How Can Technical SEO Issues Hurt Your Website?

While many marketers focus on content and link building, technical SEO — an essential backbone of any online strategy — often gets overlooked. A well-optimized website is crucial for success. 

Technical SEO refers to the optimizations that help search engines crawl and index your website more effectively. Neglecting these critical elements can not only diminish your site’s visibility but also its overall performance, leading to a poor user experience and a significant drop in traffic. 

In this post, we’ll explore: 

• common technical SEO issues that can adversely affect your website;
• how they impact your site’s ranking and user engagement;
• what steps you can take to diagnose and resolve these issues to maintain an optimal online presence.

Before tackling the specific issues that can hamper your website’s performance, it’s crucial to understand what technical SEO entails and why it’s fundamental to your online success. Technical SEO refers to the process of optimizing your website’s infrastructure so that search engines can crawl and index it more effectively. 

Technical SEO differs from on-page SEO, which concentrates on content and keyword optimization, and off-page SEO, which pertains to activities conducted outside your website to boost its ranking. Specifically, technical SEO focuses on optimizing the backend and architecture of your site.

Key Components of Technical SEO:

Understanding these components gives you a foundation to identify and fix the technical issues that might be lurking in your website’s structure.

Identifying and resolving technical SEO issues is critical for maintaining your site’s health and improving its ranking in search engines. Below are some of the most prevalent technical problems that could be sabotaging your online efforts.

Slow Site Speed

Site speed is a major factor in both user experience and search engine rankings. A slow-loading website can deter visitors, increase bounce rates, and negatively affect your position in search results. Factors that commonly contribute to slow site speed include unoptimized images, excessive HTTP requests, and bulky code.

Poor Mobile Optimization

In today’s mobile-first world, a website that isn’t optimized for mobile devices is at a significant disadvantage. Mobile optimization involves responsive design, which adjusts content layout based on the viewing device, ensuring a seamless user experience. Google prioritizes mobile-friendly websites in its search results, making this a crucial aspect of technical SEO.

Duplicate Content

Duplicate content on multiple pages of your site can confuse search engines as to which version of the content is more relevant to a search query. This confusion may lead to a dilution of ranking potential and reduce the visibility of your pages in search results. It’s important to use canonical tags to signal to search engines which version of the content is the “master” copy.

Broken Links and Improper Redirects

Broken links lead to 404 error pages which can harm your site’s user experience and reduce its trustworthiness. Similarly, improper redirects, such as excessive 302 redirects (temporary redirects), can dilute page authority and transfer less SEO value than 301 redirects (permanent redirects). Regularly auditing your site to find and fix broken links and ensuring proper redirect practices are essential maintenance tasks.

XML Sitemap Issues

An XML sitemap guides search engines through your site’s content, making it easier for them to crawl and index your pages. Issues like missing pages, including pages that should not be indexed, or outdated URLs in your sitemap can impair search engines’ understanding of your site structure and content. Ensuring your sitemap is regularly updated and error-free is vital for effective SEO.

Technical SEO issues can have profound and far-reaching effects on your website’s performance. 

Loss of Organic Traffic

Search engines aim to provide users with the best possible results for their queries. If your website suffers from technical problems such as slow speed, duplicate content, or crawl errors, it’s less likely to rank well. This poor visibility in search results directly leads to a decrease in organic traffic, as potential visitors simply cannot find your site through their usual search methods.

Decreased User Engagement

Technical issues not only affect how your website is perceived by search engines but also how it is experienced by users. For example, a site that loads slowly or doesn’t display properly on mobile devices can frustrate users, prompting them to leave before they have fully engaged with your content. This decreased engagement can result in lower conversion rates and reduced return on investment for your digital marketing efforts.

Increased Bounce Rates

Bounce rate is a metric that measures the percentage of visitors who leave your website after viewing only one page. High bounce rates are often a symptom of deeper technical issues like slow load times, navigation problems, or unresponsive design. A high bounce rate signals to search engines that your site may not be a valuable or relevant resource, potentially leading to further drops in search rankings.

Compromised Brand Reputation

The cumulative effect of these technical issues can go beyond SEO and directly impact your brand reputation. A website that is consistently slow, difficult to navigate, or generally unresponsive can create a negative perception of your brand, making users less likely to return or recommend your site to others.

Now you know which aspects of technical SEO need to be checked, it’s time to give your website a checkup. Fortunately, there are plenty of tools you can use: 

• Google Search Console: This free tool from Google helps you monitor and maintain your site’s presence in Google Search results. It provides insights into crawling errors, mobile usability issues, and security problems that might be affecting your SEO.
• SEMrush Site Audit: SEMrush offers a comprehensive site audit tool that can identify a wide range of technical SEO issues, including broken links, slow pages, and duplicate content. Note that to use this feature, you need a paid subscription
• Screaming Frog SEO Spider: This desktop program crawls websites’ URLs and analyzes them for common SEO issues. This tool is especially useful for large sites, as it can handle massive amounts of data. However, you can crawl only up to 500 URLs free of charge. 
• GTmetrix: Another free tool you can use to assess the speed of your website. You get tons of useful data and actionable recommendations.

Basically, with these tools, you are aiming to run an SEO audit of the technical aspects of your site.

SEO audits are essential for identifying both major and minor issues that could be impacting your website’s performance. While the above and many other tools can help you conduct an audit yourself, there are circumstances where it might be beneficial to seek professional SEO audit services, such as those offered by SeoProfy.

Doing the audit on your own makes sense for: 

• Small Websites: If your site is relatively small and has just a few pages, you can often manage an SEO audit using tools like Google Search Console or SEMrush.
• Limited Budgets: Startups or individuals with limited budgets might start with a DIY audit to identify major issues before deciding if professional help is needed.
• Educational Purposes: Performing an audit yourself can be educational, helping you understand the nuts and bolts of your website and SEO.

In contrast, hiring a professional SEO auditor is beneficial in such cases:

• Complex Websites: Large, complex websites, especially e-commerce sites with hundreds of pages, can benefit significantly from a professional SEO audit to handle intricate issues.
• Significant Traffic Drops: If you experience a sudden drop in traffic, it may be time to hire a professional to perform a thorough audit and identify issues you might have overlooked.
• Regular Maintenance: Businesses that depend heavily on organic traffic might find it beneficial to schedule regular professional audits to ensure optimal performance.

Professionals bring a wealth of expertise and an outside perspective that can uncover deeper issues that might be overlooked during self-audits. Their experience allows them to identify subtle nuances and implement sophisticated techniques that are essential for optimizing large or complex websites. 

Additionally, SEO experts often have access to advanced tools that provide more comprehensive analytics and insights than typical self-audit tools. This level of analysis usually culminates in a detailed action plan specifically tailored to your website’s unique needs, taking into account the latest SEO trends and search engine algorithms.