Selected answers from the Dumb SEO Questions Facebook & G+ community.
Michael Chapman: Doesn't (really) matter, from a user experience point of view we prefer top menus.
Google will read from top to bottom, so that could make a slight difference, as long as they have the right mark-up anywhere will be fine from an SEO perspective. ;
Carl Harvey: Thanks Michael, I just changed mine from a top menu to a side...Just to tidy my site up a bit, then thought i may have cocked-up! I too prefer top ones but i cant get it to look right on my site :(
Arseniy Bolotsko: +Carl Harvey ;I don't think it has much to do with SEO. Its more of an user experience issue. You can do some A/B testing and find out which one works best. Also, try to set up a heat map and see what works best for people. I posted this in this group a few months ago.
W.E. Jonk: Basically what you are asking is if boilerplate matters. In short, boilerplate content is the content that surround the main content, like navigation or other content. ;
Google does have specific algorithms to determine boilerplate. Many googlers (google employees) have stated that Google is pretty good at it. Here is a video from Matt Cutts which is still valid (imo):
Is there a way to indicate boilerplate content on a page?
In general, to me boilerplate has much more to do with UX (user experience) and how they convert. It does depend but sometimes mega menus work other times it doesn't. However a clear internal link architecture does help to crawl every corner of your site. Here is a great article from +Maile Ohye ;: ;http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.nl/2008/10/importance-of-link-architecture.html
P.S. I am not familiar with your CMS but I think these resources will help you (or I hope ;-)).
Carl Harvey: +Arseniy Bolotsko ;I will check it out now...many thanks
Real Social Shop: It does not matter from a SEO standpoint, but... be careful because, from an user experience it will... and this has the potential to reduce you engagement. ;
Dave Keys: Title, description, h1, H2, meta tags, content. Links, social mentions. Menus? Virtually no impact at all.
Arseniy Bolotsko: +Dave Keys ;Menu's are important in SEO just not that much in terms of placement. Link structure is a VERY important aspect of SEO just to name one. ;
Carl Harvey: Decisions, decisions...i keep moving the menu from the top to the side and back again lol - Thank you all so much for your answers