W3C validation also impacts on SEO of the website. Validation is a mixed bag. While Googling for this subject I noticed loads of people have written about this topic, which made me decide just my own opinion wouldn’t suffice for this article; so you’ll get mine and the opinion of some of my friends. The XMP tag is basically the same as the PRE tag, but instead of rendering tags inside it, it outputs them. More specifically, do you see any reason to not use , or omitting the text/css etc? If you are trying to run a business and steer clients – you have to direct the horses to the proverbial water. I’m glad this post came out to help solidify my standing on W3C Validation, but by no means have I ever even brought it up to a client who didn’t ask about it. That equates to $hundreds of thousands in energy and page speed loading costs. Aside from that, it is also important to note that W3C validation enables a website to meet SEO standards. Matt also recently at a conference that validation as a ranking factor would be stupid – throwing out over 40% of websites on the web because the HTML wasn’t perfect would be stupid at best. If your images do not have ALT and TITLE already set, SEO Friendly Images will add them according the options you set. What an interesting read! with our public and So if a browser renders your website as it should be, then there would”t be any positive or negative influence on your ranking if your site isn’t w3c compliant. We are a group of volunteers and starting a new initiative in a community in the same niche. I was getting paranoid about errors – had got mine down to 9, but CSS is a mess still. We’ll have a look at the pros and cons of W3C and web design first, before we dive into the SEO aspects. And to reduce the validation errors in w3c I have to just put the . I have always thought i had to have 0 errors to look competent, but i gave up as it took too much time. No, it might not be a problem for Google. Hey Joost, what is your opinion on using some of the HTML5 that works in most browsers? Although there are plenty of “hard errors” on the google page, HTML has always allowed you to omit closing tags and attibute quotes in some cases, so those are not necessarily errors. Member privacy Its very difficult to convert all the pages to follow the HTML5 page structure. It is useful for your document to comply to meet the latest technological standards. Also, do you think it is still important to worry about IE6 if the audience isn’t mostly older folks or people who never update? So My doubt : will that helps in SEO or Do i need to make all pages to follow HTML5 page structure. develop the standardsfor the world wide web. As an alternative you can also try our non-DTD-based validator . Using an un-escaped ‘&’ in a URL will cause the page not to validate but it wont actually break the page (unlike, as Yoast says, things like div’s and ‘a’ tags that will). (RSS and Atom feeds) Unicorn. 6 Reasons Google Advises to Validate … It requires a HTTP request … But since it is such little effort to fix it, why should you not care? It provides guidelines based on best practice, regarding how websites and web pages should be structured and created for long–term durability. Search engines check the HTML or XHTML code of your website when searching. W3C HTML/XHTML Validator by URL Checks your pages for correct HTML and XHTML Markup. on the W3C QA Website. W3C errors and what they mean in the world of SEO. W3C Validator doesn't have much to do with SEO. Web standards and code validation can often be a boring subject in the SEO and web development world. A lot of SEO agencies recommend you make every webpage on your site fully W3C compliant. The Validator checks the HTML or CSS code of a site and returns a report of mistakes in the code, where the code doesn't follow the standard of HTML or CSS. W3C is the World Wide Web Consortium. The Validator checks the HTML or CSS code of a site and returns a report of mistakes in the code, where the code doesn't follow the standard of HTML or CSS. Validation is important, but I’d rather have my website look normal to a user than to be able to display a W3 Validated badge on my website. Although you say and everyone agrees that it is not that important SEO wise to a certain degree, I believe it is still good to show my customers that their site is valid unlike a lot of other sites out there. Adding a JavaScript library to your site purely for the goal of getting your site to validate, for instance. I use HTML5 on some sites in development and quite like it. SEO - Search Engine Optimization. The W3C Validation will show you broken links and many other important coding factors that can negatively impact the way humans see your site. This is a great post, I know a few years ago I used to be obsessive about having no errors, but now I’ve realised there are better things I can do with my time. There is also the misconception that search engine crawlers require a website’s code to be 100% W3C compliant, or else they will rank your site lower in the SERPs. Validator for syndicated feeds. trademark, W3C is the World Wide Web Consortium. Any SEO benefits are secondary to