Optimize your SEO: A Pre-launch Checklist for your Website

While our sites are built for smooth indexing by search engines, the content you add and how you present it plays a big role in how well people can find you. Before you publish your site, follow this checklist to optimize it for search engines and visitors alike.

Getting Started with SEO

First things first—let's make sure your site has all the essential information in place. Squarespace is fantastic for making it easy to add vital information to your website that helps to optimize it for SEO.

Site Information

1. Add a Site Title: Even if you're using a logo, add a site title. This text is indexed by search engines and helps them understand what your site is about. Keep it under 60 characters and include keywords that describe your site. This can be done in your main page editor, by clicking on the header and editing the logo area.

2. Add a Site Description: Write a short, relevant description of your site (50-300 characters). This text might appear below your site title in search results and should clearly explain what visitors can expect. This can be found in your main “Settings” menu under “Marketing”.

3. Add SEO Descriptions: Each page should have a unique SEO description. Keep these descriptions short and readable (50-300 characters), and make sure they accurately describe the content of the page. Don’t forget to add SEO descriptions to individual blog posts, products, and events as well.

4. Check Page and Title Formats: Control how your page titles appear in browser tabs, social shares, and search engine results. You can set this for page titles, the homepage, and collection items like blog posts or products directly in the page settings under “SEO”.

Site Design

1. Add a Browser Icon: Your site's favicon enhances brand visibility and may appear in search results and browser tabs.

2. Add Social Sharing Images: These images are displayed on social media when your site is shared. Add one for the entire site and individual pages, blog posts, products, and events.

3. Create a Custom 404 Page: Customize the 404 page with links to popular or important areas of your site to keep visitors engaged. Great news, all our website templates come with this setup for you and ready to go.

4. Review Your Content: Ensure all pages follow content best practices. Not sure what those are? You’re in luck! Keep reading, as we dive into how to optimize your website content below.

Domain and URL Setup

It’s important to make sure your URLs and domain are working to your advantage.

1. Connect a Custom Domain: Using a custom domain instead of the built-in URL strengthens your brand and improves your visibility in search results.

2. Connect to Social Media: Link your social media profiles, push content as you publish it, and encourage sharing.

3. Ensure SSL is Enabled: Confirm your SSL panel is set to Secure. Sites without SSL may be penalized.

4. Check URL Slugs: Ensure URLs reflect the page content. Avoid random strings of characters. Adjust any non-descriptive slugs.

5. Choose Blog Post URL Format: For blogs, decide how URLs are created. Including the post title is recommended.

Location Information

Not every business will have a physical location, especially as many of us work virtually these days, and most solo entrepreneurs may have their home address listed for their business (which you likely don’t want to share online). While Squarespace and Google recommend adding an address if you can, you can skip this if your business doesn’t have a physical address.

1. Add Your Location: Your site has a better chance of appearing in local searches if Google and customers can confirm your location. Create a Contact Us page with your address and a map.

2. Publish Your Location Online: Create a Google Business Profile to manage online listings for your physical location, service areas, and hours of operation.

Optimize New Content

1. Redirect Changed or Broken Links: If you change a URL slug, create redirects to forward visitors from the old URL to the correct page.

2. Continue Updating and Adding Content: Regular updates help search engines view your site as active. Blogging is one way to regularly add content, but be sure to follow the content best practices listed below.

Content Best Practices

Keep these best practices in mind as you build your site to ensure that your content is both engaging for visitors and optimized for search engines. By following these guidelines, you'll help search engines understand your content better and improve your site's visibility. Let’s dive into some key strategies for text content and images that will set your site up for SEO success.

Text Content

Use Keywords Strategically

Keywords are the terms people use to search for information online. Including these keywords in your site’s content helps search engines understand what your site is about. However, it’s important to avoid keyword stuffing—cramming as many keywords as possible into your content. Instead, scatter keywords organically throughout your headings and content. This means using them naturally as part of your text where they make sense. For example, if you’re writing about "baking tips," you might have headings like "Top Baking Tips" or "Essential Baking Tips for Beginners," and include related keywords like "baking tricks" or "baking advice" within the content.

Structure Your Content

Use headings to organize your text. Headings make your content easier to skim for visitors and help search engines understand the structure of your content. Use H1 for main titles, H2 for subheadings, and H3 for further subdivisions.

Here’s an example of a good heading structure for a blog post about baking tips:

• H1: Top Baking Tips for Beginners

  • H2: Essential Baking Tools

    • H3: Must-Have Baking Equipment

    • H3: Nice-to-Have Baking Tools

  • H2: Basic Baking Techniques

    • H3: Mixing Ingredients Properly

    • H3: Baking at the Right Temperature

  • H2: Common Baking Mistakes to Avoid

    • H3: Overmixing the Batter

    • H3: Not Measuring Ingredients Correctly

Images

Add Alt Text to Images

Alt text describes an image for those who can’t see it and helps search engines understand what the image is about. Use descriptive, keyword-rich alt text for all images. Here are some best practices for writing alt text:

• Be Descriptive: Describe the image as clearly and concisely as possible. For example, instead of "cake," use "chocolate cake with strawberries."

• Include Keywords: Where relevant, include keywords that describe the image. For example, "gluten-free chocolate cake with strawberries" if gluten-free baking is a keyword for your site.

• Keep It Relevant: Make sure the alt text accurately reflects the image content and is relevant to the surrounding text.

Give Images Readable File Names

Instead of using generic file names like "IMG001.jpg," use descriptive names like "chocolate-cake-recipe.jpg." This helps search engines index your images properly. Here are some best practices for image file names:

• Use Hyphens to Separate Words: Instead of using spaces or underscores, use hyphens to separate words (e.g., "chocolate-cake-recipe.jpg").

• Be Specific: Use specific and descriptive file names (e.g., "gluten-free-chocolate-cake.jpg" instead of "cake1.jpg").

• Avoid Special Characters: Stick to letters, numbers, and hyphens.

Keep Pages Fast

Large images can slow down your site, affecting user experience and search engine rankings. Follow these best practices for image sizes:

• Keep Images Under 500 KB: This helps your pages load faster.

• Overall Page Size Under 5 MB: A smaller page size ensures quicker load times, which is important for both user experience and SEO.

• Use Appropriate File Formats: Use JPEGs for photographs and PNGs for images that need transparency.

• Compress Images: Use tools to compress images without losing quality to reduce file size.

• Responsive Images: Make sure your images are responsive and look good on all devices. Use HTML srcset to provide different image sizes for different screen resolutions.

After Publishing

Congratulations, your site is live! Now, let’s make sure it gets found. Here are a few additional post-launch things you can do to improve your ranking.

1. Verify Your Site with Google Search Console: Manage your site’s presence in Google search results and review how visitors find you.

2. Request Google to Index Your Site: Ask Google’s bots to review your site and update search results with your new content.

3. Verify Your Site with Bing Webmaster Tools: Manage your site’s presence in Bing and Yahoo search results.

4. Connect to Google Analytics: Track visits and other reporting through Squarespace’s built-in integration with Google.

5. Enable AMP: For blogs, enabling AMP creates a fast-loading version of your site for mobile devices.

Conclusion

Remember, optimizing your site for search engines is an ongoing process. Keep an eye on your analytics, update your content regularly, and continue learning about SEO best practices to ensure your site stays at the top of search results. There are also great tools out there such as SEOSpace that specifically work with Squarespace websites to help optimize your SEO easily and efficiently, providing a thorough audit of your current website and ways to improve it.

If you have any questions or need further assistance, give us a shout, we’re always here to help.