Search engine optimization (SEO) is crucial for any business looking to drive traffic to their website organically through search engines like Google. Having a well-optimized website can help you rank higher in search results, gain more visibility, and attract more visitors who are actively looking for your products or services. This is why choosing the right website builder is so important – not all website builders are created equal when it comes to SEO optimization.
Professional website builders that are designed for SEO can provide huge benefits in terms of optimizing your site architecture, code, speed, and content. While it’s possible to optimize websites built on any platform, professional builders make SEO seamless and efficient. In this guide, we’ll explore the top SEO benefits of using professional website builders over DIY site builders or code-heavy platforms.
Cleaner, Semantic Code
One of the most important technical SEO factors is having clean, semantic HTML code on your website pages. This makes the content and structure of your pages clearer and more understandable to search engines. Professional website builders generate clean code automatically, with proper headings, alt text, and semantic HTML tags.
DIY site builders often produce clunky code with div tags that don’t define the true purpose and layout of the page. This makes it harder for search engines to parse and index your pages correctly. Professional builders allow you to easily incorporate semantic HTML5 tags like header, footer, article, etc. Their templates incorporate logical code structures that focus on your content and make your pages more SEO-friendly.
Having clean code also makes your website more accessible for users of screen readers and other assistive devices that rely on semantic code to better understand page content. So optimizing for semantics improves both SEO and accessibility at the same time.
Optimized Page Speed
Page speed is a ranking factor – Google has stated that faster loading pages will be rewarded in search results. Professional website builders employ various speed optimizations to help pages load quickly:
- Minimized code and assets
- Lazy loading of non-critical resources
- Caching of assets
- Optimized image compression
- CDN for faster external resource delivery
This ensures that your site performs well technically and provides a smooth experience to visitors. Faster load times keep visitors engaged on pages for longer. Quickly loaded pages also tend to convert better because users don’t get frustrated waiting on slow pages.
SEO-Focused Design
Professional website builders incorporate SEO best practices into their templates and layout options:
- Clear information architecture and site structure
- Easy internal linking between related pages
- Simple on-site search
- Responsive mobile-friendly design
- Alternate text for images
- Heading tags used properly for hierarchy
- Minimal excess code and clutter
Optimized code is only one part of technical SEO. Having a clean, search-friendly design optimizes the user experience and makes it easier for search engines to crawl and index pages. The navigation, page templates, and content presentation all affect SEO. Professional builders take care of this for you automatically with their templates.
Built-In SEO Settings & Tools
The best professional website builders include SEO tools and settings built directly into their platform:
- SEO-optimized page templates
- SEO meta tag builder for custom titles & descriptions
- Auto-generated XML sitemaps
- Search engine indexing controls
- Integrated Google Analytics
- SEO copywriting assistance
- Related keywords and search volume data
- SEO error checker
- SEO performance reports
These features enable you to optimize your website for SEO from the ground up as you build out your site, instead of leaving optimization until the end. Professional SEO tools integrated directly into the builder’s interface make search optimization simple and efficient.
Easy Content Updates & Management
Regularly updating your website content is important for SEO because it gives search engines fresh material to index. Outdated, stagnant content can negatively impact rankings. Professional website builders make content updates quick and seamless.
With an intuitive editor, you can easily:
- Add new content pages
- Modify existing pages
- Insert videos/images
- Change navigation menus
- Upload products or services
- Publish blog posts and articles
No coding skills are required to manage site content. You can also handle content scheduling and publishing workflows within the platform’s interface. Dynamic content that changes frequently like blogs can be indexed faster.
Higher Quality Content
Well-written, informative content is enormously valuable for SEO and user experience. Professional website builders encourage quality content in different ways:
- Intuitive in-platform editing for spellcheck & grammar
- Readability scoring to improve page content
- SEO copywriting tips for better page text
- Easy multimedia content embedding
- Out-of-the-box blog, articles, and news features
- Built-in site search to reveal content gaps
- Related keyword recommendations for content topics
By making content creation and optimization simple, professional builders enable you to focus on producing high-quality pages that search engines will find valuable. Good content also keeps visitors on site for longer periods.
Progressive Web Apps
Progressive web apps (PWAs) are websites built using modern techniques that allow them to function similarly to mobile apps when accessed on mobile devices. Features like push notifications, offline access, app-like navigation, and touch gestures create an app-like experience.
PWAs represent the next evolution of web development. They provide faster load times, increased engagement, and higher conversions for mobile visitors. Professional website builders are on the cutting edge of leveraging PWA technology to improve visitor experience.
PWAs are also inherently optimized for organic search. Their focus on speed, responsiveness, and connectivity align perfectly with what search engines want to serve users – fast-loading pages with engaging content. As PWAs continue to grow in popularity, they will become a significant search ranking factor.
Easier Optimization of Multiple Sites
Many businesses manage multiple websites – for example, different sites for each brand, location, or language. Professional website builders make it easy to build and optimize multiple sites efficiently.
With a master account, you can:
- Use the same design templates across different sites for brand consistency.
- Manage all sites from a centralized dashboard.
- Publish content updates across all sites or to individual sites.
- Track analytics and SEO metrics for each site.
- Update SEO settings globally or per site.
Managing SEO for multiple websites is simplified considerably through the centralized control panel of a professional builder.
Summary
Choosing the right website builder has a enormous impact on your ability to rank in organic search results. Professional SEO-focused website builders provide critical advantages that can help your business gain more traffic, leads, and sales from search engines.
With semantic code, speed optimizations, built-in SEO tools, easy content management, and progressive web app capabilities, professional builders enable you to launch a website optimized for search right from the start. Pairing these technical capabilities with high-quality, search-friendly content will put your website on the path to search engine success.