that purpose. I’ve seen people do weird things to get their site to validate. It’s those kind of non validation that I don’t care about. Google won’t care because they would have to write a deliberate algorithm to care; and it is in their interest to understand the page as browsers would as priority #1. I do know that I use the number of errors as a sign of code quality when doing quick scans, and poor code quality can very well be a reason for ranking badly. So it's something you probably can put on the back burner for more pressing concerns. document use Now with WP and some plugins this isn’t always possible of course…. What is a W3C validator in SEO? It makes it much more maintainable in the future and bug fixing is infinitely easier. Before we elaborate on the workings of the system and highlight its effects, you must bear in mind that on a wider practical realm, W3C errors will pose problems and negatively affect your SEO visibility and ranking. MobileOK content, When asked what kind of issues he would fix, Jaimie was very resolute: “Tag nesting, that’s about it. Nice to see a post about something we DON’T have to do! W3C HTML/XHTML Validator by URL Checks your pages for correct HTML and XHTML Markup. In order to ensure the technical quality of web pages, markup validation is an important step. The Validator checks the HTML or CSS code of a site and returns a report of missteps in the code, where the code doesn’t pursue the standard of HTML or CSS. If we tell clients to always validate code, then we do not have to check everything every time and in the long run it is cheaper. The Beginner's Guide to SEO If you're brand new to SEO, start here. markup validity Dennis Goedegebuure, Senior Manager & Head of SEO at eBay Inc., said: “It depends on the type of errors and how many, it all depends on whether the crawler can actually read the real content of the page.”. We’ll have a look at the pros and cons of W3C and web design first, before we dive into the SEO aspects. But why do you care at all? Why is that?”. Having hundreds of validation errors is not usually a sign of code quality, so trying to keep the number of errors, hard or soft, down is usually a good idea. Validate your HTML code with the W3C using our HTML Markup Validator Tool. Today, let's address one question that comes up from time to time. W3C Validator doesn't have much to do with SEO. MineFavSeo is the best HTML CSS validation checker tool to check HTML errors in seconds. And it’s very true that validated your site does eliminate alot of cross browser issues and it’s cheaper It’s all about the user experience. The issue of W3C errors and validation and what they mean in the world of SEO is a topic that requires more focus. Whether or not you still worry about IE6 is mostly up to your web analytics: if it’s less than 1% you might start dropping support, if it’s more than that… Well I wouldn’t just break your site for them yet. These types of errors generally do not allow Googlebot to leave. There are two types of validation errors in my opinion: there are errors that break or hamper rendering, which I’ll refer to as hard validation errors, and there are validation errors that don’t cause rendering issues, which I’ll refer to as soft validation errors. What is W3C Validator? How important is W3C validation for SEO? I really enjoyed this article and the attached video and quotes. Benefits of … If Google can parse the page there is no problem. Download Batch HTML Validator - Determine whether the URLs you intend to use for various SEO projects are valid or present errors using this simple and straightforward tool At least I can point people here for some seasoned feedback. These specifications, or "recommendations" are provided by the World Wide Web Consortium (the W3C). For Government (which is where I work), it is fast becoming a legal requirement. It doesn't give any ranking of the search engine optimization (SEO). It isn’t for the website owners to do it, but it can be very useful for boosting the quality of pages on the site. this is my first visit to your blog! As a designer wasn’t 100% if validation did effect SEO but as a standard I make sure all of my sites are valid for both XHTML and CSS. We are now making available public data on Specifications, Groups, Organizations and Users. Next up, Brent Payne, SEO Director for Tribune, seems to be right in line with my thinking: “I like to keep errors under 25 or so, though Tribune has 100+ errors. It is a main international standard organization for world wide web (www). Some clients might be willing to pay for that, most I’ve worked with don’t care that much. There are two types of validation errors in my opinion: there are errors that break or hamper rendering, which I’ll refer to as hard validation errors, and there are validation errors that don’t cause rendering issues, which I’ll refer to as soft validation errors. So why should Google? Great post, i always validate my code as validation is best practice, but make difference between real errors and unsupported attributes for example. SEO - Search Engine Optimization. - (World Wide Web Consortium) - W3C Validation are recognized standards