Technical SEO for Local Websites and Why It Matters - Local SEO for Good 2025 Deck

The talk "Technical SEO for Local Websites and Why It Matters" done for Local SEO for Good 2025
Description: Local businesses rely heavily on organic visibility to attract nearby customers, but they also need a strong technical SEO foundation. Most businesses deal with a technically challenging website, or have no budget to take care of this - but what happens when the loading takes forever? Or if Core Web Vitals fail? What does all this mean for local businesses? With examples, practical tips, and common mistakes, this talk will break down the essential technical elements that directly impact local search performance and how to prioritize and address these issues.

Transcript

1. Technical SEO for Local Websites and Why It Matters Iva Jovanovic
2. Who am I? • Digital Marketing - SEO, content, social media • Strong focus on technical SEO and web development • Organizing Belgrade SEO Conference • Organizing Heapcon • Traveling, attending conferences • Animal lover
3. PACT - animal sanctuary and wildlife rescue
4. Enough about me
5. Enough about me Let’s talk about Technical SEO!
7. What is Technical SEO? ➢ Website performance ➢ Website speed ➢ Website structure ➢ Mobile-friendliness and responsive design
9. Why does a local business need a website? ➢ Online presence ➢ Building a presence on different channels ➢ Better visibility ➢ AI optimization ➢ Online booking system
10. Why does a local business need a website?
11. Why does a local business need a website? ➢ Online presence ➢ Building a presence on different channels ➢ Better visibility ➢ AI optimization ➢ Online booking system
12. Why technical SEO matters ➢ Local businesses need Technical SEO
13. Why technical SEO matters ➢ Local SEO needs Technical SEO
14. Why technical SEO matters ➢ Local SEO needs Technical SEO ➢ Technical SEO allows content and websites to perform to its full potential.
15. Why technical SEO matters ➢ Local SEO needs Technical SEO ➢ Technical SEO allows content and websites to perform to its full potential. ➢ It helps search engines find, understand, and index your website and its content.
17. What happens when the spider can’t get to your website?
18. What is preventing the spiders?
19. Spoiler alert: It’s probably your website! What is preventing the spiders?
20. TECHNICAL MISTAKES FOUND ON WEBSITES
21. Noindex tag Noindex is a rule that tells search engines like Google not to index a given webpage. When you noindex a page, search engines won’t save that page and show it in their results.
22. Noindex tag
23. Noindex tag
24. Noindex tag in Yoast on a WordPress website
25. Noindex tag in RankMath on a WordPress website
26. Robots.txt
27. Robots.txt A robots.txt file is a file placed in a website's directory that tells web crawlers and bots which parts of the website they are allowed to crawl and index, and which parts to avoid.
28. Robots.txt
30. Missing or bad robots.txt
31. Meta tags in the wrong place
32. Meta tags in the wrong place
33. Meta tags in the wrong place ➢ They must be placed in the <head> ➢ When placed in <body> they probably won’t get noticed by crawlers
34. Bad website structure
35. Bad website structure
36. Bad website structure
37. Bad website structure
38. Good website structure
39. Wrong HTML (heading) structure
40. Wrong HTML (heading) structure
41. Wrong HTML (heading) structure
42. Proper heading structure Follow the heading numbers like you’re counting them Use headings for elements that should be headings
43. Proper heading structure
44. www vs non-www Having multiple versions of the website available. It means you have a duplicate of every page on a different URL.
45. www vs non-www
46. www vs non-www
47. http vs https Having multiple versions of the website available SSL certificate
49. And here come canonicals
50. Canonicals A way of telling crawlers which page is the original It is the master version of a page that should be indexed when the same content is available at multiple different URLs
51. Canonicals
52. Canonicals For every page in the group of duplicates, you should pick one canonical version that you want to be indexed in search results. Add its URL to the "rel=canonical" labeling on each page with duplicated content, including the canonical page itself.
53. Broken links
54. Broken links ➢ Leaving staging links ➢ Not redirecting or removing links after deleting ➢ Linking incomplete URLs ➢ Adding links without the / at the end
55. Broken links
56. Broken links VS
58. 404 pages linked on the website
59. Redirects ➢ A must when deleting pages ➢ But not great to have too many ➢ Be careful when placing redirects
60. Redirects
61. Redirects
62. Redirect chains and loops
63. Redirect chains ➢ When there are multiple redirects between an initial URL and final URL ➢ Makes the final URL the user gets load longer ➢ Google aborts following redirects after 5 hops to preserve its crawling resources
64. Redirect chain
65. Redirect loops ➢ When URL is redirected to another URL, which in turn redirects back to the URL that was originally requested ➢ Creates an infinite cycle of redirects
66. Redirect loop
67. Bad URL structure ➢ Using long, complicated URLs ➢ Using auto-generated strings ➢ Mixing uppercase and lowercase letters ➢ Using underscores instead of hyphens ➢ Including spaces or special characters ➢ Duplicate URLs for the same page
68. Examples of bad URLs https://www.website.com/sr/----games---- https://www.website.com/sr/figures---dioramas https://www.website.com/blogs/news/best-beds-for-back-pain https://www.website.com/valentine-s-day-gifts-thatll-symbolize-your-love-1 https://website.com/?p=1647 https://www.website.com/blog?743e123b
69. Missing or bad sitemap
70. Missing or bad sitemap
71. Missing or bad sitemap
72. Good sitemap
73. Using blog posts as pages ➢ Instead of creating pages ➢ Using blog posts for location pages or landing pages
74. Having your blog as a blog category ➢ Happens when using blog posts for something else ➢ Using a category named Blog for the blog posts
75. Having your blog as a blog category Having https://website.com/category/blog/ and https://website.com/blog/ Instead of just having a blog page on https://website.com/blog/
76. Using too much JavaScript elements ➢ Overloading the website with too much JavaScript elements ➢ Slows down the website ➢ Often makes bad user experience
77. Hiding content ➢ Never hide content ➢ Do not use elements that hide your content ➢ Avoid JavaScript elements that can hide your content ➢ Do not use colors to hide your content
78. Hiding content
79. Hiding content
80. Slow website loading
81. Slow website loading Why would you want your website to load for ages?
82. Slow website loading Why would your users wait for your website to load?
83. How many times have we seen this?
84. Or this?
85. Or this?
86. Or this?
87. Why is this number important?
88. Why is this number important? Because nobody will wait for your website.
89. Why is this number important?
90. Why is this number important?
91. How to beat this? ➢ Properly size images. Do not upload that 5MB image. ➢ Reduce unused CSS and JavaScript. Get your developer to go through the code and see what’s being used or not. ➢ Minimize files. WordPress users can use a plugin for this. ➢ Make sure you have an efficient cache policy.
92. No responsive design
93. No responsive design
94. No responsive design ➢ Mobile usability is very important ➢ Your design must be functional on the phone ➢ Crawlers and users both need mobile to be functional
95. Too many elements used
96. Too many elements used
97. Bad website navigation
98. Footer
99. Footer
100. Footer
101. How to identify these issues? Use tools ➔ Google Search Console is a must ➔ Ahrefs, Semrush, SERanking, Moz all have site audit options ➔ Screaming Frog, Sitebulb for crawling
102. Takeways ➢ Technical SEO sets the foundation for visibility, usability, and growth. ➢ Common pitfalls like broken links, poor structure, duplicate content, slow load times, and bad navigation can quietly destroy rankings and user trust. ➢ Do those audits and prioritize your fixes. ➢ For small businesses, these aren’t optional.
104. https://www.linkedin.com/in/ivajovanovic30/ https://iva-jovanovic.com/