In the simplest of terms, a ‘silo’ is a grouping of highly focused information on a web page that links to relevant information throughout your website.
Effective site architecture works to guide your targeted site visitors to get from you what it is they came for and to take the desired action that equals conversion on your site. One of the reasons silos are developed, or rather “like information is grouped strategically” on a web page and throughout a website, is to ensure effective search engine optimization and site conversion for both the highly focused ‘long tail’ keyword phrases and the broader ‘short tail’ keyword phrases being used in the campaign. Strategically linking silos of web content helps site users to easily get what they came for as well as helping search engine ‘bots’ follow links to your web content. Silos, if done correctly, make it easy for the search ‘bots’ to index your web content and to retrieve it in the future, effectively improving your overall results including more targeted site visitors, better site conversion and higher ranking in the search engine results pages (SERPS).
Silos also allow you to manage website content more effectively by making strategic adjustments when needed over time to improve overall results. Keeping your website content updated and fresh is part of comprehensive search engine optimization. Complacency with your web content can hurt your ranking opportunities or site conversion results in the long run.
Whether your website consists of hard-coded static HTML, 100% dynamically-generated web pages, or a combination of the two, the strategic development of silos to manage content on your web pages and, through your navigation structure, between your web pages, is a great way to ensure your website is prepared to receive both your targeted site visitors and the search engine bots.
