Why you should prefer CSS to Tables

This post is a bit more technical oriented compared to some others I write. Today, I want to cover another aspect of SEO that doesn't involve keywords or so but rather the HTML structure of your website / blog.

Now, some of you may wonder what HTML structure got to do with search engine optimization. Quite simply, it does affect the visitor satisfaction following areas:

• First impression. Whether your site looks clean, neat, attractive and professional.

• Loading speed. How long will your website take to display on the screen of your visitor.

Yes, these points have nothing to do with the search engines themselves, but remember that we design websites for our human visitors and their reaction must be taken into consideration. Here it's about how your website will look, and how fast it will load.

Everybody knows that even if you rank number one on Google, it your page takes 10 minutes to load, after one minute of waiting, 99% of your visitors will be gone.

Let's go back to the HTML site structure, how it evolves and its implication for us.

At first, web pages were only text based, that was a rather dull time. Later on, the introduction of multimedia such as pictures gave a new meaning to internet. I would say that at this point of time, we can now start to talk about web design.

The problem at that time was to think of how to be able to arrange the pictures and the text in one page in a way that would not look messy. Furthermore, in a way that would help us maintain our design and outlook regardless of the screen resolution or browser.

This became the golden age of HTML Table based designs. Even nowadays, many people still use tables to design their websites.

Finally, more recently have been introduce the Cascading Style Sheet (CSS). This new language brought website to an all different level, however required many people to upgrade their knowledge.

So, as a website designer, or SEO professional, should you stick with the good old table, or should you learn how to use CSS?

The great thing about HTML Tables is that they help maintain a strict layout. Now, talking about the downsides of using HTML Table rather than CSS:

• HTML Tables are designed to hold data, not make website structure. By doing so, you'll more often than not create some HTML infraction causing your code not to validate properly. Such mistakes can have more or less dire consequences are search engines start to be pickier on neat code. Beside SEO concerns, having a clean code ensures your website to display properly in cross-browser environment.

• Limited personalization. Without the use of CSS, you'll be required to use a seamless norm for your entire page or site.

• The real downside of using HTML Table lies in its browser interpretation. One fact that most people ignore, is that an HTML Table will not appear on screen until all its content is fully loaded! If your page is full of pictures and animation, it will display a blank screen until all those elements are fully loaded, and sometimes, it can be extremely long, too long for your visitors to wait.

Alternatively, using Cascading Style Sheet to design your website / blog allows you to enjoy the following benefits:

• Fully customizable elements within your page or website. Select different size or color of links within the same page for different sections.

• Ability to create a fluid frame that will adjust itself to fit the size of the monitor resolution of your visitor.

• By using CSS, your page is divided in multiple sections that will load individually. This means that your pages will load much more faster that with a table, and at the very least, elements will show on screen are they are loaded rather than having to wait for the entire page to load.

If you understand the implication mentioned above, there's no doubt that making use of the Cascading Style Sheet over the HTML Table will greatly help you both as a designer and SEO professional. Furthermore, it is a fact that CSS is the new norm, and it is a knowledge that we all should consider to acquire.

To your Success!