Is <p> important to Search Engines Discussion

Stop! do not gear semantic content structure simply to search engines you use a paragraph tag wherever you have text that requires it, not simply where you think a search engine will look for content this is incorrect thinking , you're trying to be too clever as long as there is fresh god quality content and all other parameters of a page are handled correctly such as headings, meta tags, etc then search engines will happily index away.

I was trying to ensure that my Relevant Content is as visible as possible.

I thought that as

is supposed to be Body Text then having anything else other than the Body Text surrounded by

was somehow misleading.

If it's not the that is OK.

Please advise.

Many thanks

If you have text that reads as a paragraph then it must be in a paragraph tag, where it features within a document is fairly irrelevant, when you refer to 'body' then one tends to think of body tags and all elements would be within those tags if you refer to perhaps an element that you have called 'content' then that would probably contain your main pages written copy as opposed to any sidebars which would be more likely to carry nav links or secondary content but that might still be suited to paragraph tags.

It is not misleading to use the correct semantic tag for the type of data requiring displaying, search engines are fairly smart and can work out what is the most relevant data, but equally they like it to be semantic.

In this context could you please define 'semantic' for me.

Just to avoid any confusion.

Many thanks

Semantic Markup

It's what Standards based coders are always concerned with, data is conveyed in tags that carry/convey semantic meaning; a

tag describes text that is a paragraph, h1 describes a primary heading, ul/ol describes data that is a list, etc.

Non semantic and complete mush:

Think I am getting close...

What about Navigation and Advert Blocks etc though. Should they not be separate from the Page Content?
If so, how do you define them as 'secondary' content?

depends on what you mean by separate, links/nav generally will be in a ul list either in a sidebar or running across the top of a content area, links are important though and you do want them to get seen bear in mind one wants spiders to crawl links otherwise they won't index pages. Adverts :shrug: horrible bloody things you wouldn't want them in any prime page flow position really. Essentially keep your content as high up the page as possible ensure good document outline using heading tags where appropriate especially the h1 tag, try to avoid cluttering the page with too much scripting that a spider would have to crawl through, keep head content as light as possible, minimum of embedded code as can be helped.

Could it be said that anything that follows in

is content and anything else in

is just text on the page?

I think it's easy to say keep "content high up" but I thought that using code like

I am thoroughly convinced that SEO will eventually kill the internet starting with making the search engines useless.

Hugo is trying to convince you that semantic markup is just the proper use of the proper tag for the proper job but it seems he's hitting a roadblock.

DIVs have no inherent semantic meaning and they only gain meaning via the use of an ID or a CLASS attribute.

Thanks Triumph -

Is there therefore a correct/proper way to say "This is what the page is about" and "This is Advertising" and "This is Navigation".

I get the feeling that the most basic HTML page with just Headers and Text is the way but those pages don't look too good these days.

My intention is not to deceive in any way. Just to make pages that have Relevant Content that also have things that monetize my work and attract human eyes. If you have to play a game you have to know the rules.

Many thanks for your help and comments so far...

I think this drifted from the question.

The question is about how does a Search Engine know what the page is about as opposed to all the other stuff on it, adverts etc. Not about trying to trick SEO or viewers. Just how to use design and good practise to balance look and content...

Not sure I got a answer, maybe nobody knows or maybe it's a big secret.

All I can figure is that if a piece of text is preceded by a heading then that is the text that the page is about and as long as the Title of the page reflects a similarity then that too is what the pages is about.

Next thing is to try and figure out how to get links 'in' to my site. This seems equally shrouded in mystery yet why never seems to be questioned.

Life should be simple - why make it complicated.

I look forwards to any other contributors to this discussion.

As stated time and time again, semantic markup.

Do you think that google has some sort of comprehension of when a block of text conveys the same meaning or topic as a heading tag? Google isn't a bunch of guys reading and grading web sites, it's more like a bunch of monkeys sniffing food and putting the good bananas at the top.