Technical SEO audit checklist

1. Introduction

• Define technical SEO in simple words.
• Why a technical SEO audit matters: rankings, site performance, and user experience.
• What readers will get: a step by step actionable checklist.
• Quick real life example: a site with great content but low traffic due to crawl/index issues.

2. Crawlability and Indexability

• Robots.txt: what to check, common mistakes (blocking important pages).
• XML Sitemap: verification, updating, submitting to Google Search Console.
• Crawl errors: spotting 404, 500, redirect issues and how to fix them.
• Noindex / Nofollow tags: make sure important pages are indexable.
• Recommended tools: Google Search Console, Screaming Frog, Sitebulb.

3. Site Architecture and URL Structure

• Logical hierarchy: Home → Category → Subcategory → Product/Content.
• SEO-friendly URLs: short, clean, descriptive (avoid long query parameters).
• Breadcrumbs: why they matter and how to implement.
• Internal linking audit: distribute authority, link to important pages.
• Common mistakes (orphan pages, too many clicks to reach content) and fixes.

4. Page Speed & Core Web Vitals

• Ideal benchmarks:
  • Page load time: <3s
  • LCP: <2.5s
  • FID: <100ms
  • CLS: <0.1
• Mobile optimization: responsive images, lazy loading.
• Common speed issues & fixes: compress images, minify CSS/JS, caching, CDN setup.
• Tools: PageSpeed Insights, GTMetrix, Lighthouse.

5. Mobile Friendliness

• Responsive design: layouts, buttons, navigation across devices.
• Mobile usability: text size, clickable elements, viewport settings.
• Mobile-first indexing: ensure mobile version has same content/meta tags as desktop.
• Tools: Google Search Console (Mobile Usability report).

6. HTTPS & Security

• SSL certificate check: all pages should load on HTTPS, no mixed content.
• Security headers: HSTS, X-Frame-Options, etc.
• Malware scan: keep the site clean and safe.
• Tools: Sucuri, SiteCheck, GSC Security Issues.

7. On Page Technical SEO

• Meta tags: title tags (<60 chars), meta descriptions (<160 chars), unique and relevant.
• Heading structure (H1-H6): clear hierarchy, keyword inclusion.
• Canonical tags: prevent duplicate content.
• Structured data / Schema markup: products, FAQs, articles, etc.
• Image optimization: alt tags, compressed file sizes, lazy loading.

8. Redirects & Broken Links

• 404 errors: find and fix broken links.
• 301 redirects: point old URLs to relevant active pages.
• Redirect chains/loops: simplify to improve crawlability.
• Tools: Screaming Frog, Sitebulb.

9. Duplicate Content Issues

• Spot duplicate pages with tools (Screaming Frog, SEMrush).
• Fix with proper canonicalization.
• Manage URL parameters in Google Search Console.
• Common scenarios: HTTP vs HTTPS, www vs non-www, trailing slash issues.

10. Technical SEO Tools & Reports

• Crawl tools: Screaming Frog, Sitebulb, DeepCrawl.
• Google tools: Search Console, Analytics.
• Speed & CWV tools: Lighthouse, PageSpeed Insights.
• All-in-one platforms: Ahrefs, SEMrush, Moz.
• How to interpret reports into actionable steps.
• Crawlability and Indexability
• Site Architecture and Internal Linking

11. Bonus Checks (Advanced)

• Hreflang tags: for multilingual or multi-regional websites.
• AMP pages: validation and SEO considerations.
• Server log analysis: track how search engines crawl the site.
• Pagination best practices: rel=next/prev, canonicalization.
• Advanced tips: lazy loading SEO, HTTP/2 benefits, structured data validation.

12. Conclusion

• Recap: crawlability, indexability, speed, mobile-friendliness, security, and on-page factors.
• Stress regular audits: monthly or quarterly.
• Optional: downloadable PDF checklist template for practical use.

1. Introduction

Let me paint a picture for you.

