Abraham Lincoln’s famous description of the American Civil War states that a house divided against itself cannot stand. He was saying that a war between brothers, would not eventually lead to the complete dissolution of the United States of America, but rather, to its total absorption by one force or another.

SEO and web design can be looked at through much the same lens. There are websites that have beautiful designs that nobody will ever see. They sacrifice beauty for the sake of beauty. There are sites with fantastic web presence and link ranking that nobody looks at because they have sacrificed everything to be ranked by search engines.

Where We Are, Whither We Are Tending

The major search engines are at a tipping point with content and SEO strategy. As it stands, the Internet grows every second. There’s a constant battle, both within the search companies, and outside, to avoid being overrun by emerging content. The search giants have responded by getting more personal with their search results.

Google Plus Your World is trying to merge social networking with search. More than that, though, search is starting to rely on real user metrics as a larger and larger part of the ranking algorithm. One such metric is time spent on site, described as user engagement.

Search Engine Optimization cannot succeed on its own.  It should not be the driving force of a business’ web presence and there must be a merger of SEO utilization and prudent web design.

A Tendency to the Latter Condition

Universities and art schools have been training web designers for more than a decade. The internet has seen several phases of web design go into and out of fashion. Those sites still using outdated designs are outpaced by newer, cleaner, better designs when it comes to search ranking.

Their users find less clutter, even if the content is very much the same.  At the moment, many people are still riding the web design bandwagon. They assume that building a beautiful website will drive customers in-that simply isn’t the case. If searchers can’t find you, they will never convert to customers- no matter how lovely your site looks.

If We Stand Firm, We Shall Not Fail

Getting good results from your digital marketing strategy is not something that happens overnight. Page rankings take time to become established after a campaign to improve them. It makes sense that, during this time, a website can undergo a serious renovation. The two things together make for an excellent business strategy.

Click here to schedule your free 30 minute consultation with Chad Morgan, owner of Seattle SEO Consultant. Let’s get your new SEO strategy rolling today!