Literally, Parallax is a technique in which the background images move at different speed than the foreground images to create an illusion of 2D and 3D depth. In the recent times, web designers have adopted this technique to create brilliant website designs.
Parallax scrolling provides a whole new level of sophistication to the website (in terms of visual appeal). Still it is not the webmasters dearest, why? Because it allegedly fails to comply with the SEO guidelines, which is not true!
Before we get on to understand why, let us take a quick look at what are the widely presumed misconceptions about Parallax-
- People associate parallax with Flash and AJAX that do not comply with the SEO guidelines
- Parallax is a single page site that does not support multiple H1 headers, separate title tags, Meta descriptions, and the entire content is displayed on a single page.
- Search engines as well as users prefer site that loads fast. Website designed with Parallax scrolling take a bit longer to load.
- User engagement on site cannot be determined with Google analytics because of JavaScript tracking code that makes it difficult to determine the demographics for the traffic.
- Parallax is not browser friendly!
- Keyword optimization is difficult, as there is only one page.
- Parallax is not mobile-friendly, which is a setback in the growth for many businesses.
The allegations are pretty serious, but before you start judging, I should tell you that most of these do not have any ground and are nothing but mere myths. The other few remaining ones are problems that can be sorted out. Yes, I mean that!
To make parallax search engine friendly, our seasoned designers suggest some very important changes. Take a look-
- Use parallax for storytelling on one page, instead of putting everything on that page. You can use parallax on the homepage, or the about us page, or may be the ‘our team’ page.
- Add internal links to different sections to make it search engine friendly.
- Use multiple URLs on single page by using Ajax and navigation elements. This helps in optimizing multiple keywords.
- Blogging is an effective way to keep visitors engaged on parallax site, which helps increase traffic on site.
- Understand mobile audience and design the look of website accordingly.
- Retarget visitors on the site by determining their demographics.
- Map out sections of parallax page. This will help provide deep content to users. As they scroll down the home page, they will find more sections that are linked to other pages that offer more content.