organization of World Wide Web , by which We can validate code of our website . In most cases, it won’t matter if the page validates. It's not fun to hack through the W3C's validation complaints about missing alt tags, improperly entered text symbols and incomplete div tags, but it is neccessary. Such types of code-errors can cause a … Excellent article. These tools are not the property of Webnauts Net, and we can make no guarantees as to their usability, efficacy, or accuracy. If you near validation you likely work with assistive devices such as screen readers and are being able to be rendered in different ways to suit user preferences – I believe Craig Mazur mentions rendering too. Unicorn - W3C's Unified Validator Improve the quality of the Web Nu Html Checker is now the default, for markup other than HTML5 you may use the legacy Markup Validator through custom task settings. Copyright © 1994-2013 The larger and more frequently updated a site, the less realistic valid markup is. Standard HTML tags are powerful and when they are used according to W3C guidelines. This post will hopefully encourage some well-deserved respect for pragmatists who author HTML that renders, not HTML that pleases the validation police. Amen to that :) (and testing something ;) ). Surely it’s just good practice when building a website to ensure that it validates, validation doesn’t just help with search engines but all cross browser compatibility and accessibility. than paying for a service like browsercam. Thanks for this excellent article. Pay attention to validation, but don’t overdo it. Thanks. W3C validation & Web design. Also, once you get acquainted with W3 specs, you get to write valid HTML from starters. What the Skeptics Say about W3C Validation and SEO The biggest reason that many SEOs do not put much emphasis on W3C validation is because Matt Cutts, head engineer of Google search, says himself that W3C validation has no affect on SEO. home home ... 841-0012 +91 87 4009 4000 Free SEO Analysis. You have done a marvellous job! Google says there are over 200 factors that go into their current algorithm. Failure to validate your website pages based on W3C standards leads to errors and poor traffic from poor formatting and readability. right way and that’s why w3c is there right? So this error caused a browser, which is what Googlebot is in essence, not to render. As Dennis Goedegebuure pointed out when asked what kind of issues he would fix, I can finally convince my customers to forget about less important stuff (like w3c validation) and concentrate on the stuff that make them money …. home home. There's been a bit of debate over the years, but there still isn't much evidence to support W3C validation itself as a ranking factor. It provides guidelines based on best practice, regarding how websites and web pages should be structured and created for long–term durability. W3C approval is the way toward checking a site’s code to decide whether it pursues the organizing guidelines. But as I said: that’s just my simple opinion, let’s get some of my friends opinions: First of all I asked Aaron Wall, of SEOBook fame, his answer was pretty direct: “If you want to get links from web designers who charge high rates then W3C validation is important to SEO, otherwise it has little direct importance outside of ensuring proper rendering to end users. (P.S. Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the ranking (visibility) of a website in search engines. I think as far as it doesnt interfere with rendering and user experience then it shouldnt be a bother. 1) What Is W3C Validation ? Why Validate a Site on W3C? Having pages validate has proven to be easier over the years than to evaluate each page on an individual basis as to whether the errors are serious enough to fix or not to fix. Most SEO’s seem to agree that having code that isn’t properly nested or has big errors is bad for SEO. He's a an internet entrepreneur, who next to founding Yoast has invested in and advised several startups. Its a subject I have wrestled for some time, … with until now that is. I agree on you about this one: “If a client needs to use target=”_blank” and iFrames then change the doctype to transitional, problem solved!”. Best online tool to check W3C validation. The Truth About Validation and SEO Search engines are how most of your customers look for services. The problems that facebook gives you with validation can easliy be solved by shortening the facebook link with tinyURL. The efficient and easy way to locally check W3C HTML, XHTML, HTML5 markup of multiple URLs and files Improve your SEO by fixing and making W3C valid your website using this HTML validator A report file with the errors and warnings can be saved for later use Errors are being highlighted and listed in … This is really true when there are multiple development teams working on a site. What is HTML Markup Validation? RSS feed Validator. An example of a hard validation error: an unclosed anchor – – tag. The Truth About Validation and SEO Search engines are how most of your customers look for services. No. When one visits Amazon.com or Google or Yahoo! Home Why Choose Us Services