Content emphasis and placement is an important part of search engine optimization, typically because a good structure is required in a website in order to place content appropriately. Lets scale this into an example, if your website is selling auto parts, you would separate the parts of the car by the areas of the car the parts match, i.e. Engine Parts, Interior, Chasis Components, or you may break it down by manufacturer.
Websites can have good content, but may still struggle to rank properly, because the content has not been placed in the proper manner, or a good manner.
You may notice, if your using analytics that your bounce rate is higher.
A bounce rate above 50% will indicate issues with your websites structure and usability, placing content in a sound structure that will help users follow a path is the best way to achieve a lower bounce rate, better visitor retention and better search rankings.
Below is an example diagram of how pages may link on a website.
Each section on a website could represent a subject, theme, product etc. This system allows for the separation of information, whilst providing a sound link structure.
If you are selling car parts online, you will want to keep each section apart, so the brakes section shouldn't display engine components. Although, the menu navigation will reference other structures in a website which is where the single connection is made.
Websites will separate information typically by a subject, theme or product. When enough content is present, these own independent pieces of content can have their own sections.
This maybe represented in a directory format within your websites URL,
i.e.
www.mycarwebsite.com/cars/engines/air-filters/
www.mycarwebsite.com/cars/interior/seats/
Above, is an example where the content would be broken down by the URL into its own sub section, thus creating a good structure for a website.
However a website is broken down, content placement is best defined in the separation of the content and how the user can reach that content from entering via a landing page.
Typically, websites that break down lots of products, categories, themes or subjects will have menu navigation equipped to provide an entrance into these sections, or will use a breadcrumb structure for links.
For example,
Lets take our tropical fish example again, your tropical fish website may have lots of different information such as:
- Buying your Fish
- Taking care of your Fish
- General information about your Fish
- How your Fish Eats
Each of these different things will have sub-categories, lets break them down:
Buying your Fish < www.my-fish-shop.co.uk/buy/
Online Store
Accessories
Fish Food
Taking care of your Fish < www.my-fish-shop.co.uk/fish-care/
Cleaning the Tank
Checking your Fishes Health
General information about your Fish < www.my-fish-shop.co.uk/information/
How long your Fish Can Live
Where they Originate
How they behave with other Fish
How your Fish Eats < www.my-fish-shop.co.uk/fish-eating/
Dietary Requirements
Each of the sections above, represent top level and sub level categories.
Content placement comes into play by separating your websites content, and placing it in an appropriate URL structure which is the main focus of content separation and placement.
Placing content in a user friendly structure will allow users and search engines to find and index the information, whilst utilizing keyword rich URL's.
Placing your content does not have to be a hard job, here are some things to consider when placing content on pages throughout your website.
Content Emphasis
Content emphasis is the same as Keyword Emphasis, only with the intention of highlighting content for the end user. Although this is not so much an SEO factor, some search engines may recognize your SEO efforts for highlighting relevant content in moderation.
Content emphasis will allow you to highlight blocks of content using a number of methods including bold tags, underlining, italics or a change of font colour.
Content emphasis is overused in many websites. When highlighting content so not do it excessively unless your website requires the emphasis to promote certain events, deals or products.
Typically, you should only use content emphasis 1-2 times on a page as highlighting large chunks of content should only be done where relative blocks of text are important to the end user, more so then its surrounding content.
Emphasizing content with Italic:
Content highlighting in italic will appear tilted as follows:
TEST CONTENT IN ITALIC
Emphasizing content with bold:
Content highlighting in Bold will appear bold as follows:
TEST CONTENT IN BOLD
Emphasising content with colour:
Content highlighting in Colour will appear in colour as follows:
TEST CONTENT IN COLOUR
Emphasising content with Underlining:
Content highlighting in Underline will appear in an underline as follows:
TEST CONTENT IN UNDERLINED
Remember!
Only use content emphasis in special occasions such as the highlighting of vital information.
When used, do not use excessively.
