Whats more impotrant, results or standards? 6

[1DMF]

I've been taking part in another forum dedicated to SEO.

I have found their views and principles differ from the feelings I get on TT.

Some think standards are for anal geeks, tables make no difference to SERPs and if they want to use them for layout, so what!

Others don't care too much for accessibility especially if the guidelines over rule their required design which yields results.

an example: here is an extract from one of the posts regarding the accessibility guidlines on not using colour to communicate information

you have to take into account which market segment your site is targeting. As a quick example, from my testing the female audience from a wide age spectrum (teenage to 50's) responds very well to highlighting certain words and links with color changes, if you're using the right color palette.

So even those the Accessibility Guidelines say not to do it, the Usability Guidelines for this specific market segments would say you'd be a blithering fool not to do it.

Some might even leave title attributes or other helpfull attributes / tags out of the page or blank if they don't help or contribute in any way to SEO and SERPs.

So my question is, what do you guys think, you know I respect all of you who have helped me over the years to become a better coder and craftsman at my job, to help me think outside the box, and try to meet standards as well as functionality.

But what's the bottom line: SEO, SERPs & ROI, does it really matter as long as the bills are paid?

Are standards just for the anally retentive?,is there a happy medium, and where the standards and ROI end up in a head to head, should ROI always win.

I'd really like to hear your views on this.

Regards,
1DMF.

"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[monksnake]

Are standards just for the anally retentive?

I'm not a wicked grandmaster of HTML (like Vragabond is), but my thought is if you are going to do something, you may as well do it right.

Not adhering to standards is a way to filter out someone who takes pride in their work with someone who is just out to get paid.

I see this quote:

As a quick example, from [!]my testing[/!] the female audience

'my' testing? Did that person ask 4-5 girls what they thought about a page? That is not nearly on a wide enough scale to merit listening to.

I think you separate the good web developers from the bad very much so based upon whether or not they adhere to standards.







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[Foamcow]

Personally, I write standards compliant code for the following reasons:

1. The satisfaction of a job properly done
2. Easier to maintain the site later when someone wants changes
3. Better accessibility
4. It's really not that difficult
5. Chicks dig it

Now, the difference here is that 'other lot' are building websites to line their pockets, possibly with little care as to what the site is or how it serves it's visitors. All they ultimately care about is whether it gets a good SERPs position.

And here's the crux. At the end of the day, the site is for people. So the question they should ask is whether the site works as a site.

It just so happens that you can build highly optimised, search engine friendly, effective web sites using standards.
The 2 things aren't mutually exclusive.


Standards based sites are simply easier to look after. Sure there is a learning curve with some things, CSS for example, but once you get comfy with that it's pretty simple work.
I speak from experience here. I used do develop using tables, rough code, WYSIWYG editors then I heard about Standards and started learning. Now I reap the benefits when someone wants a change.

Don't confuse Web Standards with Tableless Layout and CSS.
It's possible to use Tables for layout and still follow defined Standards. The Standards exist to maintain a consistency between user agents.

I tell you what. I am noticing more and more clients becoming aware of Standards and I know which group of coders is going to be doing the £100 web sites and which will be building the £10,000 ones.

<honk>*:O)</honk>

Tyres: Mine's a pint of the black stuff.
Mike: You can't drink a pint of Bovril.

 

[monksnake]

5. Chicks dig it

I thought that was assumed.



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[BillyRayPreachersSon]

The 'motive' for writing a good standards-compliant site differs from person to person and company to company.

For me, it's about many things, and maybe I'm alone on this, but first and foremost, it's about the challenge of solving any layout problem a designer gives me in the most accessible way possible. I simply relish the challenge, and get a great kick out of working the brain cells out for an hour or two.

Then come the more 'normal' points that Foamcow has already mentioned:

- It's satisfying to know that you've done a good job, and also that any potential employers can look at your site and see you've done a good job.

- It's easier to maintain and upgrade a site that validates than one that's simply tag soup or built entirely using tables for layout.