Your website is like a shop. You might have amazing content, great products, and all the right prices. But if Google cannot “see” your website like blocked roads or a missing signboard no one will find it online.

Making sure Google can crawl (walk through) and index (remember) your site is the first step. Without it, all the effort you put into keywords, SEO, and content is wasted because your “shop” remains invisible to potential visitors.

What this really means is: before obsessing over fancy strategies, fix the basics. Make your site easy for Google to access, and then everything else will matter. That is exactly what happens to a website when the technical side of SEO is ignored.

Technical SEO is like making sure the roads to your shop are open, the doors are working, and the lights are on. It is the part that helps search engines like Google reach your website. It also helps them understand it. And then, it makes sure they show it to the right people.

Even if your content is excellent, without technical SEO, it will sit hidden. It is like a shop in a deserted lane.

Why does a technical SEO audit matter?

Rankings: If Google cannot crawl or index your site, you simply wont show up.

Performance: A slow or broken site drives away both search engines and visitors.

User experience: People will not wait more than a few seconds for a page to load, especially on mobile.

Let me share a story. One of my close friends in Hyderabad started a small online clothing store. She poured her heart into uploading hundreds of product pages. She carefully wrote descriptions for each product. She also took professional photos to showcase them perfectly. But traffic never came. When I checked, I saw her robots.txt file was blocking the entire product folder. Google was blind to her products. The moment we fixed it, we resubmitted the sitemap in Google Search Console. Her products started appearing in search within weeks. Sales have been monitored. That is how powerful technical SEO can be.

This guide will give you a step by step checklist. It works whether you are running a blog, an ecommerce site, or a small local business website.

2. Crawlability and Indexability

Think of search engines like delivery boys in your city. They are trying to deliver parcels (search results) to every home (website). If the roads are blocked or house numbers are missing, they cannot deliver. Crawlability is simply making sure the roads are clear. Indexability is making sure the houses are properly numbered.

Here is what you need to check:

Robots.txt This small file tells Google where it can and cannot go. A very common mistake I have seen in India is developers blocking the entire site during testing. Often, they forget to remove the block after the site is launched. A Bengaluru based startup once approached me. They were frustrated that their website was not showing in Google, even after six months. When I checked, the robots.txt had a single line that said “Disallow: /”. One small line had cost them six months of growth.

XML Sitemap Think of it like Google Maps for your website. It helps Google find all your important pages quickly. But it must be clean and up to date. I worked with an educational portal in Delhi. Their sitemap had thousands of outdated links. These were old course pages that no longer existed. Because of that, Google was wasting time crawling useless links. Once we cleaned up the sitemap and submitted it again, their new courses started showing up in search. This happened within just a few days.

Crawl Errors These are like dead ends or broken roads. Errors such as 404 (page not found) or 500 (server error) confuse both users and Google. A Pune based food delivery startup had hundreds of old restaurant pages still indexed. But those restaurants had shut down, so the pages showed 404 errors. Customers were bouncing, rankings dipped, and traffic fell. We fixed it by redirecting those pages to active restaurant pages. Within a month, their rankings and traffic began to recover.

No index and No follow Tags Sometimes, developers add “no index” tags by mistake. This can happen in important sections of a website. That is like putting up a board that says “Ignore this shop.” A digital agency in Chennai once had their entire blog marked as no index. For months they wondered why their blog posts were not ranking. When we removed that tag, their organic traffic finally started climbing steadily.

Tools to Use

Google Search Console: Free and essential. It tells you which pages are indexed, where errors exist, and how Google views your site.

Screaming Frog: A powerful crawler scans your site the way Google does. It identifies and reveals all hidden issues.

Site bulb: Great if you want a more visual understanding. It shows how search engines move around your site.

Here is the bottom line. Let me tell you something from experience. I have seen businesses pour months into writing perfect content. They carefully pick the right keywords and build backlinks. Yet, in the end, they are left wondering why their traffic never grows. The problem? Google could not even crawl or index their website. Nothing else mattered. Not the fancy content, not the backlinks, not even the SEO strategy they spent days planning.

