Most websites don’t start working on SEO until after launch—when they realize there’s no traffic. This is the most expensive approach: half the work has to be redone, and part of the site’s architecture has to be reworked. Here’s what you should do before the website goes live.
1. Compile semantic information for the design
First, the list of search queries; then, the page structure; and only then, the layouts. If you do it the other way around, you’ll end up with a beautiful website that lacks pages for half the search queries people use to find you.
The rule is simple: one request—one page. If you create both landing pages and online stores, these are two separate pages, not a single item on the list of services.
2. Plan your URLs
URLs must be readable, written in the Latin alphabet, and free of dates and technical parameters. Changing them after indexing will result in a drop in search rankings and a series of redirects:
- Okay:
/website-development/ - Bad:
/?page_id=417
3. One H1 per page
There should be only one first-level heading, and it should contain the page’s main query. Next come H2 headings for sections and H3 headings for subsections. Headings define the document’s structure; they are not a way to make the text larger—CSS is used for that.
4. Write a title and description for each page
Using the same title on all pages is one of the most common mistakes. Google treats such pages as duplicates and ranks only one of them.
- Title: Up to 60 characters; the main query should be closer to the beginning.
- Description: 120–160 characters. It doesn't directly affect your ranking, but it determines whether users will click on your result.
5. Set up the technical infrastructure
- robots.txt — It doesn't cover up anything unnecessary.
- sitemap.xml — It is generated automatically and contains only the pages you want to see in search results.
- canonical — on every page, so that filters and UTM tags don't create duplicates.
- HTTPS — with a single address option: everything else via a 301 redirect.
- lang — the correct language code in the tag
<html>. For Ukrainian, this isuk, notua.
6. Figure out the speed before launch
Core Web Vitals is a ranking factor, and the most cost-effective way to address it is during the layout phase:
- Images in modern formats, with attributes
widthandheight— otherwise, the page jumps around while loading. - Lazy loading of images below the first screen.
- Minimal use of external scripts. Each widget represents a third-party domain and adds a few hundred milliseconds.
- Fonts from the local server, from
font-display: swap.
7. Add micro-markup
Schema.org helps search engines understand who you are: Organization for the company, Article for articles, BreadcrumbList for navigation, FAQ Page for a block of questions. The markup doesn't directly improve search rankings, but it makes the snippet more noticeable.
8. Set up analytics to run at startup
Google Search Console and Analytics are set up to launch the site right away, not a month later. Otherwise, you'll lose the data from the initial period—precisely when it's most valuable: you can see which pages have started to be indexed and which haven't.
What to Do After Launch
- Check indexing in Search Console: Make sure all the necessary pages are in the index.
- Once a month, check the search terms that lead people to your site. It often turns out that people are searching using completely different words than the ones you specified.
- Add content regularly. A 5-page website doesn't compete as well as a 50-page website—provided those 50 pages are truly useful.
In Brief
SEO isn’t a separate service that’s added on after a project is delivered. It involves requirements for structure, layout, and content—and it’s cheaper to incorporate them from the start. A website built with search engine optimization in mind starts from positions that others take half a year to reach.
Planning a new website? We incorporate these requirements right from the structure phase, not after launch: Turnkey Website Development and cost calculation in three steps.
See also: які плагіни реально потрібні на старті, а які лише навантажують сайт — у порівнянні SEO-плагінів для WordPress. Якщо сторінки вже зроблені, але їх немає в пошуку, дивіться чому сайт не потрапляє в індекс Google.
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