Just like anything in life, semantics, and their impact, can be evaluated within a business and it is possible to work out whether they are ‘worth it’ in terms of implementation.
They will be worth it if they add more value than they consume in order to develop.
I suppose one of the most ‘expensive’ matters in semantic interfaces can be obtaining a bad quality ’semantic’ web site solution, which does not meet standards, expectations and it’s purpose.
I would estimate that within Greater London, United Kingdom, there exist around 1000 active truly semantic web developers, most of which are constantly tied up in roles working on various big web sites.
The question is then: ‘what do companies which do not have access to these developers do in order to create proper semantic interfaces?’. The answer is: ‘they obtain solutions which do not really comply with proper guidelines’.
Reality of life seems to be that most developers are either incapable of learning semantics properly, or simply do not care about semantics.
Both circumstances are bad for companies which are looking to obtain good quality, semantic solutions in order to reap the rewards Web 2.0 can bring to them.
It is also true that companies impose unrealistic deadlines on development of semantic interfaces, which are either impossible to meet or can only be met partially.
This is counter productive for everyone, as it creates a culture of ‘not caring’ amongst developers, while companies tend to blame developers for being incapable of creating solutions which work.
I am also acutely aware of the fact that search engines are valuing semantic features on interfaces much more than before and are awarding those solutions which are easily recognised by automated tools as containing set pieces of data (such as contact details, addresses, Geo locations, events, etc.)
Many companies also struggle with implementing pixel perfect cross browser solutions, spending many hours on them, while overlooking much more important semantic related factors of their interfaces.
SEO consultancy is implemented at the very end of the process, as opposed to from the very start.
SEO unaware developers work on creating solutions for which they believe are correct and will get well optimised, something that usually results in no Google rank whatsoever, as putting an h1 around logo is seen as ‘good practice’ as ‘logo is the most important aspect of every page’, which is, of course, so blatantly not true that it is arguably not even worth discussing.
Written by Jason Grant, BSc, MSc on 27th May 2008