Think of it like building a house. You can have the most beautiful walls, luxurious furniture, and a high tech kitchen. But if your foundation is weak, the house will never stand. Fix the crawlability and indexability of your website first. Make sure Google can find and understand every page. Once that is in place, everything else in SEO begins to fall into line. Keywords, content, backlinks all start to work.

I remember working with a small local business in Delhi. They had incredible content on their site, with helpful guides for their customers. But their traffic was almost zero. When we ran a technical SEO audit, we discovered a major issue. Their robots.txt file was blocking Google from crawling most of their pages. Fixing that alone started bringing traffic within weeks. It was incredible to see the shift. The business owner was almost in tears, seeing their hard work finally get noticed.

What does this really mean:

Before obsessing over keywords or content strategy, pause for a moment. First, check if Google can even see your site. Fix that first, and you have built a strong foundation that everything else can stand on.

3. Site Architecture and URL Structure

Think of your website like a supermarket in Mumbai. I remember walking into a mall once where the aisles were a complete mess. Chips were in the detergent section, and soft drinks were next to stationery. I ended up leaving without buying anything. The same thing happens online. If your website looks messy, people leave. Google also sees that and lowers your ranking.

To fix this, your site needs a logical order. Think of it like a map: Home → Category → Subcategory → Product.

Example: On a grocery app, it could be Home → Snacks → Namkeen → Haldiram’s Aloo Bhujia. This way, users do not get lost and can quickly reach what they want. It also helps Google understand the relationships between pages. I have seen businesses where just fixing the hierarchy boosted organic traffic. Google could finally “see” all their products.

SEO friendly URLs: Short, descriptive URLs are like street signs that make sense. Instead of www.grocerystore.in/product?id=12345. Use www.grocerystore.in/snacks/haldirams-aloo-bhujia. When I taught a small ecommerce team in Delhi about this, they were amazed. They could not believe that click through rates could increase just by cleaning up URLs.

Breadcrumbs: These are the little navigation trails to Home > Snacks > Namkeen > Haldiram’s Aloo Bhujia. I tell my students that breadcrumbs are like a map in a crowded Indian bazaar. Users get lost without them, and search engines appreciate the structure too.

Internal linking audit: Linking pages is like guiding someone through your store. I once worked with a regional grocery app. Their “Best Indian Snacks” blog posts were isolated. After linking them to top selling products, those products started ranking higher. Internal linking spreads authority and makes sure Google does not ignore important pages.

Common mistakes and fixes: Orphan pages are pages with no links pointing to them. It is like a hidden aisle no one can reach. Too many clicks to reach a product? People leave. Fixing these by adding links to menus or footers can make a huge difference.

Real life example: A regional grocery app noticed a problem. Their Diwali sweets pages were not showing up in search results. They restructured categories, added breadcrumbs, and made internal links more prominent. Within a month, these pages started ranking for searches like “buy Diwali sweets online Mumbai.” Conversions increased by 25%. Within a month, these pages started ranking for searches like “buy Diwali sweets online Mumbai.” As a result, conversions increased by 25%.

4. Page Speed and Core Web Vitals

In India, most people browse on mobile. I see this every day when teaching digital marketing students. People use their phones everywhere on the train, on the bus, even at work. If your website is slow, they won’t wait. They’ll just close it and move on. And most likely, they never come back.

Benchmarks to aim for:

Page load time: under 3 seconds

Largest Contentful Paint (LCP): under 2.5 seconds

First Input Delay (FID): under 100ms

Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS): under 0.1

Mobile optimization: Use responsive images and lazy loading. I remember showing a student how to compress images for a local Delhi fashion store. They thought a 5MB homepage image was fine until we tested it on a 3G connection. The page barely loaded, and their bounce rate was through the roof.

Common issues and fixes:

• Heavy images → compress or use WebP
• Bloated CSS/JS → minify and combines files
• No caching → implement browser caching or a CDN
• Tools like PageSpeed Insights, GTMetrix, and Lighthouse are my go to. I always tell my students: if these tools say your site is slow, treat it like a fire alarm.

