20 things about Google - Thing 07 - Google loves HTML 5!
Have you heard about HTML? It stands for Hyper Text Markup Language and is the code that is generated and passed to your Browser (Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer etc..) so that your website can be displayed.
Before 2011, websites were coded using HTML 4. The problem with it was that there was no way of telling Google which bits of the text on the page were more relevant. Have a look at the image below.
It is obvious to you and I that the main content of the page is in the middle, on the left. The menu at the top, the side bar with items of news, the footer with all of the contact information; these all appear on every page and are therefore not relevant to any one page. With HTML4, Google sees all text equally and you would use what are known as Meta Tags to help Google to understand what is important.
HTML 5 changed all of that. Not only were things like watching video (without having to download a video player) much easier, for the first time web pages could actually tell Google which was the important bit.
Have a look at the picture below. The header, footer and sidebar are all greyed out. It is a visual representation of how Google sees the page now. This is because, with HTML 5, we can now tell Google which area of the page is the main area and which isn’t. This makes Google happy and is one of the reasons which having your website built in HTML5 is important.
HTML 5 has been around since January 2011 so there is no excuse for not using it really. Please remember though, Google will assess the code quality (whether HTML4 or 5) and this also will have a significant effect on your rankings.
If you would like a free review of your website, please do get in touch.
Next time… You Tube!
Clive Loseby
Access by Design
An award winning web design Chichester company.
