Usability and SEO

There has been a lot of recent discussion on the web about the relationship between Usability and SEO, centring on an exchange between Usability expert Kim Krause Berg (of cre8pc) and the social content network Sphinn.

One good thing arising from this is that many SEOs are apparently taking Usability more seriously as one of the tools in their armoury (a good thing - thank you Kim). Another is writing like this by Jim Hedger, giving a brief overview of both concepts and their relative importance.

In essence, he states that Usability means how easy a site is to use. The ease of use of a site dramatically affects conversion rates, which affect rankings (as well as profits). Also, more interestingly, the ease of use of a site affects user behaviour, so that more users will spend more time browsing and bying - behaviour that is tracked by Google and Yahoo! (something I didn't know) and contributes to their evaluation of the site as worthwhile.

So there's another reason then - usable sites don't just give you more visitors converting to customers, they also help increase your rankings so you get more visitors in the first place - a virtuous circle.