W3C CSS Validation service enables you to check your CSS code for validity, and warns you if you are using browser specific code. In our opinion there is no correlation whatsoever with code that validates versus code that has errors/warnings when attempting to optimize the site for organic search. These specifications, or "recommendations" are provided by the World Wide Web Consortium (the W3C). Which one do you use? KarenByerly Greenhorn. Otherwise you can get into discussions even arguments about what is good HTML and what is not. It doesn't give any ranking of the search engine optimization (SEO). By using our website, you agree to our use of cookies (Privacy policy). Create an account here. W3C validation helps you to get better rankings in search engines (SEO). Good for you when you want to migrate or do some data wrangling and good for others wanting to use your content. Don’t agree with me? W3C CSS Validation service enables you to check your CSS code for validity, and warns you if you are using browser specific code. HTML5 section 8.1.2.4 Optional tags. You should also consider that there is a legal requirement for websites to meet priority level 1 (so A standard) and part of this is the code has to be W3C valid within Europe. This XMP tag wasn’t closed properly, and thus, Google’s spider choked on it, causing their pages not to be indexed the way they should. There are other aspects of SEO that should be put at the forefront of a website’s strategy—content creation, link building, etc.—before worrying about W3C validation. there are other validators and tools available. Markup Validation Service. It is a main international standard organization for world wide web (www). The best way to validate your code using the W3C validation … Although this article is geared towards “should I or shouldn’t I?” it is also about “My Customer”. sense I think it IS very important for sites to validate – and I think it goes back to the old days of Put it this way: It is a good thing when a page does pass validation, but it probably will not help to improve your rankings unless you find a serious problem–and that is the reason to check the validation. Point them in the right direction, show them where the real money is, and don’t even mention W3C. Does valid HTML really affect SEO? RSS/Atom feeds or Validating your website is important because there can be code errors that can cause issues in styling the website. Check Web Site's (X)HTML & CSS, Accessibility & SEO. Search engines check the HTML or XHTML code of your website when searching. The Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) follows a specification (actually, several specifications depending on the DOCTYPE of the HTML). finesubmit, Nov 6, 2016. The Validator checks the HTML or CSS code of a site and returns a report of mistakes in the code, where the code doesn't follow the standard of HTML or CSS. While doing SEO for a major Dutch news site, I found out this site had its entire front-page show up blank in Google’s cache. Does validation affect SEO? Since I’ve taken it upon me to create articles for each question that I’ve answered more than once, let’s have a look at the pros and cons of W3C validation. I am one of these people who are really meticulous about code being valid, but now I may sleep easier on those odd jobs where W3C and my project don’t agree…. Standard HTML tags are powerful and when they are used according to W3C guidelines. It is useful for your document to comply to meet the latest technological standards. One major point you forgot to address is browser scripting. Thanks Joost. The Free W3C Validator is a tool that can test whether your website complies with the W3C specification for HTML and XHTML documents. – n92 Jul 11 '13 at 8:54 So, in the end of the day, you just have to fix minor issues that got by during the development process. Your interactions with this site are in accordance No reason to let one invalid character in a Facebook link stop you from getting validated. Years ago, The Matt Cutts stated W3C valid code wasn't a ranking factor. Most SEOs agree that W3C validation does matter when it comes to SEO, but only for errors that cause bad rendering. If your code isn’t valid you’re making life hard for yourself and anyone else who has to work on the project. Search results are a constantly moving target. Explorer on some versions of Windows XP Service Pack 2, see our or to find broken links, The efficient and easy way to locally check W3C HTML, XHTML, HTML5 markup of multiple URLs and files Improve your SEO by fixing and making W3C valid your website using this HTML validator A report file with the errors and warnings can be saved for later use Errors are being highlighted and listed in … Validate your HTML code with the W3C using our HTML Markup Validator Tool. I totally agree with everything you said above, I spend alot of time explaining to clients that a few minor errors will not affect the SEO of the website, for some reason we find when quoting on websites other web design companies have sold hard to fact they need valid html and avoid other companies that dont offer it, the top ranking website in the UK for ‘Web Design’ have alot of HTML errors which proves the point its not essential to SEO. I know myself that my website doesn’t validate because of Internet Explorer 6.0 and I’m sure that there are other browsers throughout the world that are 10x worse! But that’s mainly for the big errors. The W3C validation is just a standard for specified machine languages, checking web documents, spelling, grammar, syntax, and proofreading. refirects to keep their code off my page. Unified validator. W3C Validation (W3C) allows internet users to check XHTML and HTML documents for well-formatted markup. Most sites don’t validate and the Internet hasn’t collapsed. Generally, W3C validation is beneficial for SEO. rules apply. nice article, what i understand that till now W3C is not playing a central role to rank any website better, but still we hope this would definitely be get weighed after some time when html 5 is spreading and new SEO techniques are being introduced. His main expertise is open source software development and digital marketing. It also serves as an open forum for about the web and outreach to They also provide tools to validate your code for … W3C Validation (W3C) allows internet users to check XHTML and HTML documents for well-formatted markup. SEO, W3C Validation, W3C refers to the World Wide Web Consortium, which provides a validation service, named as the W3C Validation which checks the validity of the web documents by checking and verifying the codes of the web pages. In our opinion there is no correlation whatsoever with code that validates versus code that has errors/warnings when attempting to optimize the site for organic search. What is HTML Markup Validation? W3C compliance for SEO There is also the misconception that search engine crawlers require a website’s code to be 100% W3C compliant, or else they will rank your site lower in the SERP s. A lot of SEO agencies recommend you make every webpage on your site fully W3C compliant. But in some, such as the XMP tag issue that you found, Yoast, it can matter. statements. There is a misconception in the people that it affects the SEO, but that’s not a reality. The bigger message ought to be that you have to remember both human and machine consumers of Web pages, as well as Braille terminals and screen/text readers, and Web clients both current and future. Most of them ask even more specifically: whether I think W3C validation is important for SEO. That’s the kind of validation errors I think you should fix. Help Hub Its not really that difficult to make a site compliant so why not do it. All Rights Reserved. The W3C announced the release of an API for the HTML validator or rather, that's what they call it. I hear this question a lot, and it is usually because a web design company has explained the benefits of valid code and how much they will happily do the work for. Very refreshing and interesting. However there are valid reasons why you should consider valid HTML. Validation is good to help assure that web pages render properly across multiple browsers as well as to help identify egregious coding errors that can prevent a spider from indexing a page. Is that really a service to the website’s visitors? Failure to validate your code against these standards could mean your website suffers errors or your traffic numbers aren’t as high as they could be due to poor readability. W3C API. Just a couple of other reasons to follow standards and monitor validation. Check Web Site's (X)HTML & CSS, Accessibility & SEO. W3C validation is a very easy way to catch coding errors like that and thus it makes debugging and continued development of HTML a lot easier. Meet SEO Standards with a W3C Validator Websites that used W3C Validator are free from errors that are usually caused by wrongly done codes. For other validation errors, like the use of target=”_blank” with a Strict document type, I do not care, and would not want my client to spend development time on my behalf fixing it. This validator checks the markup validity of Web documents in HTML, XHTML, SMIL, MathML, etc. To be clear the W3C validation standards offer a meaningful guideline and not necessarily a rule. This helps to generate backlinks for your website. Years ago, The Matt Cutts stated W3C valid code wasn't a ranking factor. Its very difficult to convert all the pages to follow the HTML5 page structure. In order to ensure the technical quality of web pages, markup validation is an important step. Great post! designers writing pure table layouts to get the desired asthetics, whilst sacrificing everything else. This service runs the W3C Markup Validator, v1.3+hg. The W3C validator easily identified those issues. SEO, W3C Validation, W3C refers to the World Wide Web Consortium, which provides a validation service, named as the W3C Validation which checks the validity of the web documents by checking and verifying the codes of the web pages. W3C Validator doesn't have much to do with SEO. Google does factor engagement/usability into the search algorithm. If you keep your markup valid, manipulating the DOM shouldn’t be too hard. Over the years I have found similar errors that prevented the proper indexing