- Guys dig it

At the end of the day, your own conscience will tell you whether or not you should be striving to do a good job. If you dont feel like you need to then maybe a change of job is in order... but if you do, then you'll already know why you should ;-)

Dan

Coedit Limited - Delivering standards compliant, accessible web solutions

[tt]Dan's Page [blue]@[/blue] Code Couch

http://www.codecouch.com/dan/

[/tt]

 

[Foamcow]

I will echo the challenge factor that Dan mentioned. I love it.

<honk>*:O)</honk>

Tyres: Mine's a pint of the black stuff.
Mike: You can't drink a pint of Bovril.

 

[1DMF]

cool i knew i'd get some thought provoking comments from the usual suspects ;-)

don't get me wrong, not all on the forum i've been using are writing bad code, if I could say any, that would be an unfair sweeping statement, and who am I to judge either way, i just feel a pull more to SEO, but hey it is an SEO site, so I guess it's not suprising.

Don't confuse Web Standards with Tableless Layout and CSS.

no true , but part of standards is semantics isn't it? or is that purely accessibility (but that's still a standard isn't it)

dunno about the guys/gals dig it, i didn't think anyone digged computer buffs! all the non-techy people I know think us computer guys/gals are all a bit weird, then again maybe it's just me ;-)

I do enjoy the challenge and you lot have cetainly given me that over the years as well as stretched me (sometimes nearly broke me!), but i am emerging the other side for sure - even if at times it's been stressful, frustrating and down right mind boggling!

pride in my work has cerainly been my motivation, and i'm not sure i'll ever be 100% happy, or knowledgable enough, but that's why you bods are so cool and helpful.

thanks a million to you all!

P.S. got any numbers for these standards loving lasses






"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[feherke]

Hi

Other document viewers are complaining if the document to display is messed. Then why to put the browsers to display invalid documents ?

I show my respect for the browsers ( with one exception ) when I create standard compliant HTML documents.

Feherke.

http://rootshell.be/~feherke/

 

[ChrisHunt]

Whats more important, results or standards?

Why should you have to choose between the two? Anybody who is unable to achieve results without breaking the standards is in the wrong job.

-- Chris Hunt
Webmaster & Tragedian
Extra Connections Ltd

 

[1DMF]

Why should you have to choose between the two?

I gave an example of this.

Now if you had a choice follow the standards and make a £1,000.00 in sales or break the standards, colour code things against the standards and make £1,000,000.00 in sales.

Is the choice obvious?

"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[Foamcow]

If you give an example like that then the choice is obvious. But what 'we' are saying is that why can't you create a standards based site that makes a million?

There is no reason whatsoever why any site can't adhere to web standards and, more to the point, good coding and design practice.

Standards and SEO are not in conflict with each other unless one makes it so.

If you are talking about black hat methods of SEO then that is a different argument and not to do with standards.

I think there is a confusion somewhere between all these terms.


Web Standards
-------------
Building web pages that conform to a predefined set of rules as laid out by the W3C. The intention of these standards is to ultimately improve compatability and reliability with additional benefits in areas such as accessibility.


Separation of Content and Style
-------------------------------
Remove styling and presentational information from HTML and use CSS instead. HTML is for marking up a document for meaning. CSS is for presenting that document in a particular way.


Semantic Coding
---------------
A simple matter of using the right tag for a specific job.
This allows the document creator to include an amount of meta information in their document. Wrapping a heading an a heading tag means that a non-human, for example, knows the content within is a heading.


Tableless Layout
----------------
Forgoing tables for creating page structure. See Semantic Coding and Separation of Content and Style.


Search Engine Optimisation / SEO
--------------------------------
Creating web documents in such a way as they are easy for a search engine to parse and index. This mainly involves good content creation but can also reach into areas of coding techniques. Regarding coding, it is more a case of being aware of what will stop a page being crawled and stopping a spider from being able to follow links within it.
It's actually harder to make a page that won't get crawled than it is to make one that will be just fine.


Search Engine Marketing / SEM
-----------------------------
Spreading the 'word' about a web site or page by means of online advertising such as banners and paid for ad placement schemes such as Google AdWords. Also obtaining incoming links via directory placement and link exchange (if you must).


I probably missed stuff but my point is that these are all separate disciplines that don't necessarily depend on each other but aren't mutually exclusive either.



