SEO Assessment – The Tech Warehouse

Leverage browser caching

In order to speed up site loading times browser caching should be leveraged. This involves making modifications to the htaccess file of the site. The following code should be added to the htaccess file:

## EXPIRES CACHING ##

ExpiresActive On
ExpiresByType image/jpg “access 1 year”
ExpiresByType image/jpeg “access 1 year”
ExpiresByType image/gif “access 1 year”
ExpiresByType image/png “access 1 year”
ExpiresByType text/css “access 1 month”
ExpiresByType text/html “access 1 month”
ExpiresByType application/pdf “access 1 month”
ExpiresByType text/x-javascript “access 1 month”
ExpiresByType application/x-shockwave-flash “access 1 month”
ExpiresByType image/x-icon “access 1 year”
ExpiresDefault “access 1 month”

## EXPIRES CACHING ##

Details of this functionality is detailed here: http://www.feedthebot.com/pagespeed/leverage-browser-caching.html

Minify HTML

In order to boost site loading time and to positively impact the text/html ratio of the site, Document HTML should be compressed.
This ultimately means stripping excess characters like spacing out of the site. This aspect can be achieved by copying and replacing template source html and using it in a tool such as http://www.willpeavy.com/minifier/.

Special considerations need to made to avoid minifying PHP and JavaScript alongside the HTML, as minifying non HTML elements may break JS/PHP functionality.

NoFollow Attributes on External Links

NoFollow attributes should be added to external links in order to better optimise the flow of Authority throughout the site. Notable external links include the social media buttons cross site.

Cache Validator Specification

In order to enhance site loading speeds cache validators ought to be specified. Site speed is one of the many factors Google currently uses in regards to ranking websites.

CSS Minification

In order to boost site loading speeds, and clear excess code (code bloat) the CSS files of the site should be minified.

Overuse of H1 Tags

There are currently multiple usages of h1 header tags on a number of pages cross site. Each page should only have one H1 tag and this should pertain to the main topic of each web page. This may be achieved via modifications to the main theme template of the site.

W3C Validity

The W3C Validation service currently shows a large number of issues (Invalid: 1 20 Errors, 14 Warnings )for the homepage of the site. As best practice any issues of invalid mark-up should be addressed so as to ensure that the site conforms to W3C standards. The details of the errors can be found here:

http://validator.w3.org/check?uri= thetechwarehouse.com

Syntax errors can make your page difficult for search engines to index.

Reduce Inline CSS

There are a number of instance where CSS attributes are used inline within the HTML document. Inline styling is a legacy/bad practice approach towards website styling. Ultimately the excess code in the HTML document has a negative impact on the text/html of the site, with more excess code putting down the perceived relevancy of the keywords in the site.
The use of inline CSS also has a detrimental impact on site loading speeds by preventing the parallel loading of HTML alongside CSS assets.

In instances where inline styling occurs, the offending CSS styles should be removed from the main HTML document and placed in the main CSS (cascading style sheet) of the site instead.

Low Text/HTML Ratio

The text/html of the homepage is currently 5%. This is particularly low and should be improved in order to ensure that content onsite is considered as relevant as possible.

CSS Issues

There are a number of instances where CSS is not working properly: An example is given here:

http://www.thetechwarehouse.com/samsung-nx-300

These should be fixed as appropriate.

Robots.txt

The site is currently missing a Robots.txt file. This file is important as it tells the search engines it is allowed to crawl and index. Without a robots.txt sensitive parts of the site may be indexed by the search engines and could pose a security vulnerability.

Move JavaScript to Document Footer

Following the logical progression in the way that web pages are rendered, it’s appropriate that the main document is loaded prior to enhancements such as JavaScript. As such any instances of JavaScript should be moved to the footer of the HTML document.
This is ultimately a web design best practice which helps enable the website to load faster. A faster website load time is factor favourable for both end users and search engines.

Conversion Recommendations

In order to boost conversion rates, it’s recommended to add social proof in the form of site wide accreditation’s from external Government or Professional bodies. These may be added as images to the sidebar or site footer. The greater the number of authoritative endorsements the greater the likelihood of end users purchasing your products.