Web Source Coding and SEO: How to Optimize Your Website Code for Search Engine Results

by Robert Clough

Google, the largest search engine, receives about 40,000 searches per second. This translates to more than 3.5 billion searches per day.

Although projections suggest that the search rate will stagnate at one point, it’s the wish of every webmaster for their page to rank high in the search results page.

But the race to the top of SERP is fierce given the high number of marketers aiming for the same spot at the top. You’ll need to put a lot more effort to stay ahead of the competition.

While optimizing on-page variables increases the odds of ranking high, your site’s coding has a greater impact on optimization.

Here’s a simple guide to help you optimize your website source coding for search engine results:

1. Clean Your Code

With time, your site’s code collects “dirt” due to errors from website modifications. The “dirt” can be anything from broken links and tags to excess whitespace.

As a result, your page’s speed slows down which then hurts your SERP ranking. It’s advised that you perform regular check-ups on that your site’s code is clean.

Make use of checker tools to help you with the cleaning.

2. Combine Script Files

Often, web owners pile up tons of script files in an effort to enhance the functionality of a site.

What escapes the understanding of webmasters is that piling up all these code files slows down the performance of a page. Search engine algorithms tend to favor sites that perform faster. So, loading tons of script files will result in a poor ranking for your page.

By combining these code files, you improve your site’s loading speed without compromising its functionality. Consequently, your ranking improves as well.

3. Make Use of Microdata

For starters, microdata is a new addition to the SEO developer’s toolbox. It allows page owners to add levels of clarifying data to a site’s HTML tags. As such, making use of microdata help search engines index and correctly rank your site in SERPs.

Additionally, the use of microdata enhances the creation of rich snippets. Informative/rich snippets attract lots of traffic to your site thus increasing click-through rates.

Keep in mind that search engines favor sites with high click-through rates.

4. Use Canonical Tag

If you’ve got a lot of web pages with similar content, you use a canonical tag. This helps the search engine bot to know which page to prioritize for ranking.
Moreover, depending on the program you’re using to build your site, some such as c# excel interop, may not create different URLs for each of your content.

As such, your site risks being subjected to duplicate content which often attracts poor ranking.

A canonical tag can be added to the ‘head section’ of your page by hand or use of plugins. It tells the search engine what to disregard or index.

5. Serve Text-Based Alternatives

Text-based descriptions pay a huge rule in image optimization. Usually, search engines can’t read the information displayed by images.

So, including a text-based description alongside your site’s images helps search engines index know what your images are about. Moreover, text descriptions help improve the user experience for screen readers.

Optimize Your Website’s Source Coding

The top position in SERPs is a coveted spot among many site owners. But relying on only on-site optimization won’t get your page to the ranks you deserve.
Going the extra mile of optimizing your site’s source coding will significantly improve your rank in search engine results page.

For a quick guide on how to optimize your website source code, be sure to use the tips above.

Be sure and visit our small business news site.