How FREE templates may be costing you traffic

Whether Joomla!, Wordpress of any other CMS system, we often use free templates provided by template designers. Not all of us have the skills or the ability to design attractive templates for our web sites. I, for one, have no artistic skills or vision when it comes to graphic and template design.

I use FREE templates available Joomla! when developing web sites for clients. However, If one isn't careful these free templates can have a negative effect on the web site SEO, search engine rankings and traffic.

The following are a few thing I look out for when I use third party templates on my web sites.

1. Back links to the designer and other web sites:

I have no problem linking back to the template designer's web site, in fact, it is only fair and right. However, you do not have to have more than one link, and that should only be a simple: Original template by "designer's name and link". Designers often put in more expanded text in their links

So, work through the links that are in the web site and limit them to the bottom of the page.

2. Links that take your visitors away from your web site:

Very often the links to the template designer's web site and to things like HTML and CSS validation take visitors away from your web site as they do not target a new page but but replace your web site when people click on those links.

Always check these links and add target="_blank" to the link to ensure that your traffic is not lost.

3. Unrelated keywords embedded in the code:

Image alt and title tags are very important when it come to SEO and if they contain keywords unrelated to your web site and web page your web site's SEO and search engine rankings are affected. The images of a free template obviously do not contain your web sites keywords, how can it? Howver, they often contain the template designer's web site name serve as "comment" tags such as, alt="spacer pic".

The alt and title tags, especially those near the top of your web page, i.e. logo and header images, are important when Google and other search engines determine the keyword density of your web pages and web site and to unrelated keywords in these tags reduce your keyword density and can reduce your search engine rankings.

Edit the template to include keywords that are relevant to the content of your web page and web site in the alt and title tags.

Spending a couple of minutes editing your free templates with these points can improve your search engines rankings.

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