Search Engine Optimization for Frames-based Websites

Great Google Tips!

Sites that use frames present special problems for all concerned because they break the page-oriented paradigm on which the World Wide Web is based. They're essentially pages within pages. Users can't bookmark the interior pages of a frames-based website and when they click on a link to such an interior page they can be left without any means of escape. But new webmasters love frames because the most common layouts are used to keep a navigation menu and site title and logo in front of the user at all times. What could be better? When it comes to search engines, frames-based websites don't always fare as well in two key areas.

The first area is sheer ranking. Since search engines base much of their ranking algorithms on link popularity schemes like Google's PageRank, a website's main page is usually the strongest. But on many framed websites, the main page consists solely of the <frameset> layout and the ubiquitous "Your browser doesn't support frames." message in the <noframes> section. This is an enormous mistake when it comes to search engine ranking.

Your <noframes> section should include a scaled-down version of a typical main page so that search engines will have more to go on than simply the page title. Use an <h1> tag to display an appropriate headline, along with a paragraph of two of keyword-rich text - what I call a mission statement paragraph to give your frame-based website's strongest page a fighting chance to compete with conventional designs.

The other search engine-related issue for framed websites is that search engines look at individual pages - not websites. So, it often happens that when a search engine user clicks on a link to a page from a frames-based website, he sees the interior page well enough, but he is left without any means for navigating to other pages within that website because the interior page has been loaded in his browser without the intended <frameset> that included the navigation menu. There is a JavaScript solution for this problem that works pretty well. The script you'll find by following the previous link here detects when a page that has been designed to be contained in a <framset> has been loaded directly into a browser, and automatically reloads the page in its proper position in the <frameset>. Its not a panacea. You still have to include a <noscript> message for those Luddites out there who run with JavaScript disabled in order to avoid pop-up windows and imagined security threats. But overall, its as elegant a solution as you'll find. The script can be found at Rainbo Design's Automatic Framed Page Loader/Re-loader.

And if you want to remove the frames from your website, but you don't want to give up the simplicity of a single common menu bar for navigation, there is help. I call my methods Rainbo Design's No-Frames Navigation System. It will show you three alternative methods of giving you a single file for providing navigation on your website without using frames.