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Do accordions/tab content affect SEO?

by philippab
6 replies
  • SEO
    • |
Hello,

I'm currently creating some new landing pages for a training website. I have spent a while creating fresh written content that is around 800 words.

My feeling is that people are more likely to click away and are unlikely to scroll to the bottom of the page, therefore I was thinking of sectioning this content on the page using an accordion or tabs.

Does anybody know whether this will have a negative effect on the SEO?

Thanks in advance
#accordions #accordions or tab #affect #content #seo #tab content
  • Profile picture of the author expmrb
    800 words are not that much. Why do you expect that they will go away? If they like your writing then will stick to the end of the post definitely.
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    • Profile picture of the author dave_hermansen
      Originally Posted by expmrb View Post

      800 words are not that much. Why do you expect that they will go away? If they like your writing then will stick to the end of the post definitely.
      I'd have to agree. Many of our most successful posts are 3,000 - 6,000 words long. 800 words is barely getting started!

      I'm just wondering why you think people would rather click a tab and open the rest of an article instead of continuing to scroll down the page? That's as bad as having to click a "More" or "Next" button.

      As far as the real question goes, it is currently thought that content behind accordions or tabs is not given as much "attention" (for lack of a better word) by search engines as if they were not "hidden". It's tough to get a super straight answer from Google about this. Recently, Gary Illyes said that Google "SHOULD" be ranking tabbed content on mobile devices exactly the same as if it was not in tabs. Notice that he used the word "should" instead of "does" or "will" and that he did not mention desktop at all, which seems odd to me in this world of responsive websites. If he is saying that it will hurt you on desktop but not on mobile because it is a better user experience to be in tabs on mobile, what are we supposed to do? Hurt our sites on one device to help it on another?
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      • Profile picture of the author philippab
        Originally Posted by dave_hermansen View Post

        I'd have to agree. Many of our most successful posts are 3,000 - 6,000 words long. 800 words is barely getting started!

        I'm just wondering why you think people would rather click a tab and open the rest of an article instead of continuing to scroll down the page? That's as bad as having to click a "More" or "Next" button.

        As far as the real question goes, it is currently thought that content behind accordions or tabs is not given as much "attention" (for lack of a better word) by search engines as if they were not "hidden". It's tough to get a super straight answer from Google about this. Recently, Gary Illyes said that Google "SHOULD" be ranking tabbed content on mobile devices exactly the same as if it was not in tabs. Notice that he used the word "should" instead of "does" or "will" and that he did not mention desktop at all, which seems odd to me in this world of responsive websites. If he is saying that it will hurt you on desktop but not on mobile because it is a better user experience to be in tabs on mobile, what are we supposed to do? Hurt our sites on one device to help it on another?
        It's not for an article, it's for a landing page, advertising a course.

        For example having the tabs:

        Who is this course for?
        Why you should choose us
        What's covered on this course
        etc

        An overwhelming amount of visitors to the site are from desktop as the courses are mainly for businesses and professionals.
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        • Profile picture of the author dave_hermansen
          Originally Posted by philippab View Post

          It's not for an article, it's for a landing page, advertising a course.

          For example having the tabs:

          Who is this course for?
          Why you should choose us
          What's covered on this course
          etc

          An overwhelming amount of visitors to the site are from desktop as the courses are mainly for businesses and professionals.
          Even so, I would simply make those headings. If your intent is for people to actually read what you have written, far more people will read it when it is not hidden behind tabs.

          We have found that a ton of internet users don't even see (or understand) tabs. They'll definitely see the headings.

          Four sections of 200 words (roughly ten lines of text per section) is hardly intimidating.
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    • Profile picture of the author philippab
      I feel that people might be overwhelmed by the amount of written content, as it's not an article, it's advertising a course.
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  • Profile picture of the author yukon
    Banned
    Do accordions/tab content affect SEO?
    Look at the text version of your webpage.
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