Iframes and SEO

[WDC]

HI all,

I am new to SEO and want you guidance with using iframes are they helpful in SEO or can cause any bas effect from SEO point of view.


Looking forward for your guidance.

[tamecrow]

I'd keep away from them. Why do you need to use iframes? There's usually a way round it.

[erikko]

i dont use iframes because that is a no no in SEo, use tables instead

[flsurfkarma]

I would suggest not using them at all. As tamecrow stated..... there is usually ways around them.

[iaccess]

As everyone has already stated here, iFrames and Frames are not good for SEO.

The reason is that search engines tend to not follow links to iFrames or Frames, nor credit the containing page for the content within the frames. Thus, any content you put in frames essentially is wasted from an SEO perspective.

With Frames and FrameSets, where the whole page consists of frames, there is never any reason to use them if SEO is a consideration for the page. No content is there to index.

However, there may be cases where iFrames are OK for SEO (at least from the perspective of not hurting you). If the iFrame content is not important for SEO (no keywords, not your content, ads, etc), and your page otherwise has good SEO content that surrounds the iFrame, then an iFrame will not hurt you. What is important here is that the main part of your page have good content.

[lukkyjay]

I've been wondering the same thing. For years, I've had this page:
Instant Colorado Health Insurance Quotes

as an Iframe because that is all I thought I could do. The bottom portion is a seperate website that provides that quote engine service for us, but I need to have special content at the top so the user stays on our website. I've been thinking about adding a sidebar and footer as well, but I haven't been able to figure it out.

You guys know a lot better - what would you do with that page?

[WDC]

Hi all,

Thanks a lot for your responses. All right I got it that, Iframes are no no for SEO mainly for main index page, I can use it in internal pages if needed.

Thanks once again.

[Orion]

If you can simply use includes (SSI)... you can also use div's and size them height and width and add overflow auto to them to give them the scroll for the content, then include the page(s) you want in there..

[subhzash]

Frames are not good in Search engines point of view. Dont use the frames use tables which can fulfill your requirements. As most of search engine spiders can not read the data which is existing in the frames

[akanksha]

As it is now clear that use of frames, iframes is not beneficial in any case from SEO perspective. You should first actually annalyse what is the requirement...and what are the various ways that you can follow instead of frames....if you are liking to make it attractive by using frames and all.....then you can make the page attractive by using tables also...which will be good for you.....

[amitgupta007_99]

Not gud for SEO, search engines are not known to associate more than one keywords to a page. and when you have 3 Iframes in a webpage, dont u think it will be confusing for a search engine to understand this?

SEO is keeping things simple and njoying the rankings

N Joy!!!!


Amit P Gupta
Web Strategist

amit@r2ainformatics.com

+91 98213 76830

[iaccess]

Originally Posted by amitgupta007_99

Not gud for SEO, search engines are not known to associate more than one keywords to a page. and when you have 3 Iframes in a webpage, dont u think it will be confusing for a search engine to understand this?

Search engines are actually VERY good at associating multiple keywords per page. I have pages where dozens of terms rank quite well.
However, for competitive terms, you do need to focus a page on a few key terms, especially given the limits in title tag and meta description tag lengths, and the need for higher keyword density in the body for competitive terms.

SEO is complex, not simple. True, a good SEO page looks simple and sticks to basic, user-oriented content as the first principle, but in competitive areas you need to do a lot of things right to rank well (content, HTML coding, keyword targeting, keyword density, website structure, good URLs, link anchor text, inbound links, page weight, avoid black hat, etc etc etc).

Back to iFrames, search engines are not "confused" by frames, they just ignore them. If you want that content indexed, use other techniques as noted elsewhere in this string. If you don't care about the framed content, it really does not matter either way for search engines.

[john@kapoo]

iFrames can be seen as a bad thing for SEO, however, depending on your *SPECIFIC* requirment, iFrames can be good. For example, you may have an eCommerce site with a garstly large nav that for certain reasons is needed on all pages. It would be good practice to use iFrames for the nav in this situation so to take the nav weight away from individual pages - thus the SEs can concentrate on the actual content & contextual links.

[Orion]

Originally Posted by john@kapoo

iFrames can be seen as a bad thing for SEO, however, depending on your *SPECIFIC* requirment, iFrames can be good. For example, you may have an eCommerce site with a garstly large nav that for certain reasons is needed on all pages. It would be good practice to use iFrames for the nav in this situation so to take the nav weight away from individual pages - thus the SEs can concentrate on the actual content & contextual links.

Still a VERY bad use of a frame... if you have a large nav use SSI and include the nav then the end user only downloads the file once. SSI (or php includes) gives you all the benefits of frames without the downfalls.

The only decent use for frames is to frame another website yet keep the visitor on your domain.

[tomfrederick]

Iframes take those contents and links to other pages. And your link building will be harder than with other webmasters and website owners. You should active the iFrame pages first, if you want your iFramed pages are friendly with the great search engines.
iFrame technology useful for easily searching

[mjtaylor]

Originally Posted by subhzash

Frames are not good in Search engines point of view. Dont use the frames use tables which can fulfill your requirements. As most of search engine spiders can not read the data which is existing in the frames

Sorry, but tables are also not a good idea. Use CSS to organize your layout.

Cheers, MJ

[youds]

Frames are out-dated and shouldn't be used, but they are still required for some tasks.

For example, embedded Flash objects can't be covered up with block level elements. Hence, on YOUDS Media the sensible thing to do is to allow a footer with position:fixed; (not IE compatiable but same principle) so that the "Call me" section isn't covered up when the page is scrolled down, over the top of a Flash object.

In FF you can get around it, not in IE. Hence the naming of the files all being appended with "frames_for_ie"

In order to keep the Search Engines happy, <noframes /> was used which increases the HTML output but solves the problem.

Since this was implemented (with a lot of additional JavaScript work) the site is now achieving top 10 results init's local area and the domain is not a year old yet!! (Search: "web design clitheroe")

This is one example where frames are ok. There is no other way around this problem, and SEO has been achieved through the use of <noframes />

A lot of the other posters are right, you should use robots.txt too tell search engines not to index the individual frames and use the Lynx Browser, available on Unix systems, to see what Google see's. This is the best advice I can give!!

[kgun]

Related WPW link:
SEO and frames in a web 2.0 world.

Good iFrame article.

Remote Scripting with IFRAME

[youds]

Originally Posted by youds

Frames are out-dated and shouldn't be used, but they are still required for some tasks.

For example, embedded Flash objects can't be covered up with block level elements. Hence, on YOUDS Media - the sensible thing to do is to allow a footer with position:fixed; (not IE compatiable but same principle) so that the "Call me" section isn't covered up when the page is scrolled down, over the top of a Flash object.

In FF you can get around it, not in IE. Hence the naming of the files all being appended with "frames_for_ie"

In order to keep the Search Engines happy, <noframes /> was used which increases the HTML output but solves the problem.

Since this was implemented (with a lot of additional JavaScript work) the site is now achieving top 10 results init's local area and the domain is not a year old yet!! (Search: "web design clitheroe")

This is one example where frames are ok. There is no other way around this problem, and SEO has been achieved through the use of <noframes />

A lot of the other posters are right, you should use robots.txt too tell search engines not to index the individual frames and use the Lynx Browser, available on Unix systems, to see what Google see's. This is the best advice I can give!!

Link was removed from post, see signature for the content that I'm referring too