Must-Consider SEO Checklist For Web Developers

A great web developer can build an impressive website and ensure it will work optimally on the many different browsers and devices that people use today. They are also crucial in building a website with a good design, easy to navigate and easy to update. And because every business today needs a website to attract and retain customers, websites need SEO to be found in search engines. These two things are vital for every business, no matter how big or small.

But just because you’re great at creating a unique website, you might not be great in the SEO realm. For this reason, we made this guide for web developers to help them build beautiful and optimized websites for search engines. These checklists for web developers offer key tips you need to attain success.

1.) HTTPs:

Most websites today need to be HTTPS. It must go without saying, but Google penalizes websites that don’t have HTTPS by lowering their ranking and taking them out of the first page. HTTPS will be of continued importance with Page Experience Update, together with safe browsing. And it is a good sense. Users or visitors want to know that all their information is secure and safe and won’t be compromised. Being a web developer, you must learn how to enable HTTPS with any website build. It is plain and simple but the first important step to SEO and website success.

2.) Set Up Tracking Properly:

The next step you take is to add tracking. You must set up tracking for all the websites you build. That’s why this stage is at the top of our SEO tips for web developers list. You cannot gauge success without an efficient way to measure it.

The following are the things you need to use:

• Google Analytics: It is an effective way to monitor a website. It gives you insights into your website that will give you data about your site traffic and analytics. You can check how many visitors go to certain pages and what keywords people search for your site.
• Google Search Console: Track the website’s performance by using Google Search Console. It is where you set up tracking code on your website. It will give you an idea of how well your website is doing, including identifying possible issues that slow down or block page views.

3.) Make SEO Friendly Robots.txt File:

Creating an SEO-friendly robots.txt file may sound scary at first. However, it is an important step you can take to help your website rank higher in search engines. And it is much easier than you might think. First things firsts, it is essential to ensure you allow the web pages to be indexed appropriately. One way of checking this is to exclude any special pages by mistakenly adding to the robots.txt file. As a web developer, you can do this by labelling it as a no-index or dis-allow. Making an SEO-friendly robots.txt file is vital and needs to be done right using the appropriate steps.

4.) Make And Upload Sitemap:

Creating a sitemap is another way you can improve your ranking in search engines. It’s an essential “behind-the-scenes” file that allows search engines to index your website. When you begin to create, make sure to make a sitemap for your website that is organized and clean. It is not only a map but also a map for the spiders that crawl to the website. This digital blueprint guides the spiders to understand your website and better analyze it. An additional step you must take in making and uploading your sitemap is uploading it into the search console. Putting the sitemap into these areas helps the spiders understand your website better.

5.) Optimize For Better Site Speed Efficiency:

If your website is slow, it makes visitors unhappy and leaves you with low page views. Opting for a fast website is an important step in order to improve SEO. Search engine spiders favour faster load times than slower load times. A website is said to be fast if it loads within 2 seconds or less. A website is counted as slow if it takes more than 3 seconds or even longer to load pages. If you are designing, you should have a fast website that is optimized for speed. It is because search engines will see your website as being responsive. Responsive web pages are one reason search engines favour your websites more than others. And it’s crucial to have a fast site to help your site rank better in the search engines, which benefits both users and businesses.

6.) Implementing A Responsive Design:

A responsive design is a great method of making your website mobile-friendly. This design does not make a separate mobile site but rather makes it one big site. Your website becomes responsive when the display changes with different devices or screens used by a user. Today, almost all websites are mobile-first, and most people’s phones are more powerful than their computers. When designing your website, don’t forget to create a responsive design that converts into more than just small screens for smartphones and tablets.

7.) Don’t Utilize Overly Large Photos:

It might seem like an excellent idea to put large photos on your page. However, it is more of a mistake than anything else. The larger the images, the longer it takes to load, and that slows down your website. This method not only affects the speed of your website. It also affects how many users stick around and see what you have to offer. When designing your website, keep in mind that this is one mistake you can’t afford if you want it to rank higher on search engines.

8.) Organize The Header Tags For SEO:

Organizing the header tags is essential to offer a good and useful website for users and visitors. Header tags are the tags that appear when your website loads. These header tags also add value to your website because they lead to more page views, clicks, and conversions. Your headings must follow a right header hierarchy if possible. It means H1 being the biggest, then H2, then H3, and so on. The H1 header must have the main keyword for SEO, which you then included in the H2 and H3. Organizing the page structure is essential for both web developers and SEO.

9.) Optimize The Meta Information:

Optimizing the meta-information is another one of the essential steps to improve search engine rankings. You must optimize your website properly by including all relevant keywords in the meta tags. There are different types of meta tags. There are header tags, footer tags, and site description tags. The meta description tag must be no longer than 160 characters which can include keywords, too.

10.) Assign Image Alt Text:

Alt Text is the text shown on the image when it is not shown on the page. It should be descriptive so that visitors can understand what they see on your website. If you want to rank better for certain keywords, implementing this tag is essential, and it will help you increase exposure and traffic.

Conclusion:

As a web developer, you need to make sure your website is up to date and well optimized. It helps increase the number of users, increase page views, and improve search engine rankings. Having a checklist of the things you are doing to improve your SEO makes it easier for you to see the progress of your changes. Remember that these are not all of the steps you have to take, but they are essential. If you implement them, then you will most likely see your website ranking higher on Google.

About the Author:

I’m Andrea Gibbs, Born, raised, and still living in New York. I’m a work-at-home mom with a background in business development, strategy, and social media marketing. I’m a blog contributor at Brand With Care to help small businesses and new entrepreneurs grow their social presence.

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