Author Archives: stinchfieldch

A few tips with regards to the proper use of headers within webpages.

In general:

• Use HTML headings for headings only. Don’t use headings to make text BIG or bold.
• Search engines use your headings to index the structure and content of your web pages.
• Users skim your pages by its headings. It is important to use headings to show the document structure.
• h1 headings should be main headings, followed by h2 headings, then the less important h3, and so on.

Read more

Other items to consider

• those who use text readers to read your site will become confused if you do not use heading tags in descending order as they were intended.
• All browsers support heading tags and each displays the headings in slightly different sizes.
• A visitor may have changed the default fonts of their browser and chosen to over ride your stylesheet so the sizes and font may different than you intended.

Read more

Use of Headings at the College of Charleston

Within the content management system at the College of Charleston, heading tags 1 and heading tags 2 are reserved and automatically used for page title and page subtitles.

Headings 3 – 6 should only be used within the main content area.

Make sure you unpublish any content including images, files, pages, folders, etc. PRIOR to deleting, renaming or moving . If this action is not taken, it will create “orphaned” pages or images on the website. The reason for this is there are two servers – one server hosts the content management system(CMS), the other server hosts the actual website. Changes are made to the “copy” contained within the content management system and THEN when published, the server copies the updated page to the web server. The only means for the user to remove a page from the webserver is to unpublish the page.

1. Deleting page: If a page (or image, folder, or some other type of content) is not unpublished prior to deleting, the old page is “orphaned” on the web server, meaning that the page will be left on the web server and a copy will not remain in the CMS for you to edit.
2. Renaming page: If you rename the page(or image, folder, or some other type of content) from within the CMS without unpublishing, the original page will be remain on the web server and when you rename the page within the CMS and publish it, it will then have the original page and the new renamed page on the web server. By having two pages, search engines will “crawl” both pages and place within the search engine database both pages with the content. If you update your second copy of the page, the first copy will not be updated, thus providing old content to search engines and frustrating the user as they are unsure as to which content is correct and most recent.

Hopefully, this explanation will clear any confusion on unpublishing, renaming and deleting content from the CMS. And as always, if you have any questions about the CMS or digital marketing, feel free to contact us.

When hyperlinking to a webpage on the College of Charleston website, make sure to use the URL from the live site and not the URL from when managing a page within the content management system.

Also, when sharing or creating a hyperlink, it’s not necessary to include the index.php at the end of the URL. For example, the following URL, http://american-studies.cofc.edu/contact/index.php, may be displayed or used to create a hyperlink as http://american-studies.cofc.edu/contact/

If sharing the URL within an email that only serves as the description for the hyperlink, american-studies.cofc.edu/contact/ may be used. However, if creating the actual link, http://american-studies.cofc.edu/contact/  should be used. Below are two examples of properly formatted working examples:

american-studies.cofc.edu/contact/ or American Studies contact page

The 5 Second Rule

You have just five seconds to capture your user’s attention when they enter your site.

If you don’t answer the user’s questions or provide the information they are seeking right away, they will click “back” and exit your site.

Users are interested in what you can do for them, not what you think about yourself or your site.

TRANSLATION: The homepage of your site is not the best location for bios, mission or vision statements.

We are asked many times about the logic behind some of our guidelines on creating effective URLs. I ran across this article today that covers the topic in detail. However, please do not read the article and then decide “Oh, let’s rename all of my folders and filenames”.

Unless done properly, the renaming of folder or filenames within the CMS, may cause “orphaned” folders or files, which means that a folder or filename would exist on the webserver, but would no longer be available within the CMS, causing a duplication of content with two folders or files – one with the old name and one with the new name. This can cause major issues with regards to search engine optimization, as well as broken links within the site.

Below are the proper steps for renaming a folder or filename successfully:

1. Unpublish the folder or filename
2. Rename the folder or filename
3. Republish the folder or filename AND republish the main folder above the renamed folder or file name.

And now, on to the article: 15 SEO Best Practices for Structuring URLs

And as always, if you have any questions regarding the information above, feel free to contact me or the webmaster.