<honk>*:O)</honk>

Tyres: Mine's a pint of the black stuff.
Mike: You can't drink a pint of Bovril.

 

[Vragabond]

And if you had a chance to go on a date with a model and have your armpits smell bad for the rest of your life (regardless of how much you've washed them) or go on a date with a normal person and have pleasant smell all over, which one would you chose?

Like yours, there's no correlation between the two events. You can code a website that follows standards and makes 1 million in sales or makes 1 thousand in sales. Or you can make a website that does not follow standards and makes 1 million or 1 thousand in sales. If google.com would be coded according to standards, would people stop searching with it? Do people read CNN.com or BBCNews more than NYTimes because the latter uses a doctype? Would more people read A List Apart if it didn't validate? I hope you would answer all the questions with no. Because these are unrelated issues. People use google because it gives them the best results, read CNN because of its offline popularity and so on.

___________________________________________________________
[small]Do something about world cancer today: PACT[/small]

 

[1DMF]

Thanks Foamy for the break down, and some very good points Vragabond.

on a side note why is google a pile of poo in terms of site validation.

I still can't understand the logic on that one, it makes billions of dollars and can't validate a simple one input field form.

or do they do it deliberatetly, some kind of point they are trying to make or two finger salute to W3C or what, I just don't get that one.

oh well mine is not to reason why I guess!





"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[Foamcow]

Why does it matter?


Anyway, I expect it's a bit more complex than just changing a form. I would imagine there is alot of application behind presenting that form and I guess it's a low priority job.

<honk>*:O)</honk>

Tyres: Mine's a pint of the black stuff.
Mike: You can't drink a pint of Bovril.

 

[1DMF]

Why does it matter?

lol - err for all the reasons you and the other just posted.

I guess google don't take pride in their work, just pride in their bank balance

"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[Foamcow]

You missed the point.

Why does it matter to anyone other than Google if they don't adhere to standards?

The reasons 'we' use standards are what I outlined. But ultimately it doesn't effect anything other than our own personal agenda. It's personal choice.

If Google choose not to update their application to conform to web standards then fair enough. It's not like the page is complex and is going to fail in different browsers.

At the end of the day the Google form works perfectly. It does what it's meant to do.

I build sites that conform to standards because I want to and because I want to be able to manage them easily in future. I also like the other benefits outlined earlier.
You use the method that does the job properly. Goolge's job is search, they are quite good at it. My job is building websites - I hope I'm doing OK at that. Standards help me.





<honk>*:O)</honk>

Tyres: Mine's a pint of the black stuff.
Mike: You can't drink a pint of Bovril.

 

[1DMF]

ok , if you put it like that, then standards are only for the individuals that care about them and nothing more.

I'm starting to wonder why I care now - lol.

only kidding

"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[monksnake]

And if you had a chance to go on a date with a model and have your armpits smell bad for the rest of your life (regardless of how much you've washed them) or go on a date with a normal person and have pleasant smell all over, which one would you chose?

I could care less how much my armpits smelled, as long as her armpits didn't smell.

I gave an example of this.
Now if you had a choice follow the standards and make a £1,000.00 in sales or break the standards, colour code things against the standards and make £1,000,000.00 in sales.

In terms of this, I really doubt that anyone's loyalty to following standards is that strong.

Who wouldn't take the 1 million in sales? The difference is the person that would normally adhere to standards would not look at the work as something they think is good (the non-standard 1 million pound/dollar page).

I think you are looking at following web standards as a moral issue, where it is actually more of a personal preference and a sign of work ethics.


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[1DMF]

I could care less how much my armpits smelled, as long as her armpits didn't smell.

lol - it's not the armpits i'd worry about!!!

no you are right, I just wonder why I was punished into submission by the standards from you guys, and then you say , who cares it's a matter of choice - lol no it wasn't I was too scared to not follow the standards you bunch of bullies

"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[monksnake]

lol - it's not the armpits i'd worry about!!!

Her breath??

and then you say , who cares it's a matter of choice

It is a matter of choice, and I wouldn't say who cares, I think web developers should follow standards. Following standards goes a long way in separating good developers from bad.


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