Technical SEO
Technical search engine optimization refers to the structure and organization of a site for maximum search engine visibility. Our coverage addresses structured data (Schema.org), website hierarchy, menus, categories, page speed, bot crawlers (including Googlebot), domain names, and more.
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Technical SEO
SEO: 7 Reasons Your Site’s Indexation Is Down
August 3, 2018 • Jill Kocher Brown
Without indexation, there is no possibility of ranking in natural search results. When indexation numbers drop, there are a handful of potential reasons. Site Speed Increasingly, slower site speeds are masquerading as ...
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Technical SEO
SEO: Shaving Seconds Off Page Speed
July 9, 2018 • Jill Kocher Brown
For customers, site speed matters. For search engines, site speed impacts organic rankings. With its mobile Speed Update rolling out now, Google is applying site speed to mobile search results ...
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Technical SEO
SEO: Harnessing Facets to Drive the Meaty Torso
June 15, 2018 • Jill Kocher Brown
Natural search performance on ecommerce sites often suffers from an invisible problem: a missing torso. For search engine optimization, a “torso” describes keywords that drive too many searches to be called ...
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Technical SEO
SEO: 3 Paths to Crawlable JavaScript
June 3, 2018 • Jill Kocher Brown
Last week’s primer described some of the reasons that Googlebot, in particular, has trouble with modern forms of JavaScript. This article addresses solutions to compensate for bots’ limitations.
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Technical SEO
SEO: No, Google Does Not Support Newer JavaScript
May 25, 2018 • Jill Kocher Brown
Some search engine optimization professionals and developers have concluded in the last couple of years that Google can crawl JavaScript. Unfortunately, that’s not always the case. Sites using Angular (the ...
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Technical SEO
301 Redirects May Save Your SEO
May 4, 2018 • Jill Kocher Brown
A search engine professional’s lucky number is 301. That’s the server header status code for a type of redirect that performs many critical functions for natural search performance. What Is a ...
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Technical SEO
SEO: Managing Modern Algorithm Updates
April 27, 2018 • Jill Kocher Brown
Google launched a broad core algorithm update last week that impacted web search appearance and rankings. Algorithm changes typically center on rankings improvements tied to determining the quality of a site’s ...
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Technical SEO
How to Optimize Mobile Search for Voice, Barcodes, and Images
April 18, 2018 • Hamlet Batista
The traditional behavior of typing keyword phrases in a Google’s search box is being replaced by searches for voice, barcodes, and images. It is impractical to type long-tail searches on mobile devices. But this difficulty also presents opportunities. In this post, I'll address how to optimize mobile searches for voice, barcodes, and images.
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Technical SEO
13 Ways to Kill Organic Search Traffic
April 15, 2018 • Jill Kocher Brown
Skill and effort influence organic search success. But any number of actions can harm search engine optimization efforts. In this post, I’ll describe 13 SEO blunders that I’ve seen over ...
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Technical SEO
Gzip Compression Could Make Your Site 90-percent Faster
March 16, 2018 • Armando Roggio
Not using gzip on your web server? Your company should be. Enabling gzip compression could improve initial page load times by as much as 90 percent. Your business's faster web pages may even lead to better search engine rankings, an increase in site traffic, and more sales.
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Technical SEO
How to Quickly Drop Seconds from a Site’s Load Time
March 13, 2018 • Hamlet Batista
There are good reasons to improve your online store’s page speed, especially for mobile. However, I’ve found that improving speed can require a lot of expensive developer work. usually following standard best practices over many months. In this article, I will share simple tricks to eliminate seconds of page load time, in just a few hours.
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Technical SEO
4 SEO Requirements for International Ecommerce Sites
March 2, 2018 • Jill Kocher Brown
Multinational ecommerce businesses with country-specific websites have distinct search engine optimization requirements. A searcher in Australia, say, must end up on the site containing Australian English, currency, and content. A searcher in Germany must land on that website. And so on.
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Technical SEO
SEO Tips for New Ecommerce Sites (and Redesigns)
February 26, 2018 • Jill Kocher Brown
The battle for organic search performance can be won or lost before a site launches. Choices made in the design and implementation stages impact the ability of an ecommerce business to change critical elements for search engine optimization, handcuffing what is typically one of the largest drivers of traffic and revenue.
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Technical SEO
HTTPS Is Important for More Reasons Than SEO
February 9, 2018 • Jill Kocher Brown
A website’s use of the secure protocol — as evidenced by the HTTPS designation and the presence of a security certificate — is a priority for search engines. But recent changes to Google Chrome make it important for web browsers, too. Google is tackling the security challenge across the web via its Chrome browser. Google is tackling the security challenge across the web via its Chrome browser. This week, the Chrome team announced that all web pages without an HTTPS certificate will display a “Not Secure” label in Chrome 68, scheduled to be launched in July 2018.