Real life example: A Mumbai based online apparel store faced slow loading times on mobile. Its product pages took 6 to 7 seconds to load. Customers were dropping off before seeing any products. After compressing images, the website’s load time improved. Enabling lazy loading further enhanced the speed. Adding Cloudflare CDN also contributed to the significant improvement. The optimizations worked together to enhance performance. As a result, the load time dropped to 2.7 seconds. The result? Bounce rate fell by 18%, and mobile sales jumped 30% the next month. The founder told me, “I did not realize just a few technical fixes could change everything.” It really drives home how much speed impacts trust and sales.

5. Mobile Friendliness

Let me tell you something from my own experience. In India, more than 70% of internet traffic comes from mobile phones. That means for most people, the smartphone is not just a device, it is their whole world. I have met students from smaller towns like Guntur, Indore, and Coimbatore. They told me they have never even touched a laptop. Their shopping, banking, entertainment, everything happens on that one small screen.

Now picture this. A young girl in Indore is searching for “best kurti under 500” on Flipkart. She finds a nice one, but the text is tiny, and she must zoom in to read. The “Buy Now” button is hidden behind an image. What do you think she will do? She will shut the app and open Myntra. Just like that, Flipkart lost a sale.

I remember when IRCTC first redesigned its mobile app. The complaints poured in. Buttons were too close together, and the menus were confusing. For senior citizens who depended on it to book tickets, the experience was nearly impossible to manage. My uncle, who travels often by train, gave up and went back to the website. But IRCTC listened. They introduced bigger buttons, a simpler login, and a cleaner layout. Within months, the app’s adoption went through the roof. People started saying, “Finally, it works.”

And here is where it gets even more important. Google now practices mobile first indexing. That means when Google decides how to rank your website, it checks the mobile version first. If your mobile site is stripped down or missing content, you are basically telling Google, “My website is incomplete.” Ecommerce brands like Ajio have figured this out. Their product pages on desktop and mobile look the same descriptions, same reviews, same meta tags. That consistency keeps both Google and users happy.

So how do you know if your website is mobile friendly?

Tools can help. Google Search Console’s Mobile Usability report shows if your fonts are too small. It also highlights if clickable elements overlap. And it tells you if your pages are not displaying properly on phones. Think of it as a doctor’s health report for your website. If you ignore it, you are losing customers every single day without even realizing.

6. HTTPS and Security

Now lets talk about trust. Imagine you are shopping for groceries online. You fill your cart, total comes to ₹2,000, and just when you are about to pay, the browser flashes a warning: “Not Secure.” What would you do? Close the tab, right? I would too.

I remember a small clothing brand from Surat that launched its online saree store in 2020. The owners worked hard on product photos and promotions. But they forgot one simple thing, an SSL certificate. Customers reached the checkout page, saw “Not Secure,” and immediately dropped off. Bounce rates shot up, and sales were almost zero. Weeks later, they realized the mistake. They installed SSL. Most hosting providers now give it for free. Suddenly, customers started completing their orders. That one tiny lock icon next to the URL literally saved their business.

Security is not just about SSL though. Banks like HDFC and ICICI add extra layers of protection using security headers. These might sound too technical like HSTS or X-Frame Options. But in plain words, they prevent hackers from opening your site in unsafe environments. That is one big reason why people trust banks with sensitive details like card numbers.

Then there is malware. A Hyderabad based travel blogger once shared his nightmare with me. One day, he woke up to see his blog showing popups for gambling websites. Imagine the shock. Overnight, his loyal readers stopped visiting. Google even flagged his site. Only after he used a tool like Sucuri to clean the malware did he slowly win back trust. It took him months to recover.

So, what can you do?

At the very least, keep an eye on your site’s health. Sucuri Site Check lets you scan malware for free. Google Search Console has a Security Issues section. This section alerts you if your site has been compromised. Think of these tools like CCTV cameras for your digital shop. Without them, you are leaving the door open.

