What is indexing of a page?

So, you’ve written a shiny new web page, filled it with beautiful content and amazing images and you are super proud of what you’ve created. You hit ‘publish’, and lo! Your web page is on the internet, so you can sit back and enjoy all the sweet traffic and potential customers that it can bring you.

Or is it?

Just because your website is on the internet, doesn’t automatically mean that it’s been indexed on the internet. But what does indexed on the internet even mean and how on earth can you find out (apart from y’know, Googling yourself and scrolling forevermore trying to find your listing; which I don’t recommend.

Indexing a webpage on search engines like Google is like getting a book indexed within a library. You need to log it with the librarian, aka the Google Bots, then the Google Bots can start to figure out what the page is about (hello keywords, hello rich, useful content) and start to rank you accordingly. If you skip the indexing part, Google may never decide to index your page. Just because you hit publish, don’t assume it will get indexed.

There are a few ways you can check that your website has been indexed.

Using Search Operator to check if your web page is indexed.

How to use Google Search Console to check indexing.

This handy website, built by the Big G themselves, gives you all the insight you need into how your website performs and is catalogued on Google. It’s an SEO’s best friend, and it should be yours too. If you aren’t using Google Search Console then you are missing out on a huge wealth of information and quite possibly, a few web disasters too. Crikey, better get on it, then.

The first step is to login into your Google Search Console (aka GSC), if you don’t have one, then set one up and get the code installed on your website. Google has a handy guide that you can follow to do this.

How to find all of your excluded pages in Google Search Console.

Why won’t Google index my pages?

There are numerous reasons as to why Google won’t index pages, which is all part of the fun in the wonderful world of SEO. Here are the top common reasons why Google is refusing to index your pages:

Robot.txt blocking.

Check you haven’t accidentally asked Google NOT to index your page. Easily done, so check your CMS and make sure there’s no robot blocking code in there, or a button accidentally switched on in your backend that stops it from being indexed.

It doesn’t require indexing.

Some pages don’t actually need indexing, and Google is pretty smart when it comes to that. In your coverage tab, have a look at the URLs that haven’t been indexed. If they contain format=rss, tags, index, etc. then they don’t actually need indexing so ignore those.

Thin and duplicate content.

If your page contains little to no content or duplicate content then Google won’t see a reason to index it or will assume the first page with the duplicate content is the original (and therefore the best). Ensure you have good quality content on your page, and that content is unique to the rest of your website. This is especially important for local SEO and wanting to rank for multiple local locations.

No sitemap.

Would you go on a road trip without a map? Then you shouldn’t submit a website without a sitemap. Search engines need a sitemap to help understand your website, and it’s especially important if you have a complex website, with deep layers. Every time you add a new page, it’s imperative you add your sitemap again to GSC.

No internal links.

Search engines love internal linking, and so do your users. Making use of good internal links to relevant content not only helps users navigate around your website it also helps search engines understand your website, that’s essential if you want to be indexed and ranked as well.

How can I tell when my website page has been indexed?

Need help getting indexed and found on Google? Then I can help. I’m an SEO specialist and I’ve worked with countless businesses to increase their organic SEO and bring in new sales, clients and users. Want to chat? I do. Pop me an email today.