Optimizing HTML for Search Engines

Topic Level: Advanced Web Design

One of the advantages of static HTML pages over dynamic pages, is the ease with which they can be found and read by search engine robots. Specifically, the web pages generated by Jade offer the following benefits to the real estate agent who wants to conform to best practice:

•	The directory structure and navigation links between all of the pages are logical and easy for both a user and a robot to follow.

•	The meta tags can be highly relevant and consistent with the page content.

•	The page titles can be unique, relevant and consistent with the page content.

•	Each page generated by Jade can have unique content.

•	The images have relevant alternate text.

•	The HTML code conforms to current standards.

•	The pages load quickly with high-quality small-sized image files.

•	Style sheets are linked, producing pages with less code.

The <Title> tag

In the default designs, the <title> tag is filled by the category headline on category pages and the property caption on property pages.

If the property captions will not make informative titles, other fields can be used instead. For example:

<title> {property field="type"},{property field="numbedrooms"} bedrooms, {property field="location"}</title>

•	This will produce pages with unique titles and give the web searcher a clear indication of what the page is about (e.g. "Single family home, 4 bedrooms, Austin" or "Detached House, 3 bedrooms, Surrey" or "Piso, 3 dormitorios, Malaga").

The Meta tags

In the default designs, the description meta tag is filled by the ShortDescription field on property pages and by the Category Introduction (if any) on category pages.

If either of these fields are not suitable, you can replace them with another field or a combination of fields. You can add any other meta tags that you feel necessary. For instance, you can create keyword meta tags using a series of field tags and words as described in the previous paragraph.

The Page Heading

In the templates supplied by JadeTools, the main heading (<H1>) on property pages is the property Caption and on the category pages, it is the category headline.

•	To use another field as the main heading on the property pages, edit the property template. You can set up and apply the Property Pages > page_headline style to format the output.

•	To change the text used as the category headline, edit the Web Categories.

Page url: http://www.jadetools.com/jps/user_manual/HTML/index.html?searchengineoptimization.htm