Crawling and indexing
Search engines read sites with robots; your robots.txt says which doors are open, and the XML sitemap hands them a map. If a page should rank, it must be crawlable and indexable — check both in Search Console before anything else.
The common tragedy: great content, blocked by an accidental rule. Ten minutes of checking prevents it.
Speed and mobile
Pages should load in under three seconds on a phone over average connection, and every layout must work on mobile-first rendering — Google reads the mobile version, period.
Compress images, don't stack unnecessary plugins, and complain to whoever owns the hosting if the server is slow. These fixes are cheap and permanent.
Structure signals
One canonical URL per piece of content — duplicates split signals, canonicals consolidate them. HTTPS everywhere, redirects chained no more than once, and breadcrumbs that match the URL structure.
None of this is glamorous. All of it compounds.
What to outsource
Site-wide migrations, JavaScript rendering problems and crawl budget surgery deserve a developer. Everything above, a careful non-developer can maintain with Search Console and a crawling tool.
Learn to read the reports; hire for the exceptions. That division of labor covers most businesses at near-zero cost.
Frequently Asked Questions
Google Search Console — free, authoritative, and it shows you what Google actually sees. Add a crawler like Screaming Frog later.
Yes — unindexed pages can't rank no matter their authority. Technical health is the floor; links are the ceiling.
Related service
This guide connects to a package in our catalog.
Fix the floor, then build the ceiling