Publishing more pages feels productive. It rarely helps if Google cannot reach those pages, or if your site sends mixed signals about which URLs matter. A short technical review before a content push can save months of waiting.
This checklist follows the order we use on client sites. Start at the top, because problems with crawling and indexing hide every other improvement.
Crawling and indexing
1. Confirm that your important pages are indexable
Open the Pages report in Google Search Console and compare it with your list of key pages. Look for pages marked "Excluded by noindex tag," "Blocked by robots.txt" or "Crawled, currently not indexed." Each status points to a different fix, so do not treat them as one problem.
2. Review robots.txt
Your robots.txt file tells crawlers which paths to skip. A single stray line can block a whole section of your site. Check that it does not block CSS, JavaScript or important folders, and that it lists your sitemap. Remember that robots.txt controls crawling, not indexing. To keep a page out of search results, use a noindex tag and leave the page crawlable so Google can see the tag.
3. Submit a clean XML sitemap
Your sitemap should list only canonical, indexable URLs that return a 200 status. Remove redirected pages, error pages and noindexed pages. Submit it in Search Console and watch for errors.
4. Fix canonical tags
Every indexable page should point to the version you want to rank. Check that canonicals are absolute URLs, that they match your preferred protocol and domain, and that they do not point at redirected or noindexed pages.
Site structure
5. Remove redirect chains and broken links
A redirect that leads to another redirect slows users and wastes crawl effort. Update internal links to point straight to the final URL. Crawl your site to find 404 errors and fix or redirect each one that still receives links or visits.
6. Strengthen internal linking
Pages that no other page links to are hard for crawlers to find and easy to rank poorly. Make sure every important page is reachable within a few clicks from the home page, and add links from related content using descriptive anchor text.
7. Use a clear URL structure
Short, readable URLs that reflect your site hierarchy help people and search engines. Avoid unnecessary parameters and keep one version of each URL.
Speed and experience
8. Measure Core Web Vitals on real pages
Google reports three Core Web Vitals: Largest Contentful Paint, which should be 2.5 seconds or less, Interaction to Next Paint, which should be 200 milliseconds or less, and Cumulative Layout Shift, which should be 0.1 or less. Use the Core Web Vitals report in Search Console for field data, and PageSpeed Insights to see what to change on a single page.
9. Compress and size images properly
Large images are the most common cause of a slow Largest Contentful Paint. Serve modern formats such as WebP or AVIF, set width and height attributes, and lazy-load images that sit below the fold.
10. Check mobile usability
Google primarily uses the mobile version of your pages for indexing. Make sure the mobile page contains the same main content, headings, links and structured data as the desktop page, and that buttons and text are easy to use on a small screen.
Signals and security
11. Serve everything over HTTPS
Redirect all HTTP URLs to HTTPS and fix mixed content warnings so no page loads insecure resources. Confirm that your certificate is valid and renews automatically.
12. Add and validate structured data
Schema markup helps search engines understand your pages. Add Organization or LocalBusiness data to your home page, Article markup to blog posts, Product markup to product pages and FAQPage markup only where the questions and answers appear on the page. Test each template with Google's Rich Results Test.
How to prioritize the fixes
Not every issue deserves the same urgency. Fix anything that stops pages from being crawled or indexed first. Next, handle problems that affect many pages at once, such as a broken template or a slow theme. Leave small warnings for later. A tool may report hundreds of issues, but only a handful usually affect rankings.
If you want an expert to look at the whole picture, our technical SEO service starts with a crawl and ends with a ranked list of fixes. You can also begin with a full SEO audit.