There are a number of ways that Web Standards development practices can serve our goal of building more findable websites. Here are some of the most significant once:

• Ensures search engine spiders can parse your code without stumbling on errors such as missing close tags or syntax errors
• Often decreases the ratio markup to content, which can help improve search engine rankings
• Improves page load times so search engines can quickly index your entire site
• Improves the communication of the information hierarchy of your pages so search engines can discern what content is important
• Accessibility standards provide a number of opportunities to include descriptive keywords in your markup that will help disabled users and search engines better understand the contents of your page

Web standards can put you on the right path to building documents that are search engine friendly. However, it’s  important to note that following standards is not an SEO silver bullet. If only it were that simple!

When marking can put you up a document, you still need to use your head when considering the most appropriate tag for your content. What the content of your pages says is important to search engines-but how you say it is equally important.

Web Standards Solutions: The Markup and Style Handbook, Special Edition

Search engines like

• Content that is naturally keyword rich( not stuffed)  and valuable to readers
• Content that is visible to search engine spiders with no barriers that may prevent a full indexing of pages.
• Content that communicates a clear information hierarchy so spiders can understand what the page is about.
• Content that loads quickly so spiders can index it efficiently.
• Links to your site from reputable sources so they can determine the reputation of your site.
• Honest content that isn’t trying to trick the search engine.
• More content than code to mark up the page.
• Clean, meaningful URL’s with keywords in them if possible.
• Domains that have been around for a while.

There’s a lot of logic in what the search engines are asking of us. They just want us to give them plenty of honest, high quality content in a format that they can read. As we move towards this goal, we are going to reap additional benefits, too.

For example, following accessibility standards not only broadens your audience to include users with disabilities and those on alternate devices( such as handhelds), its will also promote search engine optimization. Content in alt and title attributes-to name just a couple of elements that promote accessibility-provides more context and relevance for a search engine to understand what a page is about and can more accurately connect searchers with your page. Best practices for findability and accessibility often overlap.

People and search engines both appreciate great content . When people find useful content on a website, they tend to evangelize-creating links on their blog, links on user –generated news sites, and even discussing your content on discussion  boards. Those inbound links to your site not only bring other people to your site, they boost your reputation with search engines. Search engines evaluate the reputation of a site  based upon how many other reputable sites link to  it This means that when you provide your users with good content, you are also improving the findability of your site.

Web standards development practices also provide great findability benefits by improving search engine optimization:

• They help you avoid code errors that could prevent search engines from understanding your content.
• They promote the practice of marking up your content in a semantically meaningful way (which search engines will better understand).
• They help reduce the volume of code required to deliver your content, creating a better content-to-code ratio and faster indexing.
• They foster best practices in coding that allow external code files to cache in the browser, speeding up the load time.

As we will see, Web standards-though not a silver bullet-are a great ally in our findability endeavors.

Search Engine Optimization For Dummies (For Dummies (Computer/Tech))

Although you can certainly manipulated  your code and your content to increase your chances of receiving traffic from search engines, there are other ways to direct traffic to a site. With millions of pages on the Web, contemporary websites need to help users find content using as many methods as possible. Findability is the broader discipline that unites all strategies to help your audience find what they seek.

Findability is present in

• Information architecture
• Development
• Marketing
• Copywriting
• Design
• Search Engine Optimization(SEO)
• Accessibility
• Usability

We discover findability in all of the major disciplines that make up the Web. So often freelancers and members of smaller Web teams end up wearing a number of different hats-doing the work of an information architect, designer, developer, and more. Whether you find yourself handling strictly Web development or being the jack-of-all-trades on projects, it’s important to think about findability at every step of the way so you can ensure the success of your site for both users and the client.