Accessibility and SEO
Across the UNC School of Medicine’s WordPress network, over 70% of web traffic originates from Google searches. This underscores the critical role of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) in ensuring your content reaches its intended audience.
SEO is an ongoing process of optimizing your website to rank higher in search engine results, making it easier for users to discover your site when searching for relevant information. At its core, SEO is about aligning your content with what users need and what search engines value. Following SEO best practices—such as using relevant keywords, creating clear and engaging content, and ensuring fast page loading times—helps boost your site’s visibility, attract more visitors, and drive engagement. These efforts directly support your broader goals, whether that’s disseminating knowledge, recruiting, or building a community.
The Role of Accessibility (A11Y) in SEO
Accessibility (A11Y) is a vital component of SEO. Accessible websites are designed to be usable by everyone, including individuals with disabilities. This ensures inclusivity while aligning with SEO principles. For example:
- Adding alt text for images benefits visually impaired users and helps search engines understand your visual content.
- Structured headings improve navigation for screen readers and assist search engine crawlers in indexing your content.
Focusing on accessibility doesn’t just make your site more usable—it also improves your search rankings, enhances user experience, and ensures compliance with legal standards. It’s a win-win for both inclusivity and discoverability.
Actionable SEO and Accessibility Best Practices
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Improve User Experience (UX)
- Use Semantic HTML: Ensure proper use of headings, ARIA roles, and other semantic HTML elements to improve usability for all users.
- Optimize Page Load Speeds: Fast-loading pages enhance both user experience and Google rankings. Using numerous, very large images for example would increase page load times. Also consider reducing the total number of directory profiles, news posts, or video embeds showing on any single page with pagination or limits.
- Audit Broken Links: Broken links harm user experience and SEO. Regularly review and update your site to fix broken links and remove outdated content, ensuring visitors can access accurate information. The easiest way to find broken links is to take time to click around your website – focusing on the most trafficked pages. Another way is to use our 404 Error Tool to look for errors that could be a result of broken links.
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Crawlability and Indexing
- Logical Page Titles, Slugs, and URL Structures: Use clear, descriptive titles and URLs to help users and search engines understand your content. For example, a page structure with slugs like:
/medicine/education/residency/curriculum
indicates that the page is about “the curriculum” for the “residency” which is part of “education” in “medicine.” - Leverage XML Sitemaps: Our websites automatically generate XML sitemaps to ensure that all published pages, events, posts, profiles, etc. are discoverable by search engines – even if they’re not linked in your site’s navigation menu or from other pages.
- Monitor for Orphaned Pages: Identify and address pages that aren’t linked anywhere but are still indexed through the sitemap. These pages can confuse users and dilute your site’s SEO value.
- Avoid Duplicate Content: Ensure all content is unique. For similar topics across multiple URLs, tailor content to specific audiences or consolidate to a single, authoritative page.
- Logical Page Titles, Slugs, and URL Structures: Use clear, descriptive titles and URLs to help users and search engines understand your content. For example, a page structure with slugs like:
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Mobile Optimization
- Design Mobile-Friendly Pages: Use responsive designs and content layouts, like those in the School of Medicine’s Cells Plugin, to ensure optimal display across devices.
- Adopt Mobile-First Principles: Google prioritizes mobile-first indexing, so accessible, mobile-friendly designs will improve your SEO performance. With 50% of visitors using mobile devices, prioritizing mobile usability will also align your SEO efforts with your audience needs.
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Captions and Transcripts
- Provide Captions for Videos: Enhance usability and SEO by adding captions to videos. Learn more about video captioning
- Include Audio Transcripts: Text-based transcripts improve accessibility and allow search engines to crawl and index your audio content.
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Content Cleanup
- Archive Outdated Content: Remove or archive old draft pages, past events, or content that no longer attracts traffic.
- Consolidate Low-Traffic Pages: Rewrite, merge, or delete pages with minimal engagement to improve overall site relevance and search rankings.
- Use Analytics Tools: Leverage tools like Google Analytics to identify pages that need updating or removal based on traffic patterns.
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Streamline Plugins and Media
- Deactivate Unused Plugins: Remove unused WordPress plugins to enhance site security and performance.
- Clean the Media Library: Regularly delete outdated or unused media files, as all uploaded items are discoverable by search engines. Ensure all media items comply with accessibility standards and copyright regulations.
- Ensure A11Y Compliance for Media: Confirm that all uploaded media items (like documents) are accessible, with alt text for images and captions for videos.
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Optimize Site Navigation
- Align Navigation with Page Structure: Organize your navigation menus to match your site’s hierarchy. This helps users find content easily and signals structure to search engines.