13 Steps to Boost Your Law Firm’s Website Crawlability and Indexability

In this blog post, we’ll walk you through 13 practical steps to enhance your website’s crawlability and indexability, helping you improve your search rankings and visibility.

1. Improve Page Loading Speed

Page loading speed is vital not only for user experience but also for search engine crawlability. A fast website keeps visitors engaged and ensures that search engines can efficiently crawl your pages. Here’s how to boost your page speed:

• Upgrade your hosting plan for better performance.
• Minify CSS, JavaScript, and HTML files.
• Optimize images with proper compression.
• Leverage browser caching.
• Reduce unnecessary redirects.
• Remove unneeded third-party scripts or plugins.

2. Measure & Optimize Core Web Vitals

Core Web Vitals are a set of specific factors that Google considers crucial for user experience. They include:

• Largest Contentful Paint (LCP): Ensure it happens within 2.5 seconds.
• Interaction To Next Paint (INP): Aim for less than 200 milliseconds.
• Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS): Keep it under 0.1.

Tools like Google Search Console and PageSpeed Insights can help you monitor and optimize these metrics, leading to a better user experience and improved crawlability.

3. Optimize Crawl Budget

Your crawl budget is the number of pages Google will crawl on your site within a specific timeframe. To make the most of it:

• Ensure a clean and navigable site structure.
• Eliminate duplicate content.
• Use robots.txt to block unimportant pages.
• Implement canonical tags to consolidate page versions.
• Regularly update and submit your XML sitemap.

4. Strengthen Internal Link Structure

A well-organized internal link structure helps search engines understand the hierarchy of your pages. Ensure your homepage links to subpages, which then link to more specific pages. Also, check for broken links and avoid linking to outdated URLs.

5. Submit Your Sitemap to Google

Submitting an updated sitemap to Google Search Console can expedite the indexing process, especially after significant content updates. This is particularly beneficial for law firm websites with deep structures or frequent content additions.

6. Update Robots.txt Files

Your robots.txt file instructs search engines on how to crawl your site. Use it to manage bot traffic effectively, but be cautious—misconfigurations can block search engines from accessing important pages.

7. Check Your Canonicalization

Canonical tags indicate the preferred version of a page when similar or duplicate pages exist. Regularly check for rogue canonical tags that might misdirect search engines, ensuring they index the correct pages.

8. Perform a Site Audit

Conduct regular site audits to check your indexability rate and identify any issues that might hinder crawling or indexing. Tools like Google Search Console’s URL Inspection Tool and Screaming Frog can help with this process.

9. Check for Duplicate Content

Duplicate content can confuse search engines, leading to indexing errors. Regularly audit your site for duplicate tags, session IDs, and pagination issues, and resolve them to avoid crawlability problems.

10. Eliminate Redirect Chains and Internal Redirects

Redirect chains can cause indexing issues and frustrate both users and search engines. Use tools like Screaming Frog to identify and eliminate these chains, ensuring a smoother crawling process.

11. Fix Broken Links

Broken links not only disrupt user experience but also hinder search engine crawlers. Regularly scan your site for broken links and fix them by redirecting, updating, or removing them.

12. Use IndexNow

IndexNow allows websites to proactively inform search engines about content changes, ensuring faster indexing. Use this protocol wisely for meaningful updates to enhance your site’s crawlability and indexability.

13. Implement Structured Data

Structured data helps search engines better understand your content, improving your chances of appearing in rich results like featured snippets. Implement structured data on your site using schema.org, JSON-LD, or microdata.

Key Takeaways:

Boost your law firm’s online presence by ensuring search engines can easily discover and index your website. By optimizing your page loading speed, refining your internal link structure, submitting an updated sitemap, and implementing structured data, you can significantly improve your site’s crawlability and indexability, ultimately leading to higher search rankings. Regular site audits and addressing issues like broken links, redirect chains, and duplicate content are essential for maintaining a search-engine-friendly website. Partner with Good2bSocial, the experts in legal SEO, to maximize your site’s visibility and attract more clients—contact us today to start optimizing your website.