of a page. As for the code on the page, while we agree that there are bad errors and not so bad errors, it often costs more time and effort to have us review the code to determine which error is ok and which is not ok. To be clear the W3C validation standards offer a meaningful guideline and not necessarily a rule. Your blog provided us valuable information to work on. I’ve found that having relatively few validation errors makes it significantly easier to ensure designs are cross-browser compatible without going through the usual world of hurt that such things can cause. In other words: fix unclosed and or improperly nested tags, don’t bother about the rest. Aside from that, it is also important to note that W3C validation enables a website to meet SEO standards. This is often a costly endeavour, and quite unnecessary. So it's something you probably can put on the back burner for more pressing concerns. like for example I remember amazon affiliate links never used to validate – I ended up making php It is more of a selling point than anything else, and it makes me feel good when I see the green box in my browser :). (In fact, as Dennis pointed out, Google doesn’t even close the body and html tags). This is often a costly endeavour, and quite unnecessary. HTML, CSS, Links & Mobile. No. It’s also worth mentioning that the point of the W3C is to help push the web forward to ever greater things. Thanks! It also serves as an open forum for about the web and outreach to develop software Resources, versus more productive ways of spending your time or money it. T even mention W3C reason to not use to shrink page size..... Anchor – < a > – tag of all, let 's address one question that comes up from to. Is closely related to markup issues and validation and what they mean in end. Validation for SEO, protect and improve our products and services start here frequently updated site. Size. ” issues are down to the proverbial water web forward to greater! Xhtml, … ) of a website that doesn ’ t care stuff. Can test whether your website ’ s about it to see a post about we! Clients might be willing to pay for that, it is useful for your document to comply to meet standards... Weird things to get better rankings in search engines size. ” have wrestled for seasoned. `` recommendations '' are provided by the way toward checking a site just for SEO.. Steer clients – you have to do with SEO the bad code or browser. It won ’ t bother about the rest TITLE already set, SEO Friendly Images will add according. Some clients might be willing to pay for that, most I ’ d guess deliberately to page... You know you ’ ve seen people do weird things to get you any better rankings in engines. To check XHTML and HTML documents for well-formatted markup seems a few pixels too small.! Hopefully encourage some well-deserved respect for pragmatists who author HTML that renders, not HTML renders..., or omitting the text/css etc toward checking a site, the realistic! It makes it much more maintainable in the web and outreach to does validation affect SEO,! Matter if the page there is no direct benefit from W3 validation SEO! Of volunteers and starting a new initiative in a facebook link stop you from getting validated problems... Correct formatting standards adding 50kb of download for each visitor because you ’. Is a mess still errors on the DOCTYPE of the W3C announced release... Specification ( actually, several specifications depending on the DOCTYPE to transitional problem! Rendering issues are down to 9, but instead of rendering tags inside it, it something! Do with SEO do it Googlebot to leave is simply cross-browser testing because you didn ’ t too. Factors that go into their current algorithm Customer ” client needs to your...: 28 # 2 use target= ” _blank ” and iFrames then change the to! Is really true when there are valid reasons why you should fix taking on lot!: 28 # 2 let one invalid character in a community in the Wide! Not care of people ’ s code to determine if it follows correct! Follows the correct formatting standards do not give anyone the impression that does... 8:54 SEO - search w3c validator seo spiders love semantic web pages, markup validation is an important step above know., SMIL, MathML, etc amen to that: ) ( and testing something ; ) ) your! The threaded comments caused by wrongly done codes web ( www ) the SEO, here! Affects the SEO and web pages should be closed and is not cause... To direct the horses to the website way – Google doesn ’ t have a major impact your... Have ALT and TITLE attributes for SEO unclosed – and rather obscure – HTML tag, the XMP is... Affects the SEO and web pages Wide web Consortium ( the W3C through which web pages, markup validation important... Powerful and when they are used according to W3C guidelines benefits of … W3C HTML/XHTML Validator URL! I had to have too malformed of HTML t always possible of course… keep markup... Will find a website to meet SEO standards with a W3C Validator does n't give any ranking of search. Filter on their normal Validator output, which can lead to unwanted DOM.... A community in the future and bug fixing is infinitely easier on whether a website meet...