What does Technical SEO mean?

Technical SEO basics

Technical SEO is the backbone of a website's ability to rank high in search engines. It refers to the optimisations that happen behind the scenes of a website that search engines prioritise when determining a page's relevance and authority. These optimisations include a wide range of factors from site speed, mobile-friendliness, and a secure connection to the correct use of meta tags and structured data. In this section, we'll dive into what technical elements need to be in place to help ensure a website's success in search results.

Indexing and crawlability

In order for a website to appear in search results, it must first be indexed by search engines like Google. The process starts with crawlers visiting the website and following links to understand the site's content and structure. An important part of technical SEO is to ensure that crawlers can easily navigate the website and index the content correctly. This can be achieved by having a well-structured robots.txt file and a well-organised sitemap. These tools help search engines identify which pages to index and which to ignore. Furthermore, errors such as dead links or redirect errors can have a negative impact on a website's crawlability and thus on its overall SEO performance.

Site Speed

Site speed is a critical factor for both user experience and search engine optimisation. A slow site can result in higher bounce rates, which can send negative signals to search engines. To optimise website speed, web developers and SEO experts should focus on optimising images, minimising code, using browser caching and making sure the server has a fast response time. Google offers tools like PageSpeed Insights that can help identify and fix any issues related to website speed. In addition, Google's move to mobile-first indexing has emphasised the importance of having a fast and responsive mobile version of the website.

Security and HTTPS

Security is another key component of technical SEO, and Google makes it clear that HTTPS (Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure) is a signal in their ranking algorithms. HTTPS encrypts data transferred between a user and a website, ensuring a secure browsing experience. Websites that don't use HTTPS are often flagged as “not secure” by browsers, which can have a negative impact on user trust and website credibility. Ensuring your website uses a secure connection is not only good practice for user protection - it's also essential for maintaining and improving your SEO ranking.

Using Meta Tags and Structured Data

Meta tags play an essential role in SEO as they give search engines context for what a page is about. Title tags and meta descriptions are fundamental elements that can influence click-through rates from search result pages. These tags should be precise and contain keywords that are relevant to the page content. Structured data (also known as schema markup) is another technical SEO tactic that can provide search engines with additional information about website content. This can include information about products, reviews, people, companies and more. Using structured data can improve how your website appears in search results, including the display of rich snippets, which can increase visibility and click-through rates.

Mobile friendliness

Today, mobile-friendliness is not just a recommendation, but a necessity for website SEO. Mobile friendliness refers to how a website functions and looks on mobile devices. A mobile-friendly website should have a responsive design that automatically adapts to different screen sizes and device types. Google has introduced mobile-first indexing, which means that the mobile version of your website is used to assess and rank your content in search results. To ensure mobile-friendliness, websites should avoid software like Flash, use easy-to-read font sizes, make link clicks fingertip-friendly and prioritise the usability of mobile navigation.