Page layout for best SEO

Am I thinking correctly?

[hdpt00]

Hey all, I was just wondering if I could get a little input from some of you experts. I'm starting a site and my planned layout will be like <snip> for instance (i.e.: 3 columns, links on left column, main text in middle, google ads on right.) Is there anything wrong with this approach? I'm thinking since the content will be in the middle, spiders will "read" the text links first and not my actual content. Am I going about this wrong or will I have to modify my projected layout? I want to be as competitive as I can; will I then have to eliminate the left column and only have two, main body content and then google ads and links on the right?

Thanks,
Brandon

[edited by: engine at 5:24 pm (utc) on April 5, 2004]
[edit reason] no urls, thanks [/edit]

[pleeker]

I'm thinking since the content will be in the middle, spiders will "read" the text links first and not my actual content.

You've got it basically right. To see a close approximation of what a crawler sees when it gets to your page(s), use a Lynx Viewer. (Do a Google search for Lynx Viewer - it's the first result.)

[hdpt00]

Well then, assuming I and pleeker are right, which I do, what is the way around this so SEs see the content first and not get penalized for any tricks in google assuming I keep this 3 column layout idea...?

Thanks,
Brandon

[stever]

If you are using tables and you want your content in the middle to be read first, you could use the empty cell "trick".

(You make the table cells into two rows. Join the middle top and bottom together with rowspan. Put the links in the bottom left cell and leave the top left cell empty.)

[danieljean]

Table tricks, or just use CSS, and have the content div generated before the navigation.

One definite example where standards compliance will help with search engines :)