Mobile friendliness brings the customers in. HTTPS and security keep them from running away. Together, they decide whether your business grows or collapses online.

7. On Page Technical SEO

On page technical SEO is like making sure your shop is organized perfectly. This way, both Google and your customers know exactly where everything is. I always tell my students that even if you have the best products, if your pages are messy, no one will find them.

Meta tags are the first impression. Imagine you are scrolling through Google for Aashirvaad Atta. If the title says just “Atta 5kg” and the description is blank or generic, would you click it? Probably not. Big Basket gets this right. Titles like “Aashirvaad Atta 5kg – Buy Online in India” immediately tell you what it is and that you can buy it online. Meta descriptions act like a mini ad for your page. They give users a quick preview of what your page is about. Make sure they are clear and enticing and keep them under 160 characters. I remember when one of my students ran a small online grocery store in Pune. Their titles were all “Product Page,” and no one clicked. After rewriting titles and descriptions properly, their click throughs doubled in a week.

Heading structure is next. Think of it like chapters in a book. H1 is your main topic, H2s are sections, H3s are subsections. Flipkart does this well for products. A page on smartphones has H1 as “Smartphones,” H2s for brands or filters, H3s for specifications. Users scan easily and Google understands the hierarchy. I often see small ecommerce sites skip this, and their pages feel messy. One of my students had an electronics site with 50 products where every heading was H1. Google got confused, and their products never ranked.

Canonical tags prevent duplicate content. Lets say the same saree is in both “Women’s Clothing” and “Festive Collection.” Without canonical tags, Google thinks you are trying to trick it, and your ranking suffers. Canonical tags point Google to the main page. I once helped a boutique online store in Jaipur with this. After setting proper canonicals, a few of their products jumped to page one on Google.

Structured data and schema markup are like showing Google extra information about your page. Nykaa uses this to display star ratings, price, and stock in search results. Users trust these pages more and clicks go up. I remember a student who added product schema to their cosmetics website. Within a month, their products started appearing with ratings in Google. As a result, sales increased.

Image optimization is huge, especially in India where everyone uses mobile. High quality images slow down your site if not optimized. Myntra compresses images to improve loading speed. It also uses descriptive alt text, such as “Red Cotton Kurti for Women,” to make images more accessible. Additionally, the site implements lazy loading for images, ensuring they load only when needed. I once taught a class where a students food delivery app was slow because of huge images. After compression and alt tags, the site speed improved, and Google rewarded them with better ranking.

Here is the story: Imagine you opened a gourmet snack store online in India. You upload hundreds of products, but your meta titles are vague, images are huge, and headings are inconsistent. Traffic is low, despite amazing products. That is the magic of on page technical SEO these small fixes can dramatically boost visibility and sales.

8. Redirects and Broken Links

Broken links are like a dead end in your shop aisle. Customers hate it, and Google does too.

404 errors happen when a page is deleted or URLs change. Imagine a food delivery website in Pune removes a menu item. If there is no redirect, users click the link and see nothing. Frustrating, right?

301 redirects are your best friend. They send users and Google from an old page to a new, relevant one. Swiggy does this perfectly. If a restaurant is removed, they redirect users to the category page. SEO value stays intact, and users do not feel lost.

Redirect chains and loops are like taking a long, confusing route to reach a product. URL A → B → C slows Google down and wastes crawl budget. I have seen a fashion blog in Delhi with a chain like this. Fixing it to A → C made a huge difference in ranking.

Tools like Screaming Frog or Sitebulb are lifesavers. They scan your site and tell you exactly which links are broken, or which redirects are wrong. One of my students in Bangalore ignored broken links on their electronics site. Customers clicked old smartphone links and hit 404s. Rankings dropped. After setting proper 301 redirects, traffic came back, and user trust increased.

Here is the reality:

Small mistakes, like broken links or missing redirects, might seem minor. But these tiny issues can destroy the credibility of your site in Googles eyes. Fix them, and both users and search engines will reward you.

