While everyone’s focused on creating content and building backlinks (which are important, don’t get me wrong), many businesses overlook the foundation that makes all that work pay off. It’s like building a beautiful house on a rickety foundation.
What Is Technical SEO?
Technical SEO consists of all the behind-the-scenes elements that help search engines find, understand, and display your site to potential customers. Think of it as the infrastructure of your website – when it’s working properly, everything runs smoothly. When it isn’t, your site’s performance suffers.
Every webpage contains hidden code elements that search engines read to understand what the page is about. These elements – like title tags, meta descriptions, and header tags – are like a book’s table of contents and chapter headings for search engines. While visitors don’t see these elements directly, they significantly impact how well your site ranks in search results. Getting these technical building blocks right is crucial for search engines to properly categorize and rank your content.
Speed Matters
Here’s a sobering fact: a one-second delay in load time can cost you 7% of your potential business. That’s real revenue walking away because a site loads too slowly.
While your website might load quickly on a desktop computer with high-speed internet, mobile users often face a different reality. Mobile network speeds can be significantly slower than home internet connections, and today more than half of all web traffic comes from mobile devices. This means we need to be especially careful about how we serve content to mobile users – often using compressed images or selectively loading images based on connection speed. A page that loads in 2 seconds on your office computer might take 15 seconds on someone’s phone if it’s not properly optimized.
Common speed issues include:
- Oversized images taking too long to load
- Inefficient code that needs optimization
- Underperforming servers slowing everything down
Mobile-Friendly Is Essential
Today’s reality is that people primarily use their phones to search online, and Google has noticed. They now look at the mobile version of your site first when deciding search rankings. If your site isn’t mobile-friendly, you’re missing out on a significant portion of potential customers.
The mobile browsing experience is fundamentally different from desktop browsing. On a computer, users have a large screen, precise mouse control, and a full keyboard. On phones, they’re using their fingers to tap and scroll, often while on the move or multitasking. This means navigation menus, buttons, and forms need to be completely redesigned for mobile users. Text needs to be larger, touch targets need to be finger-sized, and content needs to be arranged in a single column that’s easy to scroll through.
Ensuring Complete Site Visibility to Search Engines
Many businesses don’t realize that search engines might be missing important pages on their site. We address this through:
- XML sitemaps that guide search engines through your content
- Clear, logical URL structures
- Strategic use of robots.txt files to direct search engine crawling
Local SEO Technical Factors
Local SEO has its own set of technical requirements that affect how well you rank in local search results. This includes proper implementation of location-specific schema markup, consistent NAP (Name, Address, Phone) information across your site, and technical optimization of location-based pages. Multiple-location businesses need special attention to their site structure to avoid duplicate content issues while still maintaining unique pages for each location. Technical elements like proper canonical tags and location-specific XML sitemaps become crucial for businesses serving different geographic areas.
Structured Data for Better Results
By implementing structured data markup, we help search engines better understand your content. This often results in enhanced search listings, which can improve your visibility and click-through rates.
Need Help With Technical SEO?
Technical SEO can be complex, and it changes constantly. While you focus on running your business and serving your customers, we stay current with the latest technical requirements and best practices.
At Tenon SEM, we manage these technical elements to ensure your site performs at its best. We’ll identify issues you might not know exist and implement solutions that align with your business goals. Ready to build a stronger foundation for your online presence? Let’s talk about getting your technical SEO right.
We also have a sister site that focuses on medical practices: Practice Forge.