Search engine optimization (SEO) is making your website or app Google-friendly. It’s the work you do for machines (crawlers) to rank your resource high in search results. Thus, business owners rarely think about human-friendliness when they work on SEO, relating the usability feature to the realm of UX.
A bummer: this approach is deeply counterproductive.
In fact, SEO and UX should work in alignment to result in a universally appealing, usable product. For this reason, it’s vital to check whether your SaaS web design company is competent in SEO issues. Even if it doesn’t work on the SEO optimization of your resource, its experts need to seek proper alignment between SEO and UX components to give your digital product a user- and machine-friendly look. Here is a set of tips from SEO and UX pros on balancing the two.
What Is SEO?
The primary purpose of SEO is to attract people to your website by ranking high in search engines. Once a user enters a search inquiry in the Google search bar, your page will be displayed in the top 3-5-10 results if you do everything right in terms of SEO. Thus, effective SEO efforts result in:
- Better organic traffic
- Better brand visibility and quicker user awareness
- Higher user trust in Google’s top search results
- Business sustainability without extensive investments in paid ads and marketing
SEO efforts are rarely made for people. SEO work is organized with the principles of Google ranking in mind.
What Is UX?
UX is responsible for your web resource’s usability from the human perspective. It determines how comfortable the visitors are with the menu of your app or website, whether people find your UVP relevant to their inquiries, whether they can complete tasks simply and quickly, etc. High usability results in the following business gains:
- Higher conversion rates
- Better business positioning in the competitive niche
- User retention
- Lower churn rates
Tips to Balance UX and SEO Efforts in a Stellar Digital Product
SEO is responsible for making your resource easily discoverable by the target users. Once the visitors come to it, UX is responsible for making them stay and convert into active users, buyers, or subscribers. So, as you can see from the previous sections, SEO and UX are not as distinct as you thought.
#1 Prioritize Content
Content remains king, especially in the realm of SaaS content marketing. However, it’s not just about the amount, but the type of content that truly matters. Today’s users make crucial decisions within the first 6 seconds, demanding concise, to-the-point statements that capture their attention.
The task of optimizing content volume may be conflicting from UX and SEO perspectives. SEO requirements advocate more content, denser use of keywords, and delivery of tons of value to the user. UX rules say that you need to minimize content volume to leave the users with core, impactful messages. Thus, you will need to find the middle ground between value-laden content and its optimal positioning, interactive delivery, and user-friendly content formats. Dividing the wall of text with visuals, formatting means, and spaces will add convenience and make even long-reads manageable.
#2 Use Keywords Wisely
An SEO specialist’s daydream is a page stuffed with tons of keywords, giving your resource a #1 position on all user searchers. But this content organization is a usability killer. If your content is only for machines, you can’t count on users’ loyalty and interest. So, where is the golden middle?
The answer is in the meticulous approach to keyword search and prioritizing keyword phrases in the content. Use only a couple of essential keywords on each page to make the content readable and appealing. You’re sure to achieve a greater SEO and UX impact if you choose quality over quantity, giving everyone what they need.
#3 Optimize Loading Times
The loading speed is a universal criterion of SEO and UX quality. Search engines reduce the resource’s ranking if they see that the loading time exceeds the limits of reasonability. Slow loading speed is also a bummer for human visitors, as modern users are impatient and demanding. So, by improving the loading speed of your website’s pages, you will kill two birds with one stone. Your ranking will rise, and visitors will be grateful for a quick, user-friendly page display.
#4 Simplify User Navigation
The clue to optimal SEO and UX organization is understanding how users navigate through your resource’s architecture. If you have too many menu categories and sections, even savvy users can lose their way and get confused. Thus, it’s vital to stick to the mandatory minimum of pages and menu options so that your visitors find what they need with a couple of clicks. This organization will enhance your resource’s clarity for users, helping them achieve their goals and improving the SEO ranking due to user activity and interest.
#5 Invest in Mobile-Friendliness
The modern world is going mobile, and you can’t ignore the trend anymore. This change affects both SEO efforts and UX design solutions. For instance, SEO ranking in mobile browsers heavily depends on the UX choices for mobile optimization of layout and browsing convenience. SEO also gets affected by the small mobile screen size, requiring less content with more value. It’s vital to consider fluid layouts that change together with the screen size and give users a seamless UX no matter what gadget they use. Thus, your path to success in the mobile market is responsiveness, content condensation, and quick loading.
Concluding Thoughts
Following the SEO and UX recommendations separately is an easy way. Still, this divide is often at the heart of the broader product inconsistencies and problems that you might find hard to identify at once.
Concerted SEO and UX efforts take more time and collaboration, but it wins you a better reputation with people and machines in the end. Besides, Google has been recently paying more attention to UX, focusing on SEO and UX quality – a bulletproof combination for digital success.
