Website Design SEO: 12 Steps To Building A Website For Search (SEO)

After blowing ￡20,000 in 2009 on my first website, and having helped dozens of websites launch online since then, I figured it was time to share my process to design and build a website that has marketing and your audience in mind from the ground up.

Watch the video above for all the details and here’s an overview of the steps:

1. Trim the fat: take content across that’s needed only.
2. Technical SEO analysis: identity what could be hurting your website in Google search and make sure those things are fixed in your new build.
3. Keyword research: maximise your launch by researching keywords your audience is searching and baking this into the overall architecture and content.
4. Site architecture: define the optimal architecture considering the existing website (if applicable) using keyword and competitor research.
5. Page information structure: define how best to present the content to the end-user to optimise for UX whilst maximising organic search presence.
6. Tone of voice: define how you want to speak to people online. As Elmore Leonard said, “If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it”.
7. Write your story: each page is a story in itself and should be weaved together as one larger story. This is where good storytelling copywriting comes in.
8. Website design: with all the research and copy drafted, time to start bringing your message to life with design.
9. Website development: approved designs are now brought to life with development.
10. Redirect plan: to avoid impacting your existing organic traffic, it’s very important to have a redirect plan in place. (applicable to website migrations only)
11. Test test test: test your site fully in a staging server to ensure it’s fully user friendly, buttons and forms work, SEO optimisation is accurate and copy is correct.
12. Go Live test: with confidence push the site live and run the same tests you did in step 11.

Hope you find the video useful.

Neil Sheth