A Comprehensive Guide to Technical SEO

In the world of SEO, the technicality of a website pertains a great importance. Search engines like Google prefer those websites to show on top search results which have great usability, optimized loading speed, easily crawlable URLs, and enhanced indexability.

All these factors come under a major part of SEO, which we called Technical SEO. In this guide, we will know about the core concepts involved, why it is so important, and which technical SEO factors can help your website perform well on Google.

Let’s begin with an introduction to Technical SEO.

What is Technical SEO?

Technical SEO is one of the main SEO methods that focuses on improving website’s functionality, usability, indexability and crawlability. It includes optimizing user experience to enhance website’s usability. Fast loading speeds, clear navigation, and mobile-friendliness keep visitors engaged and coming back for more.

Before diving into technical SEO improvements, it’s crucial to understand your current state. A site audit provides a comprehensive picture of your website’s health and identifies areas needing optimization.

While technical SEO doesn’t guarantee top rankings, it provides a solid foundation for other SEO strategies to work effectively. It goes beyond just making your website look good; it optimizes its structure and functionality for crawlability, understandability, and accessibility.

Why Technical SEO is Important?

The secret weapon behind many successful online presences is technical SEO. It goes beyond aesthetics, delving deep into the technical aspects of your website to ensure search engines understand, index, and display your content effectively.

Some specific benefits of technical SEO include:

• Improved Crawlability

Technical SEO acts as the key, removing barriers and allowing search engines like Google to easily discover and understand your content. This translates to higher visibility in search results and increased chances of ranking for relevant keywords.

• Faster Page Load Times

Technical SEO optimizes your website for speed, ensuring lightning-fast loading times that keep visitors engaged and coming back for more.Websites with faster loading time enhance user experience, conclusively boosting search engine rankings.

• Better User Experience

Technical SEO helps to create a seamless experience for your users. Imagine a website with clear navigation, mobile-friendliness, and intuitive design. This is the magic of technical SEO, making your website a joy to explore, fostering user engagement, and ultimately driving conversions.

• Enhanced Search Rankings

Search engines don’t just rely on content; they consider technical factors like website speed, mobile-friendliness, and structured data when ranking websites. By implementing technical SEO best practices, you ensure your website stays visible and adapts to the ever-evolving search landscape, potentially boosting your ranking potential.

Involving technical SEO as one of the major strategies in your overall marketing plan will help to make your website more discoverable, reachable and accessible to visitors.

Fundamentals of Technical SEO

Practicing technical SEO is not that simple, especially when you know very little about website’s coding architecture. It also requires some support from developers, testers and UI/UX designers as well. To understand the fundamentals of technical SEO better, have a look at the factors involved:

1. Page Speed

If your website or a particular page is taking too much time to load completely then most users choose to leave it. This causes poor experience as well as increase in bounce rate. Studies from Google has shared the fact that the probability of users giving up on pages taking up to 5 seconds to load is around 90%.

That’s why optimizing loading time of a website and web pages is crucial in technical SEO. Here are some crucialactions to take while doing technical SEO improve loading time:

• Compressing files on the server
• Optimizing or reducing overall size of the images/graphics.
• Reducing unnecessary HTML and CSS scripts.
• Create Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMPs);
• Leverage caching from browsers

In today’s fast-paced digital world, website speed is no longer an option; it’s a necessity. This is where technical SEO comes in, offering a toolbox of strategies to optimize and manage your website for lightning-fast loading times.

2. Site Architecture

Website architecture is one of the crucial factors in technical SEO. It helps search engine bots to analyze your website, understand the relation between web pages, and track the internal links. That’s why you need to have a layered website architecture that provide categorized web pages, and hierarchies between them.

A search engine-friendly website architecture drives more fluent indexing and crawling by search engine bots, making it rank on top SERPs. It includes:

• Internal linkage: to showcase the pages which have higher authority.
• Formatting of URLs: to make them easily crawlable and indexable.
• Creation of sitemaps: that help bots to crawl pages easily.

Google considers site architecture when ranking pages, rewarding well-structured websites. A logical layout makes navigating your website a breeze for visitors, keeping them engaged and exploring.

3. Structured Data

Your website is like a store with multiple areas (web pages). Search engine bots will visit your website to analyze these areas, but they might get if they don’t find any signs to navigate between one area to another (basically one web page to another).

Hence, you need to define and implement structured data in your website. Here are some practices to involve while structure data in your website:

• Make it easy for bots to find relevant page: Robots crawl your site like shoppers, looking for meaningful and relevant content. Structured data can tell them where to find the exact pages where the required content is available.

