Semantic sites communicate better

The idea of any website is to communicate with it audience. By using semantic xHTML we have the possibility to layout the xHTML in a manor that makes it quickest to load, quickest method of screen design and re-design, gracefully degrades and uses the correct tag for the correct place.

Some example correct tag usage

• <abbr> & <acronym> are used to denote acronyms and abbreviations
• <address> is used to encapsulate an address.
• <h1> .. <h6> are used to create different levels of heading and present a document outline.
• <thead>, <tbody> & <tfoot> are used when creating a table, and tables are not used to create a design layout.
• <ul> & <ol> are used to create lists

In-line styles are gone

When creating semantic xHTML it is important not to include in-line styles in the code. All of the design is meant to come from an external CSS file, thus reducing your page load sizes as the CSS file only needs to be loaded once for your site, and in-line styles must be loaded on every page.

If you site needs a new look and feel, having in-line styles will increase that task exponentially. Due to having to treat each page as a separate new design rather than having one CSS file that holds it all.

SEO and Semantic xHTML and close friends

Creating a semantic xHTML page will automatically increase your SEO. By its nature, semantic xHTML is laid out in the way that the search engine wishes to see it. All of the information on the screen is placed into the correct containers within the code, making it easier for the search engine to info map the data.

Having info mapped properly makes the look up process of the search engine quicker and usually places you higher on the ranking on the results returned.