marketing strategy. It is simple but not easy. Documenting the marketing, redesign, navigation and structure  – this is the simplicity of a content guide.

Imagine a funnel. The structure and funnel navigation leads your user on a journey to get them to take the action you would want on each and every page. If you are a service organization or an ecommerce business, every funnel is widest on the top. You can structure each page to determine are you making a friend, educating your user, showing a video, giving them facts, finding these answers are the best approach to the beginning of a content guide.

As a user moves through the content funnel or web page you then support the top of the funnel with images and data, as they move to the bottom structure, this is where there is a call to action. This is where conversion happens. They see reviews, or testimonials, or a request to call, or fill out a form.

Each page is given this type of consideration in digital marketing services and web design – it is part of the layout.

The SEO piece then combines by adding new and specific keywords or key phrases to the theme of the page of content.

These elements together are powerful.

Funnel | Premazon Inc
Linking | Premazon Inc

Further linking will occur with supporting themes and pages and before you know it – you have a built out the content guide of your website.

There are static pages to begin with and from there it is a format to follow with blog posts, articles and even curated content sections on your website. There are many ways to get curated content (gathered information from various sources around a topic or interest) for SEO purposes, Google articles, summarization tools like elink, brandvoice, or even news feeds from your favorite industry publications in the US and around the world.

Content for Mobile

Content for mobile is similar to content for desktop with one large exception. The movement of elements. What is normally left to right content reading of web sections becomes a stacked content section with left to right content reading. On mobile, the menu is collapsed and shown via a hamburger menu so the navigation is the same but appears different.

The SEO aspect is to ensure your funnel is still followed and the conversions stay in the forefront of the mobile content and digital marketing design.

Page Guide

A page guide is a detailed way to include exactly what you want on every page of your website. It is important to have brand awareness in your digital marketing and still have some elements consistent throughout the site. Premazon uses a template approach so once a client likes the template for a page, post, or article – there is consistency in services and expectations.

Colors

Colors actually have psychology behind them. When choosing your colors, we want all of your digital marketing and design colors to match your logo and print materials while getting across the exact message you want a user to see and feel when they land on your website.

  • Red – Very Stimulating, red is also the color of a stop sign, red is associated with power and aggression
  • Orange – Softer than Red while exuding friendliness and activity
  • Yellow – Heightens emotion and is a playful and happy color 
  • Green – Connects and is the universal sign of go, well-being and energy.
  • Blue – Trust and often used with medical, promotes reliability and sincerity
  • Purple – Most women are drawn to purple. Wisdom, spirituality, and creativity are seen
  • Pink – A color rarely understood and used with baby products and sweets
  • Beige – Known as the wildcard of colors, frequently used when displaying the outdoors or a earthy vibe
  • White – Simple, pure, and a quiet powerhouse – is often used as an accent color
  • Black – Luxury, timeless, and classic. Works with most accent colors

Layout

The layout will have the most impact on a clean design. There are two main approaches to the layout of pages that are designed with SEO and conversions in mind.

  • F-shaped design – a webpage, article, and search results like those on Google that have a large amount of copy, meaning text-heavy, this is the most common approach. Think of the letter F, begin at the top of the page and read right, then move left and down and read right, then follow down left.
  • Z-shaped pattern – when a page is not text oriented, this can be applied and can be continued throughout a page. The top left to right then angled down back to the left, finishing right, like the letter z is how this is used.

Videos

Although videos can be embedded in a website, it is important to not let a video take away from your digital marketing message. There are always exceptions, an example might be your whole design of the page is to get people to watch a video. From an SEO standpoint there are two things to consider:

  • Load time – this can really hurt a web page and affect a site in general if the video is not embedded correctly and it does not pass Google lighthouse suggestions.
  • Time onsite – this is a metric where video can improve your overall metrics. Google wants to know you have landed on a page you want and are pleased to spend time on the page.

Images, Icons, Favicons

Be sure to either take your own photos or use royalty free images the same applies to icons. A favicon is used site wide and can be helpful in branding this is the image that appears in a browser when someone lands on your website.

Fonts

Interesting fact, a font you might fall in love with and want to use might not be browser friendly. We suggest knowing your font choices and choosing a font that will work on Google, Bing, Safari and other web browsers. Google fonts is an easy and free tool to use when looking for the right font.

Shapes and Spacing

There is spacing everywhere on a webpage. Between letters, paragraphs, images, sections. It is better to have space than to be crammed. Shapes can actually direct the flow of information and direct your users where you want them to go. Shapes can also soften an image simply by rounding a corner. An ecommerce website can have many options on a page but the overall spacing can be a deal breaker in regards to conversion.

We have built thousands of websites since 2008 and helped hundreds of companies with their digital marketing needs. Premazon uses WordPress in our ux design services, we apply SEO to each aspect as we move through to a finished product. UX design for those unfamiliar with the term is designing digital or physical products. A website is the product referred to when using the ux term. Engagement on your website is part of offering value to your customers. Premazon works together with you to ensure proper management and to offer the services you need to have a successful experience with us and your customers.

According to Forbes “SEO is still one of the best customer acquisition strategies for locally focused businesses.”  PPC (pay per click) is an advertising option, a paid program for driving traffic. A Google Adwords ppc advertisement  for example can drive traffic quickly to a website. The pricing for paid traffic is sometimes 10 times the cost of a great SEO services strategy. Affordable pricing and affordable SEO services is what is at the heart of Premazon.

Often a paid program can be confused with design or SEO. SEO will focus on driving users to a specific page or pages via traffic and relevant content. An organic placement in Google is an example of a successful SEO tactic as well as good content. A paid program will definitely drive traffic and users to a specific page or pages, however, you pay for each user.

You can think of SEO and content as a sure way to make users land on your desktop and mobile pages. Part of our SEO and marketing is to develop each page with an example user in mind. We may have an example of multiple users for one website. We may have multiple pages dedicated to one user persona. One thing is clear, SEO and marketing are all part of establishing the correct content so that we can make each page unique for a user.

As a Google Partner, Premazon can assist with PPC services and advertising throughout the Internet, however, in the long run, a great website that is SEO optimized will increase results and conversions. Internet marketing includes understanding the management of the sales process or funnel needed to make an optimal return. When you partner with us we systematically take you through our SEO and marketing services and together decide on the pricing and management options that are the right fit.

Many Websites Need SEO

There are websites that are beautiful that need SEO services and attention. There are websites that need to be reworked or have a complete redesign with both design and SEO services. Premazon is able to help figure out the most direct process to accomplish your SEO and marketing goals and services. Our team of SEO experts and specialists work diligently with your management, the marketing manager or director of your business to accomplish the right strategy and approach for a new or redesigned website. We will guide you with best practices for Shopify or Wix sites. As Google partners, we will guide you through how to make your users visit your web pages. Google has a metric for a user time on a page. Google also approaches mobile, the mobile structure, and the mobile speed as an example of how your pages make a user stay on your site.

Remember your website is an asset and selling feature. Our services will compliment your voice online.