Technical SEO
Technical SEO concerns frequently prevent a website from ranking as high as it should. Here are some basic technological best practices that should be followed by everyone.
1. Make a structure for your website (new sites only)
It's critical that your website's users and search engines can traverse it effortlessly. That is why you must design a coherent website structure.
To do so, make a simple mind map like this:
To allow search engines and visitors to navigate between sites, each branch on the map should be an internal link.
2. Check to see if your site can be crawled.
Because Google can't index information that isn't crawlable, it's worth checking the Coverage report in Google Search Console for any robots.txt warnings or exclusions.
You should remove the rule that is triggering the block from your robots.txt file if you want Google to index any of the blacklisted pages correctly.
3. Check to see if your site is searchable.
Crawling and indexing are not the same things. Just because a page can be crawled doesn't mean it can be indexed. Indexing is not feasible if the page has a ‘noindex' robots meta tag or an X-Robots-tag.
In the Coverage report, Google informs you about noindexed URLs.
Remove the ‘noindex' tag from any ‘noindexed' pages that should be indexed.
4. Verify that you're using HTTPS.
HTTPS has been validated as ranking criteria for lightweight websites.
It's time to switch to HTTPS if you're not already doing so.
Aside from potential SEO benefits, HTTPS will protect the data of your visitors. This is especially vital if your website has any contact forms. It's not just important; it's a requirement if you're asking for passwords or payment information.
How do you know if your site uses HTTPS?
Look for a padlock in your browser’s search bar:
5. Ensure that your website is only accessible through one domain.
Your website's visitors should not be able to view it from different places. It can cause issues with crawling, indexing, and security.
To check that everything’s in order, plug these four URLs into httpstatus.io:
http://softwaresondemand.com
http://www.softwaresondemand.com
https://softwaresondemand.com
https://www.softwaresondemand.com
If everything’s good, three of them should redirect to the fourth.
If this does not occur, you will need to implement a permanent 301 redirect.
It's also critical that the accessible version of your website be the secure version if you're using HTTPS (which you should be). Either https://yourdomain.com or https://www.yourdomain.com would suffice.
6. Ensure that your website loads quickly.
Since 2010, page speed has been a ranking criterion on desktop, and since 2018, it has been on mobile.
It's simple to understand why. It's inconvenient to click a search result and then have to wait for it to load. As a result, as page speed falls, the likelihood of a bounce rises.
You can use tools like PageSpeed Insights.
7. Check to see if your website is mobile-friendly.
Because mobile devices account for the majority of searches, having a mobile-friendly website is more vital than ever.
Use Google's Mobile-Friendly Test tool to see if your site needs to be improved.
8. Repair any broken pages
Broken links can detract from the user experience and disrupt the flow of authority into and out of your website.
To find broken links on your site:
▪ Use Ahrefs Broken Link Checker to discover broken links on your website.
▪ Site Audit crawls your website.
▪ Keep an eye out for “404-page” issues.
Here's how to handle any broken links you come across:
9. Correct any concerns with duplicate content.
Duplicate content is the same or nearly identical content that appears in multiple places on the internet. Because of faceted navigation, it's a regular e-commerce SEO issue. Hundreds of duplicate content issues can result from this alone.
Broken links can detract from the user experience and disrupt the flow of authority into and out of your website.
Here we complete our Technical SEO section. Click Keywords Research to read about the next steps in SEO Checklist.