Technical SEO: Best Practices for Crawling and Indexing

SEO is not only about using the right keywords and crafting well-written content. There are aspects, such as technical SEO, which definitely require a professional’s touch. The SEO team at our digital marketing agency is ready to help you make sure that your site is always up to date.

Here is what you need to know about this aspect of search engine optimization.

What Does Technical SEO Involve?

Technical SEO refers to a set of actions performed on a website to make sure that it meets the basic prerequisites set by Google for ranking. Some of these actions involve:

  • Creating a SEO-friendly website structure
  • Submitting a sitemap to Google
  • Checking for any crawling and indexing errors
  • Improving the loading speed of your website
  • Checking that the site has a valid SSL security certificate
  • Making sure that the website is mobile friendly
  • Checking for and removing low quality backlinks

These actions should be scheduled at least on an annual basis or any time Google announces significant changes in its ranking factors. One such important change happened in 2020, when Google introduced the Page Experience ranking factor.

The Best Practices for Technical SEO We Use

Our SEO specialists rely on the most up to date and effective best practices when we work on your website. These include:

1. Using HTTPS

HTTPS is a secure internet protocol for accessing web pages. It adds a layer of security to sensitive user information, such as user names and passwords or credit card data.

Google added HTTPS as one of the key ranking signals since 2014. Any site that does not meet this security standard will not be considered for Google search results.

2. Checking that Only One Version of Your Site is Accessible to Users and Google

Do you know that Google differentiates between https://companysite.com and https://www.companysite.com? If you transitioned from one version to another without setting up redirects and hiding the old site from search engine crawlers, you may compete against yourself.

This is one of the first things SEO experts will check for and fix. Once this technical SEO best practice is implemented, you will see an increase in organic traffic and clients.

website issues are reflected in organic traffic

3. Improving Page Speed

Recommended website loading times have decreased tremendously from several seconds to just 2.5 seconds. This is the value for one of the three Core Web Vitals ranking factors, the Largest Contentful Paint (LCP). This factor calculates the time until the largest element of a web page loads after a user clicked on a link or typed a URL address.

SEO specialists start by testing your site to check its performance. Then, they will fix all the identified errors and tweak the site to improve loading speed. Some of the actions involve:

  • Optimizing the size of image, audio and video files
  • Using a content distribution network (CDN) to help the website load faster across the globe
  • Minifying the code to improve page load speed
  • Removing outdated and unnecessary widgets and third-party add-ons

4. Finding and Fixing Duplicate Content Issues

Many business owners and marketers still believe that Google penalizes duplicate content. While this is not true, it does not mean that you should ignore this issue. The biggest problems arise from:

  • Undesirable URLs ranking in Google search results
  • Backlink dilution
  • Wasted crawl budget
  • Users will believe that you are not professional

For this reason, removing duplicate content is a must in technical SEO. In many cases, removing this content means deleting unnecessary web pages. In turn, this will make your site structure simpler and speed up the loading time of your site.

5. Checking that Your Site Is Mobile-Friendly

Google has completed its mobile-first indexing in 2023. It means that its spiders will crawl only websites that are optimized for mobile devices. Also, most consumers use their mobile devices to browse the internet.

For this reason, your site must offer the best browsing experience on all types of devices: desktop computer, laptop, smartphone and tablet. Our specialists will check if your site complies with this rule and make the necessary changes to make your site mobile-friendly.

EverConvert Is Ready to Help You with Technical SEO

The specialists at EverConvert know everything about the best practices in technical SEO. We will ensure that your site meets all the ranking factors set by Google and is visible in online search results.

This will help you turn clicks into profits, putting you ahead of your competitors. Schedule an initial appointment with one of our consultants today!

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