The relationship between SEO and Usability is now clearer to me than I can ever remember it being. It might be that Search Engines are promoting this fact more, or that the web community is discussing it more, or simply that over the past few years my degree of interest in these two areas has increased. I’d like to think that it’s a combination of all three.
Having now worked on numerous web projects within larger organisations, I have locked away in my database of memories the times I struggled to get the web usability message across to those I worked for. It seemed so logical to me at the time… I would say, “your catchy/creative/clever/cutting-edge title may not mean anything to the user… we need a title that clearly describes the content”. The response I often heard was “but, we held a brainstorming session to come up with the title... and it was the Director who suggested the best version”. This kind of response made picking my battles somewhat easier but no less painful.
Looking back now I know that there are things I could have said to get me the result I was looking for – “the competition would never do that, we’ll lose sales if we do that and/or we’ll be seen as innovative if we do it this way”.
I’ve also faced the challenge of promoting the importance of web usability from a web administration perspective. I’ve often had to ask for “click here” or “read more” to be renamed so that link labels clearly describe the page that they link to – not something you’d expect to have to do these days, right… wrong. I’ve had to push back on unrealistic graphic design expectations… not being able to implement a design exactly... to the pixel, and being told that I should just use an image - embedding valuable keywords in that image or impacting on download speed. I’ve debated the need for content to be labelled using keywords that target users will be looking for, and that content is located in a branch of the IA that is consistent with how those users group information.
Web content management systems and frameworks
Web Content Management Systems (CMS) and Web Management Frameworks (WMF) make the above mentioned issues easier to manage. They utilise/promote CSS, consistent page layouts, templates, dynamically generated navigation, content reuse, workflows and publishing guidelines (just to mention a few) which all play a role in maintaining quality, and as a result usability.
Unfortunately, in my experience web content is rarely developed for the online medium. Web content is still often copy that has been created for print, and that at the last minute needs to be retrofitted for the web. This doesn’t leave much time for the content contributor to consider web usability. As a result, even the best CMS and WMF may not stop poor usability creeping back into your web environment. It’s something that a web administrator and publishing team need to remain passionate about and promote the importance of, any chance they get.
The SEO buzz
It now puts a smile on my face to know that SEO is a buzz word that can be used to promote web usability. SEO pricks the ears of management when mentioned.
I think that some of the credit for this fact has to go to SEM. SEM has a tangible cost and often requires the involvement of decision makers/those in charge of the purse strings. As a result, they’ve been educated about organic and paid search results (making SEO a topic of interest). It’s the “free” alternative to paying for search engine placement, in the most prominent location on the screen!
The other influencing factor appears to be the heightened competition between search engines. Not only are they offering new services, they’re fine tuning and adapting their relevance algorithms, and telling us how to meet the standards that they’re setting. When it comes down to it, they need to deliver quality search engine results to retain users - they’re a business that needs to offer a high standard of service to retain customers. Websites are part of their service offering. It’s to their advantage that the websites returned at the top of a SERP deliver the information that users are seeking.
Seo and Usability
SEO has it’s foundations in the quality and freshness of content, encompassing elements such as titles, keywords and links. These are aspects of a site that often suffer from poor usability. By giving careful consideration to site structure, the keywords applied to page titles, content and links it’s possible to perform SEO and by default improve usability.
If users can:
- trust that a link will deliver what it promises,
- predict where they will be taken,
- understand where they are and are not confused when they arrive on a page - via either a search engine, a link or navigation, and
- view a site structure (either via the navigation or the sitemap) and feel comfortable with the labels applied – they feel like they’re made just for them.
then, ultimately so will a search engine.
So, if you’re having trouble promoting usability, the opportunity exists to leverage the SEO buzz. When attempting to promote usability, present decision makers with an argument that connects with the things that are important to them - often money, competition and reputation. And, SEO is something that they are likely to have already heard about.
Go forth and improve the usability of your site/s… I mean, Search Engine Optimise.