9. Duplicate Content Issues

Duplicate content is one of those sneaky problems. It quietly eats away at your website’s SEO. And the worst part is, you might not even realize it is happening. Let me give you a real example from my teaching experience. I was consulting with a small ecommerce store in Jaipur that sold ethnic wear. They had URLs like https://www.example.com/sarees and http://example.com/sarees. To any customer, both pages looked the same. But to Google, it has two separate pages with identical content. The result was frustrating. Neither page ranked well. Their organic traffic was stagnant.

Here is how to deal with it:

Spot duplicates:

Tools like Screaming Frog or SEMrush can crawl your entire site. They help identify duplicate titles, meta descriptions, and content. I once worked with a regional grocery app. On this app, the product “Organic Turmeric 100g” was listed under multiple categories. Each had a slightly different URL. Once we identified the duplicates, it became clear why Google was not ranking any of those pages well.

Canonicalization:

This is where you pick one version of a page as the “master” and tell Google to prioritize it.

Using our turmeric example, all duplicate URLs should point to it. https://www.example.com/products/organic-turmeric-100g. Doing this correctly not only boosted rankings. It also made internal linking much cleaner.

Manage URL parameters:

Many Indian online stores rely heavily on filters such as color, size, and price. Using these filters can create dozens of URLs, all of which have essentially the same content. Google Search Console allows you to tell Google which parameters to ignore. I remember an electronics store in Mumbai. They lost months of potential traffic because filtered URLs were being indexed as separate pages.

Once they set the parameters correctly, traffic to their category pages jumped noticeably. This happened within just a few weeks.

Common scenarios:

HTTP vs HTTPS, www vs non www, trailing slash issues. A news portal I worked with had both www.newsportal.in/article and newsportal.in/article indexed separately. Their search visibility was split and confused. Implementing proper canonical tags and 301 redirects doubled their organic traffic within weeks.

What this really means is duplicate content is not just a technical annoyance. It directly affects your traffic, revenue, and credibility. Fixing it brings measurable results fast, and the impact is almost immediately visible.

10. Technical SEO Tools and Reports

Think of technical SEO tools like your eyes and ears when auditing a site. Without them, you’re essentially flying blind. Let me share a few stories from my work with Indian businesses to show why these tools matter.

Crawl tools:

Screaming Frog, Site bulb, and Deep Crawl can scan your entire site. They reveal broken links, missing meta tags, duplicate content, and more. I once worked with a midsized Bangalore ecommerce platform. A single crawl revealed over 200 missing meta descriptions. It was overwhelming at first. But within a week of systematically fixing them, their organic traffic started climbing. The satisfaction on the team’s face when rankings improved was priceless.

Google tools:

Search Console and Analytics are free but incredibly powerful. They reveal crawl errors, indexing issues, and which pages bring traffic. I remember a fashion blog in Mumbai. It had several category pages accidentally set as no  index. The owner was frustrated for months thinking SEO was not working. Once we corrected the tags, organic traffic jumped 30 percent in just a month.

Speed and Core Web Vitals tools:

Lighthouse and Page Speed Insights are useful tools. They help in analyzing website performance. They show issues with LCP, FID, and CLS. They also highlight page speed problems. A grocery delivery app I worked with struggled with slow loading product pages. By compressing images and enabling browser caching, LCP dropped from 4.2 seconds to 2.1 seconds. The app saw not only higher traffic. But it also saw more conversions. This happened because users were staying longer.

All in one platform:

Tools like Ahrefs, SEMrush, and Moz are widely used by SEO professionals. They help track backlinks, monitor keyword rankings, and assess overall site health. A Delhi based electronics store had multiple 301 redirect chains, making crawling inefficient. Simplifying the redirects flagged by SEMrush improved crawl efficiency. This, in turn, helped Google understand their site structure better.

How to use reports: Collecting data is only the first step. The real skill is analyzing it and turning it into actions. This could mean fixing broken links. It might also involve optimizing titles. Compressing images is another important step. You may also need to update canonical tags. I often tell my students, a report is only valuable if it changes what you do next. Real improvements happen when data drives decisions, not just sit in a dashboard.

