Search engines need to be able to find, understand, and index your content before it can appear in search results. If your site is not getting the visibility you expect, here are some best practices to improve SEO discoverability.
Planning
Planning for good content is always better than optimizing terrible content down the line.
Keyword Research
Research what search keywords you want your content to rank for. For example, if you're starting a website with resources on no-code, you will want to rank for: best no-code tools for xyz, build website without code etc. I use Google Keyword Planner to quickly scope out relevant keywords for my topic before writing.
Find low competition keywords
All keywords are not created equal. Some are easier to rank for than others. Starting out, it is imperative that you target the low competition keywords. Since there's less of a crowd and a shortage for good content, your post is much more likely to show up in the search results. Use UberSuggest to pick keywords with high volume and less competition.
Match Search Intent
Now that we have a low competition keyword, it's time to google it to get a sense of the content that is already ranking. The content that you write should also target the keyword in the same way. Google has a preference to rank content that matches the search intent.
In this example, when searching for "no code tools", notice that Google results are very specifically lists of No Code tools, not content like tutorials on No Code, or interviews with No Code creators etc.
If you were to write content for the same keyword, your post should follow the same recipe.
Content
Once you have a sense of what you want to write on, make sure your content structure follows these guidelines. You can also make this process a lot easier with the help of SEO agencies that specialize in SaaS.
Make Sure Your Site Is Indexable
Check that search engines are allowed to crawl and index your site:
- Disable password protection if you want pages to appear in search results.
- Ensure the page is published and accessible publicly.
- Verify that search engines are not blocked through robots.txt settings or meta tags.
Add SEO Metadata
SEO metadata helps search engines understand what your pages are about.
For each important page, add:
- A clear page title
- A concise meta description
- Relevant social sharing images
Try to use keywords naturally in your titles and descriptions.
Use Clear Page Structure
Organize your content using headings and subheadings:
- H1 for the main page title
- H2 and H3 for supporting sections
A well-structured page helps both visitors and search engines understand your content.
Create Internal Links
Link related pages together throughout your site. Internal links help search engines discover additional content and understand the relationship between your pages.
For example:
- Blog posts linking to related articles
- Documentation pages linking to relevant guides
- Navigation menus linking to key pages
Publish High-Quality Content
Search engines prioritize useful and original content. Focus on creating pages that answer users' questions and provide value rather than simply targeting keywords.
Keep Your Content Updated
Regularly review and update important pages to ensure information remains accurate and relevant. Fresh content signals that your site is actively maintained.
Technical
Loading in external resources on a web page is extremely expensive. CSS and JS block the rendering of the pa ge until they are fully loaded in which makes the site load very slowly.
Super is very good at applying optimizations under the hood to circumvent this but it's still good to be aware of them for when you are adding your own external resources on top.
External Javascript
- Defer your JavaScript content
<head>
<script src="main.js" defer></script>
</head>CSS StyleSheets
- Preload your CSS stylesheets
<head>
<link rel="preload" href="style.css" as="style">
</head>Fonts
- When using custom fonts, always go for the ones in Google Fonts. They have been heavily optimized by the Super team to load instantly.
- Set font-display to swap so that the browser falls back on a local font until the external font is available.
body {
font-display: swap;
}DNS
- Make sure your URLs are all redirected to https. Super custom domains already handle this for you.
- www.mywebsite.com -> https://mywebsite.com
- https://mywebsite.com -> https://mywebsite.com
- http://mywebsite.com -> https://mywebsite.com
Google Search Console
Google requires a sitemap file that explains how your pages are set up on your website. Super already does the hard work by creating this file for you. All you have to do to get Google to understand your site structure is submit it to Google Search Console.
- Open up Google Search Console and enter in your domain.
- Add a TXT record to your DNS to verify that you are indeed the owner of the domain.
- Select
Sitemapson the menu tab on the left. Add a new sitemap by adding the URL:yourwebsite.com/sitemap.xml
Perfect! With these changes, your site should start appearing in Google Search results in no time!
