The majority of websites rely significantly on search engines to drive visitors. However, the results send up to three-quarters of all clicks to the top three websites for any particular search. This implies that you must get to the top of the search results page to enjoy the rewards. This is something that search engine optimization may help you with. However, before you can begin ascending the ranks, you must first establish your presence. That is why Google must index your WordPress website. No work will get you to the top of the search engine rankings if Google doesn’t even know your website exists. So, don’t squander your time and labor – be confident that your website is mobile-friendly.
Why do you need Google to index your WordPress website?
It’s easy to see why visibility in Google search results is essential: a lot of traffic originates from search engines, and Google is the most popular. That is why SEO is so crucial — more exposure leads to more visitors. However, even the most acceptable SEO methods take time to produce results, and it would be best to reduce that time as much as feasible. One way to accomplish this is to guarantee that your website is indexed.
How do you get Google to index your WordPress website?
When a user searches for a particular term, Google ranks relevant results based on information stored in its massive index of web pages. This index is built by Google bots, who explore the internet regularly and find new pages. These bots will eventually locate almost any website. However, it may take them some time to get to yours with millions of pages to comb through. So cut out the go-betweens and get your pages manually indexed.
Make use of the proper search engine visibility settings
The first step is straightforward: Navigate to Settings > Reading and look for the Search Engine Visibility section. Then, uncheck the “Discourage search engines from indexing this site” box. This makes it possible for search bots to crawl and index your sites. Although this makes your website available to search engines by default, you may prohibit individual pages from being seen.
Link your Google Search Console and WordPress accounts
The whole goal of putting in all of this work is to gain Google’s notice. But, although you’re going for the search engine, don’t forget that Google offers a slew of business tools. One of the most common WP blunders is failing to use such tools and create accounts for your business on them. So, go to Google Search Console and input your website’s URL (complete with the https:// and www. prefixes). Before adding the website to the Console, you must first confirm that it is yours. There are several methods for doing this; follow the verification method you want to use.
Create and publish XML sitemaps to Google Search Console
An XML sitemap is a file that acts as a directory for all your pages. These may be pretty useful to bots while navigating your website, especially if you have an extensive catalog of pages or don’t employ internal linking regularly. They will serve as a road map to all of your website’s significant pages, allowing crawling bots to discover them more efficiently and better comprehend how they connect. Don’t worry — you can make similar maps using a plugin, so it’s relatively straightforward!
Individual pages should be submitted to Google Search Console
Of course, your website will alter once you’ve established your sitemap. To change your material, you’ll need to create new pages. If any of them are critical, you will want Google to index them as quickly as possible. Resubmitting your XML sitemap with the additional pages is one approach to ensure this happens. If you don’t want to deal with it, you may use the URL inspection tool instead. Enter the URL you want Google to crawl. You’ll never have a problem if you do this regularly since you’ll never have too many URLs to send.
Now that Google has indexed your WordPress website, it’s time to focus on your ranking.
It’s vital to realize that indexing is only the beginning. Even once Google has indexed your pages, it will regularly crawl your website. This allows Google to update and evaluate the quality of your material. Once you’ve gotten this far in the process, additional elements start to come into play, and it’s no longer enough for Google bots to be aware that your website exists. They must also find your website straightforward to use and browse. This will help you go up in the rankings.
Remember to check the status of your pages regularly
The effort does not end after your WordPress website is indexed by Google. Google can deindexdeindex your pages just as quickly as it can index them. This is common when some information looks to be duplicated, or your website is suspect owing to poor SEO methods. You may also deindexdeindex sites yourself if you’ve published material you don’t want to affect your ranking; for example, updates about your business can be valuable for your consumers but are unlikely to rank.
As a result, it’s critical to ensure that all pages you wish to index are still being crawled regularly. You may also use the URL inspection tool for this. If you discover anything is missing, attempt to locate it.
How to Monitor and Improve Your WordPress Website’s Google Indexing
Getting your WordPress website indexed by Google is just the beginning. The next step is monitoring its indexing status regularly to ensure it remains available to search engines. It would help if you also focused on improving your website’s ranking by creating high-quality, user-friendly content that’s easy to navigate. Here are some tips to help you monitor and improve your website’s Google indexing:
Fix crawl errors: Crawl errors can prevent Google bots from indexing your website. Use Google Search Console to identify and fix crawl errors.
Create and publish high-quality content: Google rewards websites that provide high-quality, relevant content that’s easy to navigate. Use keywords your target audience is searching for to improve your website’s visibility in search results.
Optimize your website for mobile devices: More than half of all website traffic comes from mobile devices. Ensure that your website is mobile-friendly to improve its ranking in search results.
Use internal linking: Internal linking helps Google bots navigate your website and improves the user experience for visitors. Use descriptive anchor text to help Google understand the content of the linked pages.
Use external linking: Linking to high-quality external websites can improve your website’s credibility and increase its visibility in search results.
Use social media to promote your website: Social media can help drive traffic and increase its visibility in search results. Please share your website’s content on social media platforms and encourage others to share it.
By monitoring your website’s indexing status and regularly updating your content, you can improve your website’s ranking in search results and drive more traffic to your WordPress website. Remember to focus on providing high-quality, user-friendly content that’s easy to navigate to ensure the best results.