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Technical SEO
6 Ways Web Developers Can Improve SEO
February 2, 2018 • Jill Kocher Brown
The relationship between web developers and search-engine-optimization teams is sometimes contentious. Seemingly unrelated technical decisions by developers can impact organic search traffic. But there are enormous SEO benefits in working with development teams and their release planning and testing cycles. In 13 years, I’ve encountered just one developer who refused to consider SEO recommendations.
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Technical SEO
SEO: Google to Make Mobile Speed a Ranking Factor
January 19, 2018 • Jill Kocher Brown
If you weren’t already focused on your mobile site’s performance, Google is giving you a reason. In July of 2018, Google will use a new ranking signal focused purely on mobile site speed: the “Speed Update.” Google will dampen rankings for slower mobile sites to help mobile searchers find sites that deliver what Google considers to be a better mobile experience. Desktop site speed has been a Google ranking factor for almost eight years — its obsession with speed isn’t anything new. What is new is that Google will now include mobile sites in the site speed ranking equation.
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Technical SEO
SEO: How to Identify High Rankings That Produce No Clicks
January 14, 2018 • Hamlet Batista
Google's AdWords Keyword Planner is helpful for keyword research, as are many third-party tools. But Google Search Console can also identify keyword optimization opportunities. I'll explain in this post. Many search engine optimizers believe that a web page can rank organically for just a few keywords, perhaps three to five.
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Technical SEO
How to Increase Click-throughs on Organic Search Listings
January 4, 2018 • Hamlet Batista
Finding new keywords to target and developing content around them is a common practice for search engine optimization. But optimizing for a keyword does not necessarily mean a searcher will ...
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Technical SEO
SEO: For Redesigns and Migrations, Prepare for the Worst
December 1, 2017 • Jill Kocher Brown
You spend months preparing for your ecommerce redesign or migration. You take search engine optimization into consideration and anticipate an increase in organic search traffic after launch. But what happens ...
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Technical SEO
SEO: How to Perform a Flash Audit, to Restore Traffic
November 14, 2017 • Hamlet Batista
I’m often asked to help reverse drops in traffic from organic search. It usually occurs from major site developments, such as redesigns and ecommerce platform changes. Traffic drops can be ...
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Technical SEO
SEO: 7 Ways to Kill Duplicate Content
November 12, 2017 • Jill Kocher Brown
Duplicate content is endemic to ecommerce sites. Seemingly every platform, no matter how SEO-friendly, produces some form of duplicate content, holding a site back from peak performance. First, let’s look at ...
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Technical SEO
SEO Fire Drill: ‘Traffic Is Down!’
October 15, 2017 • Jill Kocher Brown
Organic search traffic often drives significant revenue for ecommerce sites. As a result, it is prone to fire drills around performance. Here’s how to determine when there’s a critical problem ...
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Technical SEO
SEO: How to Improve Site-specific Ranking Factors
October 10, 2017 • Hamlet Batista
A client recently attended a webinar where a presenter provided a list of the top search engine ranking factors. The client wanted me to confirm the list, or provide my ...
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Technical SEO
SEO: Making Recommendations on Mockups
September 15, 2017 • Jill Kocher Brown
Mockups are a key part of creating new marketing campaigns and redesigning entire websites. As partners in the process of producing those new experiences, search-engine-optimization professionals should offer feedback at ...
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Technical SEO
How to Incrementally Move an Ecommerce Site to HTTPS
August 27, 2017 • Hamlet Batista
In October, Google Chrome will release version 62, which will warn website visitors with a “Not Secure” message when they type in data — such as site searches and newsletter ...
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Technical SEO
3 SEO Wins (Often Overlooked) for Ecommerce Sites
July 16, 2017 • Hamlet Batista
There is more to search engine optimization than keywords, titles, meta descriptions, and H1s. In this post, I’ll address three valuable, and often overlooked, SEO opportunities for ecommerce sites: PDFs,
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Technical SEO
SEO: 7 Reasons to Use a Site Crawler
July 14, 2017 • Jill Kocher Brown
No matter how well you think you know your site, a crawler will always turn up something new. In some cases, it’s those things that you don’t know about that ...
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Technical SEO
SEO: Your Faceted Navigation Could Be Better
May 15, 2017 • Jill Kocher Brown
Faceted navigation drives traffic and sales for valuable long-tail search phrases because it applies increasingly refined attributes to shoppers’ searches for their desired products. Optimizing your faceted navigation is the ...
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Technical SEO
SEO: Faceted Navigation Is Your Biggest Opportunity
May 7, 2017 • Jill Kocher Brown
Regardless of what your ecommerce site sells, the biggest opportunity for improving your natural search performance is likely optimizing faceted navigation. Also known as faceted or guided search, faceted navigation applies ...
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Technical SEO
SEO: Creating the Perfect URL, or Not
April 28, 2017 • Jill Kocher Brown
URLs are what search engines use to aggregate all the data they collect regarding a page of content. For search engine optimization, what’s in a URL can be the difference ...
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