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If you are not too sure about what Favicons are, these are small 16×16 pixel icons that commonly have the first letter or logo of a specific brand; they can also represent a generic image to represent the type of business that one has. These are commonly placed in files called favicon.ico and are allocated in a website’s root directory.
Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 5 (1995) was the first to support this type of file, and it was also known as the ‘shortcut icon’ of the codes that were placed in the <head>section of a website. Eventually, the favicon was standardized and patterned by the W3C (World Wide Web Consortium) along with the recommendation of HTML.
Supposedly, the Favicons were intended for bookmarked URLs, but in this technologically advanced period, there are numerous times when favicons are used for display and are actually considered user-friendly. Favicons are generally used for branding and are practically useful in various ways; for example, if you have a lot of tabs open while searching online, notice the symbols next to the website’s title; these are the favicons that have been utilized to represent the site that you are currently on.
Favicon for SEO
With that explained, you may think that Favicons do not really have any SEO benefits when placed on your site, and you are somewhat correct. There are no directly stated SEO benefits and uses of having these on your site; however, there are possible indirect benefits of Favicons for SEO. Listed below are some of them:
- Increased Site Usefulness
The usefulness of a website equates to an increased search engine ranking; so if there is a favicon placed right next to your site’s title on bookmarks, browser tabs, and history archives, you can say that it has a small but rather important role in SEO if it can help users save time while simultaneously making it easier for them to identify and browse through your website.
- Bookmarks
If you notice, having favicons seems to have a better advantage and recognition over sites that do not. An example of this would be Google which has the browser, Chrome, for users through which they reduce a selection of signals from search rankings for sites that are bookmarked on the web. When there is no favicon on your site, it is possible that it may lose the chance of being part of the bookmarked list of a Chrome browser, and may indirectly lose the chance on small but important ranking signals.
There may be some theories available that support the fact that favicons may have a positive effect on SEO, but even if they have or have no effect on SEO, favicons will surely stay because of their usefulness in branding which obliquely influences the SEO of a website.
Favicons – Are they Necessary for your Website?
Although favicons are little and rather insignificant things, they work well to make a website stand out and are also vital for branding purposes. Favicons help websites look more credible and professional which means that even if these are little parts of a site, having these incorporated into a website only shows attention to detail which gives people the idea of a complete website.
Favicons also work well for bolstering and building up your brand, and since branding can be quite a challenge for a lot of businesses, having a favicon allows you to place your colors or logo in another part of the web; finally, the other main reason for using favicons is to improve the experience of users.
