SEO is an addition of many little parameters to tweak in order to achieve good rankings.

The CSS vs table based design is only one of the aspect and not one of the most important, but enought to consider if you don't have the backlinks to help you get the rankings you want.

CSS allows you to have lighter pages, a higher text to code ratio and place the important content at the top of the page (close to the body tag) when tables are read left to right and top to bottom.

In a 2 column design (left col navigation, right col main content) search engines will read the nav first and the the content. With CSS you can have them read the content first and then the nav.

Hope this helps.

Actually between you and me (and all the readers) I doubt whether having your text in css is any better to the search engines, or even most viewers, than tables.

Sure you get less code on the page but I am sure the search engine can easily ignore TD Table, etc tags stripping them out of their analysis, and leave the text.

I imagine if you took some of the worst coding possible (aka Frontpage 2000 and earlier) the search engine could still strip the code out for the text.

Sure the file size is smaller, but really, that is only an issue if you are a massive site trying to conserve bandwidth.

I use CSS, because it looks nicer, is easier to change, and gives me warm fuzzy feelings when I see the clean sharp code. CSS is definitly worth the effort to learn and use, but the reslts may have no difference on your indexing in google.

netchicken1, what you say may very well be true.

However, I guess I'm the superstitious type. I use layers rather than tables, so that I can get the page content "meat" as close to the top of the source code as possible.

CSS Vs Table huh, V nice

I always keep tables for data however saying that our main site uses only tables.

Over the years I have tested lots of different methods and managed to gain great results from most, CSS in my mind along with all my other tasks all meet up to make great LASTING results.

See the thing is results or lasting results, I have our sales teams explaining it like building a house, sure you can have a great brand new house but when a storm comes or the kids start playing what’s going to be left of the house?

If you have a brand new house with the best building materials and foundations, the kids nor the storm will matter, it’s the same with this CSS for a number of reasons is great, and when I tried and tested it a while ago it stands longer than anything, obviously its not simply the CSS on its own that sustains rankings, it’s the whole package.

Everything will add up and in my trails this to date along with other things is the best, saying that our main sites still rank with tables, so I guess it all boils down to preference.

Thanks for all reply. I am going to order some CSS books form amazon today.

I am going to order some CSS books form amazon today

You just answered your own question. The first rule of investigative journalism and the like is "follow the money". A good rule of thumb in observing any debate is to ask "who stands to make money?"

As for SEO, if your site looks logical and the data is fully readable in a text browser, like Lynx, then you can be sure a search engine spider can handle it, irrespective of how you choose to mark it up.

Matt