Search Engine Optimisation Web Log (BLOG)
Editor: Matt Paines

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Google's AJAX advice

Google has been compiling some tips for creating Ajax-enhanced websites to help webmasters and SEOs to make websites search engine friendly. It has recognised that its spiders have difficulty finding their way around sites which use JavaScript for navigation.
 
The blog says a webmasters best bet for creating a website which is crawlable by Googlebots and other search engines is to provide HTML links to content.


As you’d expect, Google is advocating that webmasters build sites with accessibility firmly in mind.
 
Google claims that one of the easiest ways to test a website's accessibility is to explore it in a browser with JavaScript turned off. It can also be viewed in a text-only browser. Viewing a site as text-only can also help a webmaster identify other content which may be hard for a Googlebot to see, including images and Flash.



For websites with links requiring JavaScript for Ajax functionality, it points to a way that Ajax and static links can coexist in example form. It says:

When creating your links, format them so they'll offer a static link as well as calling a JavaScript function. That way you'll have the Ajax functionality for JavaScript users, while non-JavaScript users can ignore the script and follow the link. 
For example:
<a href=”ajax.htm?foo=32” onClick=”navigate('ajax.html#foo=32'); return false”>foo 32</a>

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