SEO and Information Architecture

This session talked about different elements you need to keep in mind when architecting your web site so that your site is search and user friendly. Architecting a web site that is search and user friendly is not supposed to be an easy task since there are many things you will need to consider. Here are some of the most important points the speakers talked about in this session:

• Do not make people think when people come to the site. The site architecture should be such that it is intuitive for the end-users to navigate the site
• It should help visitors get to the content pages easily
• A well architected site focuses on the following 3 important areas:
  • URL and Site Structure
    • Need to redirect alternate domains
    • Setup right canonical URL structure
    • URL structure should be keyword friendly
    • Home page should not have any duplicate page redirects, i.e. multiple URLs should not resolve to the home page
    • Site should have smart navigation paths
    • Ensure session ids vs. cookies are not creating duplicate content or endless loops
    • Create custom 404 redirects
    • Create flat site structure, not tall directory structure
  • Link and Navigation Structure
    • Navigation should be keyword friendly
    • Good usage of breadcrumb
    • Navigation should use anchor text
    • Linking to related content
    • Site should have effective internal search
    • It should have good usage of site map
    • Fix broken links
    • Implement 301 redirects
  • Document and Page Structure
    • Functional page hierarchy – logo should not use an H1 tag
    • Use of proper title tags
    • Strong meta tags
    • Unique content
    • Site should have contextual linking
    • Use of heading tags (Hx tags, i.e. H1, H2, etc)
    • Image should have proper titles and alt attributes
    • Site should be designed for accessibility
    • Site should be multiple browsers compatible
    • Site should contain printer friendly pages
    • Check for duplicate content. Ensure that site does not have duplicate content

  One of the presenters, Stoney deGeyter, shared an awesome web-marketing checklist, which can be found here.