Crawlability and Indexability

Here is the thing that if Google cannot crawl or index your site properly, all your SEO efforts are wasted. I always tell my students, imagine you have built a beautiful shop in Delhi, but the entrance is blocked. No matter how great your products are, no one can come in. That is exactly what happens when crawlability issues exist.

Check robots.txt:

This file tells search engines which pages to crawl and which to ignore. A regional electronics retailer in Pune had accidentally blocked their sale pages. No one saw them in search. Once we fixed the robots.txt, traffic to those pages surged within days.

XML Sitemap:

Think of this as a map for Google. Without it, search engines may miss some of your pages. I remember a Chennai based fashion blog that never submitted a sitemap. Some category pages were never indexed. After adding a sitemap, those pages started ranking. Traffic jumped by almost 25 percent.

No index tags and meta robots:

Sometimes pages are intentionally hidden. This can include thank you pages or internal search results. But often, web developers add no index tags by mistake. That Mumbai grocery app I mentioned earlier had several product pages. These pages were accidentally marked as no index. Fixing that alone brought back dozens of pages to Google search results.

Crawl budget:

This is more crucial for large sites. Google only crawls a limited number of pages at a time. Duplicate content, broken links, or redirect chains waste that budget. A big e commerce site in India lost potential traffic. This happened because Google spent time crawling low value pages. Once they cleaned up redirects and fixed the duplicate pages with proper canonical tags. After that, their important pages started getting crawled more often.

The takeaway here is simple. If Google cannot crawl or index your pages correctly, it does not matter how much content you have created. It also does not matter how much SEO work you’ve done. Fix crawlability first, and the rest becomes easier.

Site Architecture and Internal Linking

Site structure is like the skeleton of your website. If it is weak, your site cannot support growth. I always ask my students to picture a library with books scattered randomly. Hard to find anything, right? That is how Google sees poorly structured websites.

Organize content into categories: An online bookstore in Kolkata had hundreds of books. But there were no clear categories. We reorganized it into Fiction, Non Fiction, Children, and Academic. Internal links were updated. Suddenly, users spent more time browsing. At the same time, Google started ranking deeper pages that were previously invisible.

Internal linking: Linking related pages strengthens SEO. It passes authority and helps users navigate better. I worked with a Jaipur fashion brand where each Kurti product linked to its collection and related accessories. This improved their rankings, and customers started buying combos more frequently.

Hierarchy matters: Keep important pages closer to the homepage. The grocery app I mentioned structured its homepage with top categories first. Then came the subcategories, followed by the products. Google crawled and indexed key pages faster. As a result, organic traffic to category pages doubled within a few months.

Anchor text: Use descriptive text instead of “click here.” Instead of linking a Kurti product with “view here,” we changed it to “Red Cotton Kurti for Women.” This tells both users and Google exactly what the page is about.

A solid site architecture is not just about SEO it is about guiding your visitors. When users find what they want easily, engagement and conversions improve naturally.

11. Bonus Checks (Advanced) – Step by Step

After covering the basics, these advanced checks give your website an edge that most Indian businesses miss. I have seen even successful brands struggle here. They often ignore these tiny but powerful details, and that is where they lose out. Lets break it down.

Href lang Tags – Serve the Right Language to the Right Audience

Imagine you run a travel website like MakeMyTrip. Your audience is in India, UAE, and Singapore, and you have content in English and Hindi. Without href lang tags, Google might not understand which language page to show. As a result, someone searching in English in Singapore could end up seeing the Hindi page. That frustrates users. I have personally guided a study abroad consultancy from Telangana. Their English and Telugu pages were getting mixed up in Google’s search. Students from Dubai were seeing Telugu pages. They bounced immediately.

How to implement href lang:

Identify the languages and regions you serve. For example, you might support English in India (en-in), Hindi in India (hi-in), or English in the UAE (en-ae).

