There is an interesting discussion going on over at the Search Engine Watch forums that addresses the sometimes tumultuous relationship between Web designers and search engine optimizers. See the full thread here.

In the past I came across a lot of Web sites that seemed to excel in the optimization of Web pages at the expense of Web site design. Luckily, as time has passed it seems the most savvy affiliates understand there has to be a reasonable balance between optimization and design.

Think of balancing site design, usability and optimization as a way to maximize the potential profits from your Web site. If your site is not optimized, you are going to have to spend a ton of money to get people to your site. And if your site design leaves something to be desired, your conversions are going to be lower.

A couple of my favorite quotes from the thread are:

In reality, designers really need to understand that search engines are like a third browser — and in fact a far more popular browser used by more people than using Firefox. They will spend tons of time making sure a site works for IE or Firefox, even Opera, but no time to make sure that the browsers of search engines are going to be OK with it?

– From Danny Sullivan

and

I just dont see how you can honestly separate these three elements:

- usability
- design
- optimization (whether you do it for web standards reasons or usability reasons or SEO reasons)

– From Randfish

So going into 2006, I challenge affiliate marketers to strike the balance between SEO and design on their Web sites. If your site is optimized but the design stinks, fix it. There are many great freelance Web designers out there. And if your design is great but your content is invisible to search engine spiders, change your site design.

If you think your site is well designed–but youre not sure–ask someone who knows a little something about Web design for pointers. If you have no idea if your site is visible to search engines, see my post from yesterday.

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