The optimization of the website itself, called “SEO Onsite,” is the basis of natural referencing. We must first ensure to offer search engine robots a clean and efficient site. In other words, “SEO Friendly”! And this involves removing blocking factors (avoiding errors and properly setting up redirects), optimizing markup (from title tags to pagination tags through the implementation of structured data), and finally optimizing the loading time.
Removal of blocking factors
For robots from Google and other search engines to easily navigate your site, you must be careful not to get any wrong answers. For this, it is advisable to regularly monitor and resolve its 404 and 500 errors.
4XX and 5XX error
There are two types of errors: those in 4XX and those in 5XX. The most common of these are 404 errors as well as 500 errors.
A 404 error represents a page that has been deleted or moved. Thus, the old URL which was previously positioned in the search results responds with a 404 error. This is problematic for the user who may be disappointed and will interrupt his visit to the site. This is also a problem for natural referencing since you will lose the positions acquired on this URL. The ideal solution to this is a 301 redirect, as we will discuss in the next paragraph.
A 500 error represents an error from the server. This means that there is probably a problem with your hosting: overloaded bandwidth, server in difficulty, data exchange time too long… When you receive many 500 errors, you have to turn to your web host to resolve the problem.
3XX redirects
As we started to talk about in the previous paragraph, 404 errors should be fixed with redirects. There are two types: permanent redirects (301) and temporary redirects (302 or 307).
The most common and often the most recommended redirects are 301 permanent redirects. They make it possible to redirect Internet users to the new URL and inform robots that the page has been moved. So you don’t lose the historical positions of the old URL. Of course, ideally, it’s best not to change URLs, but redirects help limit the damage.
If you have a WordPress site, two plugins have been proven to easily manage 301 redirects via the admin interface: “404 to 301” from Joel James and “Redirection” from John Godley. If you are not on WordPress or do not want to use a plugin, you can also manage redirects through the .htaccess file in your FTP server.
Finally, there are also temporary redirects, most often 302 redirects. They are used to redirect the Internet user but inform the robots that the redirection is temporary. This means that the redirection is not taken into account for SEO; it is the old URL that remains indexed and positioned. The robots come back regularly to see if the page has returned or is still in redirection 302. This type of redirection is justified in particular for the pages of balances between two periods.
In general, if you do not fully understand the subject, prefer 301 redirects to 302 redirects to avoid errors.
Markup optimization
After having solved the blocking factors, it is advisable to have clean and well-configured markings. Here we will talk about the main ones, although there are many others for special cases. Their good management will make it possible to obtain a more efficient site and better indexed by the search engine robots.
In general, these tags translate to robots what the user perceives with his human eye. Indeed, the robots perceive only code; this allows them to indicate where the page’s various elements are located.
Titles: Hn
The titles, in HTML language, are coded in the form of Hn. Thus, a first-level title will have the tag <h1>, that of the second level <h2>, etc … in general; we do not go beyond <h6>. These tags help Google understand where the titles are located. The content in the titles will have more weight and importance, in particular the H1 title.
However, there are a few rules to follow. First of all, it is preferable to have only one H1 title per page. Then, you have to respect Hn’s hierarchy: have an H1, then an H2, then an H3, etc … For example, you should avoid having an H5 before the H1. Also, do not go directly from an H2 to an H4.
Click rate: structured data
Structured data helps show more content in search results, increasing the click-through rate.
The best known are the breadcrumb trail and the reviews. These Rich Snippets can easily be set up using extensions if you have a WordPress site.
Other tags: pagination, canonical, translation …
There are still many other tags, particularly two for the pagination and translation functions.
Pagination is managed by the rel prev tags for the previous page and rel next for the next page. This makes it possible to indicate to the robots the URLs of the preceding and following pages within the pagination framework.
The canonical tag, or canonical, is used to inform robots if pages are duplicated and contain the same content (for example, filtered pages for an e-commerce site). This is to avoid any duplicate content problem.
Finally, the translation can also be managed with tags; this is the href lang tag. This allows crawlers to know that there is a translation of this page in another language and another country.
Optimization of loading time
Finally, after having worked to obtain a technically clean site, it is important to pay attention to its performance. This will reduce its loading time, thus benefiting both the Internet user and the Google robot.
Image optimization
Optimizing the images will reduce the weight of the page and, therefore, the loading time. We can compress the images, reduce them in size, load them as the page is downloaded … We offer a category of articles on optimizing images for SEO.
Cache management
Finally, another way to improve load time is to allow site caching. This will make it possible not to reload the site each time there is a new visit, thus significantly improving the loading time.
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