There is a golden rule when developing a website: the earlier you start thinking about optimising it for Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), the easier it will be to achieve high rankings and attract more of your target audience. In this article, we'll look at key steps and strategies for improving your website's visibility during the development phase.
1. Keyword research
Before you start developing, conduct keyword research on the keywords that are most relevant to your niche and target audience. Use tools such as Google Keyword Planner, SEMrush or Ahrefs to identify the most popular and in-demand queries. This will give you a better understanding of what topics and queries your audience is interested in and what keywords are being used in your niche. Create a keyword list that will serve as the foundation for your content and optimisation strategy.
Consider the following aspects when compiling your list:
- Search Traffic Volume: Determine how many people per month are searching for each of your keywords.
- Keyword Competitiveness: Assess the level of competition for each keyword using tools such as Keyword Difficulty in SEMrush or Keyword Difficulty Tool in Ahrefs.
- Query Relevancy: Make sure the keywords you choose are closely related to your niche and reflect the needs and interests of your target audience.
- Keyword Phrase Length: Consider both short and long keyword phrases (long-tail keywords or long-tail keywords) to cover both broad and narrow niche queries.
After a thorough analysis, create a list of keywords, considering their priority and potential effectiveness for your SEO strategy.
2. URL structure
When designing the structure of your website, pay attention to page URLs as they play an important role in SEO. Informative URLs help search engines better understand the page content and improve user experience. They should contain keywords related to your content and reflect the structure of your content. For example, instead of using generic and uninformative URLs like " www.example.com/page1 ", it is preferable to create a structure that reflects the essence of your content, such as " www.example.com/services/service-name ", where "service-name" is a keyword describing the content of the page. This approach will make your URLs more understandable to users and search engines, which in turn can increase their relevance and improve your site's ranking in search results.
3. Mobile optimisation
With an increasing number of users using mobile devices to access the internet, mobile optimisation is becoming a necessity. Make sure that your website is not only adapted for mobile devices, but also offers the user a pleasant and hassle-free user experience. This includes not only fast loading pages and easy navigation, but also optimal display of content on different screen sizes. Mobile optimisation not only increases user satisfaction, but also affects your search engine rankings. Search engine algorithms favour mobile-friendly sites when ranking results, so paying attention to mobile optimisation can help your site come out on top of search queries.
4. Optimise download speed
Page load speed has a huge impact on user experience and search engine rankings. Use tools like Google PageSpeed Insights to evaluate your site's performance and offer recommendations on how to improve load speed. This may include the following:
- Image Compression : Optimise images on your website using lossless compression or other methods to reduce file size without compromising quality.
- CSS and JavaScript Minification : Remove unnecessary spaces, comments and extra characters from CSS and JavaScript files to reduce their size and speed up page loading.
- Choosing a fast and reliable hosting : Choose a hosting provider that offers fast page loading speeds and reliable server performance, which can also have a significant impact on your website's performance.
Note that improving page load speed not only improves user experience, but is also an important factor for SEO, as search engines favour fast and performant sites when ranking search results.
5. Content Optimisation
During the development phase, pay special attention to content optimisation, as it is one of the key factors in a successful SEO strategy. In addition to inserting keywords in titles, meta descriptions and ALT texts of images, it is also important to pay attention to the quality of content. It should be informative, unique and relevant to the needs of your target audience. Make sure the content is not only optimised for search engines, but also offers value and solves users' problems. Keyword density should be controlled so that it looks natural and does not give the impression of being artificially loaded with keywords. Ultimately, your content should be user-centred, not just search engine algorithms.
6. Creating an XML sitemap
XML sitemap plays an important role in the indexing of your content by search engines. It provides search engine crawlers with information about the structure of your site and helps them traverse your pages more easily. Creating an XML sitemap and submitting it to Google Search Console, Bing Webmaster Tools and other search engines will improve your site's visibility in search results. With an XML sitemap, search engine robots will be able to detect new pages and content updates faster, which will increase the speed of indexing and updating information about your site in search engines. So, don't forget to create and regularly update your XML sitemap to ensure your content is effectively indexed and ranked in search engines.
7. Use of structured data
Structured data plays a key role in increasing your website's visibility in search engines. They allow search engines to understand your site's content more accurately and display it in a more informative and expressive way in search results. Using Schema.org markup for different types of content such as organisations, products, articles and others helps search engines to correctly interpret the information on your site. This enriches search result snippets, making them more attractive to users and increasing the likelihood of a click. As a result, websites with well-structured data have a better chance of showing up in search engine results and attracting a targeted audience.
Table: Example of a content optimisation plan
| Stage | Task | Description |
| 1 | Keyword research | Conduct keyword research using tools such as Google Keyword Planner, SEMrush, Ahrefs, etc. |
| 2 | Competitor analysis | Study your competitors' SEO strategies and identify their strengths and weaknesses. |
| 3 | Creating a list of keywords | Make a list of primary and secondary keywords related to your niche and target audience. |
| 4 | Developing a content strategy | Determine content types (articles, blogs, videos, etc.) and a publishing plan based on keywords and your audience's needs. |
| 5 | Creating unique and informative content | Develop content that is not only optimised for search engines, but also offers value and information to your users. |
| 6 | Content Optimisation | Insert keywords into titles, meta descriptions, ALT texts of images and other content elements. Make sure keywords are used naturally. |
| 7 | Creating internal links | Create internal links to link the different pages of your website and improve its structure and navigation. |
| 8 | Optimising download speed | Apply tips to improve loading speed such as compressing images, minifying CSS and JavaScript, choosing high performance hosting. |
| 9 | Creating an XML sitemap | Create an XML sitemap and submit it to Google Search Console and other search engines to improve the indexing of your content. |
| 10 | Use of structured data | Add Schema.org markup for your content to help search engines better understand its meaning and display it in search results. |
This table will help you to systematise and control the content optimisation process at all stages of your website development.
Conclusion
Effective website optimisation during the development phase of a website plays a crucial role in its success in the search engines. Each of the steps discussed in this article - from keyword research to the use of structured data - has its own importance in improving your site's visibility and ranking. By paying special attention to each aspect of SEO during the development phase, you can create not only an attractive and user-friendly website, but also achieve high search engine rankings.
However, it should be remembered that SEO is an ongoing process that requires constant updating and optimisation. At the same time, technologies and requirements of search engines can change, so it is important to be aware of the latest trends and algorithmic updates.
We hope that this article will help you create a website that will not only attract more of your target audience, but will also ensure their satisfaction with quality and informative content. Along with this, proper optimisation will help your website to become outstanding and competitive in the online business world.
