AWM

Posted on May 14, 2011 by admin

What is W3C?

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is an international industry consortium dedicated to “lead the World Wide Web to its full potential by developing protocols and guidelines that ensure long-term growth for the Web.”

So basically they make the web a better place by creating standards for building websites.

What’s in it for me?

There are numerous benefits for building your website with W3C compliance.

• Improve search engine listings

  Google loves W3C compliant websites as not only are the websites easier to index, but they insure a standard of code that prevents spammy or malicious tactics of search engine ranking.

  So for no other reason than Google’s favoritism, we highly recommend using W3C standards when building any website.

• Increase audience reach

  So the SEO (search engine optimisation) benefits will obviously increase your audience reach, but that’s not the only way.

  According to W3C, up to 20% of people are affected by some form of disability. A significant portion of people with disabilities can benefit from web sites specifically designed to be more accessible. Which is a big part of the W3C policies.

• Reduce loads on your computer

  Non W3C compliant code can put unnecessary strain on anyone who is browsing it.
  Have you ever been to a website that immediately pops up with errors or distorts the content?
  This is an extreme, but you can bet your bottom dollar that this site doesn’t comply with W3C.

• Reduce site maintenance costs

  One of the biggest mistakes people make when getting their websites developed, is getting someone to build it and not checking if they are building it in an open source (or a non propriety) code. If you don’t check this, you may find that you are locked into using the same developer for the rest of your web-sites life, as they are the only ones that will be able to edit it and can therefore charge what ever they want.

  On the flip side, if you do use an open source code and follow W3C compliance, you will be able to get anyone (with half a clue) to edit your website.

When is it ok not to use W3C?

There are some circumstances when you won’t be able to use W3C standards. Like when new technologies come out that simply have not had standards developed for them. Or if you are trying to do something that the W3C standards wouldn’t want you to, like talking to a legacy system that you can’t change.