There are literally hundreds of factors that go into Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Unfortunately for digital marketers, we aren’t given a handbook that lists each one in a nice format. A lot of the SEO work is done in visible ways on your webpage. Design, content, and keyword research are just a few major factors that determine the search engine ranking of your website. However, there are some behind-the-scenes factors that no amount of written SEO work can fix.
Here are 4 common technical issues that can ruin your website’s SEO.
1. Site Speed
When a business sets up their website, they normally go with the hosting company that is reliable and within budget. What business owners and managers don’t realize is one of the biggest questions you should ask a hosting company is about speed. The longer it takes your website to load, the worse your ranking will be. Google has confirmed that site speed is one of the critical factors in SEO, and they also state that mobile users don’t wait longer than 3 seconds for your site to load before they move on.
2. Penalties
Has your website had spam issues or been previously hacked? Did you pay a company to provide you with a bunch of backlinks? Google is quick to penalize websites that they deem as spam or unsafe websites. When your website gets a penalty, your SEO ranking is cratered. Your digital marketing expert should monitor for this, and resolve any issues ASAP.
3. Poor Mobile Experience
As discussed in site speed, if your website isn’t optimized for mobile, your ranking will greatly decrease. Mobile-optimized websites respond better and generally are looked at as better by Google and other search engines. Especially with Google moving to Mobile-first Indexing, your mobile website has never been more important.
4. Crawl Issues
When Google and other search engines index your website, a bot “crawls” through and indexes every bit of content. However, if your website isn’t optimized for this, Google will realize it, and your website ranking will suffer. Making sure your sitemap and Robots.txt file are in good order will ensure that when Google indexes your website, everything will run smoothly and there will be no issues.
If you are unsure about any of these issues regarding your business’ website, give us a call. We can perform a complimentary SEO audit to see how your website is ranking, and if there could be any improvements. If you have spent a lot of money on web design and marketing, but aren’t seeing any results, this could mean that your website is suffering on the back end. Debra Lopez Public Relations can help!