• Show extra info with rich snippets: Adding snippets will help your web pages become search-friendly and helpful for bots to crawl. For example, if you own a website for a restaurant then adding snippets like opening hours, famous menu items, average price for two, etc. can make your site preferable to show on top search results.

• Using breadcrumbs to navigate: Breadcrumbs shows the navigation from main page to sub-pages. They help users to explore your website more easily, and even jump to the page from where they started.

Search engine bots understand things better when they find pages faster, which might help your website show up higher in search results. This drives more clicks through organic traffic and hence boosting the overall visibility on search engine result pages (SERPs).

4. Mobile-friendliness

Google’s priority to mobile-friendliness is nothing new in today’s era. This is all due to ever-growing dominance of smartphones and tablets. And hence, technical SEO has included the implementation of the mobile-first index in other crucial practices.

The cornerstone of mobile optimization lies in responsiveness. This technology delivers the same HTML code and URL across all devices, seamlessly adapting the visual presentation through CSS code based on screen size.

Thankfully, popular website builders like WordPress, Wix, and Shopify (for e-commerce) often include built-in mobile optimization features, minimizing the need for extensive coding expertise.

By embracing a mobile-first approach, you not only cater to the preferences of the majority of search users but also optimize your website with technical SEO and Google’s ranking algorithms.

5. Sitemaps

A sitemap is an XML file that provides information to search engine bots about which pages are available to crawl and how they are related to each other. Every page is documented in this file, with each one having its own unique identity in terms of headings or titles.

Having a sitemap is crucial, especially if your website has large number of isolated pages. The sitemap ensures Googlebot doesn’t miss any valuable pages, guaranteeing comprehensive indexing and discoverability.

Submitting your sitemap to Google is a straightforward process. The most user-friendly method is through Google Search Console, which provides a dedicated tool for sitemap reporting. However, for technically inclined users, options like specifying the file path in robots.txt or using the “ping” function offer more control.

6. Security

Experiencing a website hack or security breach can be a nightmare for any website owner. Not only is it frustrating to discover and rectify the issue, but it also affects trust of your customers seeking of doing business with you.

Website security is paramount, not just for protecting your customers’ data and building trust, but also for maintaining good standing with search engines like Google. In 2014, Google made a significant move by announcing HTTPS as a crucial ranking factor. This decision aimed to incentivize website administrators and businesses to prioritize security and invest in robust safeguards.

This shift reflects the growing importance of user privacy and data protection in our increasingly digital world. By prioritizing website security, you demonstrate your commitment to responsible data handling and build trust with your audience.

How eSearch Logix Can Help with technical SEO?

Exploring the aspects of technical SEO might feel challenging, especially with constantly evolving algorithms and diverse technical aspects. This guide will help you understand these aspects, and all other crucial factors that play vital role in executing technical SEO practices.

However, if you need support from professionals, then eSearch Logix is your one-stop shop for all thing’s technical SEO, offering expert guidance and solutions to optimize your website for success.

By partnering with us, you will leverage expertise of our dedicated SEO teams. They have provided tremendous results to 300+ brands across the world. More than 50K keywords were ranked among top 3 positionson Google for our beloved clients by our SEO experts.

We’ll work collaboratively with you to achieve your online goals, ensuring your website is seen, understood, and valued by both users and search engines.

FAQs

1. What exactly is technical SEO?

Technical SEO refers to the behind-the-scenes optimization of your website to make it easier for search engines to crawl, understand, and index your content. It’s like building a clear and well-organized road map for search engine bots to navigate your website effectively.

2. Is technical SEO important for startups as well?

Whether you’ve just started or even a small business with a basic website, technical SEO plays a crucial role in how well you perform in search results. A technically sound website is easier for search engines to find and rank, leading to increased visibility, organic traffic, and ultimately, conversions. It also ensures a smooth and positive user experience, further contributing to your website’s success.

3. How can you improve technical SEO for my website?

eSearch Logix offers comprehensive technical SEO services, including audits, implementation, ongoing monitoring, and reporting. Our team of experts can handle all the technical aspects, allowing you to focus on your core business while ensuring your website is optimized for success.

4. I’ve optimized my website technically, but my rankings haven’t improved – why?

Technical SEO is just one piece of the SEO puzzle. While it’s crucial, other factors like high-quality content, strong backlinks, and user engagement also play a significant role in ranking success.