Add href lang tags in the <head> section of your page or in your sitemap.

Test using Google’s Search Console under International Targeting.

Once my client added the correct href lang tags, inquiries from overseas doubled in two months. It is a small fix with a big impact.

AMP Pages  ( Instant Load, Better Engagement)

Remember when Times of India and Hindustan Times adopted AMP? For readers in tier 2 and tier 3 cities with patchy 4G, waiting 10 seconds for a news page was painful. AMP reduced it to 1 to 2 seconds. I experienced this firsthand while traveling by train and trying to read cricket updates. The AMP page opened instantly, the normal page took forever.

How to implement AMP:

Install an AMP plugin if you use WordPress or manually code AMP versions for your pages.

Ensure your AMP pages are validated in the AMP Test tool.

Monitor in Google Search Console to check indexing and traffic.

For ecommerce, AMP can increase engagement on mobile, making users trust your brand more and browse longer.

Server Log Analysis – See What Google Really Sees

Here is a secret many digital marketers ignore. Your site might look perfect, but Googlebot could be wasting time crawling the wrong pages. A Bangalore ecommerce startup I advised noticed their new product pages weren’t ranking. The culprit? Googlebot kept hitting old promo pages and ignored fresh listings.

Steps to analyze server logs:

Download server logs from your hosting provider.

Filter for Googlebot visits and check which URLs are crawled most.

Fix internal linking, update sitemaps, and remove unnecessary redirects.

After this, the clients new products started ranking and sales doubled within two months. It is like giving Google a roadmap to your best pages.

Pagination Best Practices – Do not Hide Your Products

Many Indian online stores like Myntra or Ajio paginate product listings across multiple pages. Without proper setup, Google might index only the first page. I helped a saree retailer in Surat who had 25 pages of products. Only the first page appeared in search. After adding rel next and prev tags and canonical links correctly, all products were indexed. Within months, hundreds of sarees started ranking individually.

How to fix pagination:

Add rel=next and rel=prev links between paginated pages.

Use canonical URLs for each page pointing to themselves.

Check in Google Search Console to ensure all pages are indexed.

Advanced Tips

Lazy Loading: For image heavy sites like Swiggy or Zomato, lazy loading is essential. Load images only when visible on screen. This speeds up your site without harming SEO.

HTTP/2 Benefits: Many Indian hosts now offer HTTP/2. It loads multiple resources simultaneously. A Pune based client switched. Their mobile load speed improved dramatically. This led to a lower bounce rate and increased conversions.

Structured Data: Adding schema helps Google display rich snippets with reviews, prices, and ratings. A small electronics shop in Delhi implemented Product schema. Click through rates jumped 20 percent. Even small businesses can look bigger with structured data.

12. Conclusion

Here is the truth. Technical SEO is not about fancy tricks. Think of your website like your scooter. In India, most people do not wait for their scooter to break down before taking it for a service. They check the engine, clean it, top up oil, and make sure everything runs smoothly.

Technical SEO is like that regular service, but for your website. You make sure search engines can “see” all your pages (crawl and index), your site loads fast, works well on phones, and stays secure. When your site is well maintained like this, it naturally performs better in Google rankings just like a well serviced scooter runs better on the road. You take it to the mechanic regularly. Otherwise, one small issue becomes a costly repair. The same logic applies to websites. Regular audits  monthly or at least quarterly help you catch small problems before they become big losses.

I will share a real story. A clothing brand in Hyderabad once came to me panicking. They had lost 40 percent of their traffic overnight. The cause was simple. Their sitemap had stopped updating new arrivals. Google was not indexing their latest products. Fixing it was easy, but recovery took three months. Those were three painful months when sales dipped badly. That is why I always tell students and clients: prevention is cheaper than cure.

If you want to make this whole process less overwhelming, create a simple checklist. Print it out or keep a digital copy. Every time you audit, just tick off each item. Over time it wo does not feel like a big project. It will feel like a regular health check. And that is how you keep your website healthy and growing.