You already understand the importance of good SEO (or search engine optimization). After all, you want your site to rank highly when potential customers Google certain keywords related to your business.

You may even have heard the statistic that the top three results of a keyword search receive a whopping 60{8dc931576aaf27c44dbb25937eb9834b9b6728f2c00ffa91b47b7d493fd24c5f} of all clicks.

Good web design, however, is becoming even more important when it comes to how highly Google regards the value of your site. How come?

What Is Good Web Design?

The answer to that question has changed significantly over the years.

Clean and Simple

There was a time when cramming a lot of information onto every web page was the industry standard. Web designers feared that visitors wouldn’t bother to click around a site to find what they were looking for, so in a way, it made sense to include as much as possible on each page.

Yet this approach actually made it more difficult for visitors to get what they needed, and therefore more likely to abandon the site and go elsewhere.

Now, designers understand that a clean interface with well-organized navigation produces better results when it comes to bounce rate, time spent on each page, and eventually, leads or conversions.

Mobile-Ready

The meteoric rise of mobile devices — and the number of people who are “smartphone dependent,” or who only access their internet through their phones — means that it’s more important than ever to have a site that looks good when viewed on any device.

Responsive web design, in which the site determines how it’s being viewed and changes accordingly, is one way to go. Many web developers are choosing to employ separate site interfaces for mobile and desktop viewers.

Which route you take matters less than having a mobile-ready site, period. No one wants to zoom and pinch and scroll to see the copy on your landing page. When they see the desktop site on their smartphone, they will click away. It’s almost a guarantee.

Fast Load Times

Your website has to load quickly, no matter how visitors are accessing it. Increased page load times of even fractions of seconds will result in higher bounce rates. Part of the appeal of the internet, after all, is instantaneous access to information. Unless you can provide that, folks won’t be interested in what you have to offer.

What Do These Have to Do With SEO?

These elements make sense from a consumer’s perspective, but they are also important to the search engines. Recent algorithm updates rolled out by Google emphasize the necessity of quick loading times, mobile friendliness, and aesthetically appealing, easy to use designs.

Google has even begun to use machine learning in order to ensure that its algorithms act more like humans. Ironic, perhaps, but true.

If you are wondering how to improve visitor experience and optimize your site as much as possible to achieve better rankings, Seattle Web Design can help.

These are just a few of the factors that comprise the intersection of SEO and web design. Learn more by giving us a call today.