Setup & Foundations
Before you do anything else
These are the non-negotiable foundations. Without these in place, everything else is harder to measure and harder to fix.
- [ ] Connect Google Search Console (Critical)
Verify your domain via DNS or HTML tag. This is your primary source of truth for how Google sees your site: impressions, clicks, crawl errors, and indexing status.
- [ ] Set up an analytics tool (Critical)
Google Analytics 4 or a privacy-friendly alternative like Plausible. You need traffic data to understand what is working. Make sure goals and conversions are tracked.
- [ ] Submit your sitemap (Critical)
Create an XML sitemap and submit it in Google Search Console under Sitemaps. This tells Google which pages exist and helps it prioritize crawling.
- [ ] Verify all pages are indexed (Critical)
Use the URL Inspection tool in Search Console. Check that important pages are indexed and not accidentally blocked by noindex tags or robots.txt rules.
- [ ] Configure your robots.txt (Important)
Make sure your robots.txt file does not accidentally block pages you want indexed. Check it at yourdomain.com/robots.txt. Do not block CSS or JS files.
- [ ] Use HTTPS everywhere (Critical)
All pages should be served over HTTPS. Mixed content (HTTP assets on an HTTPS page) causes warnings and can hurt rankings. Enforce HTTPS redirects.
- [ ] Set a canonical domain (Important)
Decide whether your canonical domain is with or without www and set up a permanent 301 redirect from the other version. This prevents duplicate content issues.
Technical SEO
Speed, structure & crawlability
Technical SEO ensures search engines can efficiently crawl, render, and understand your site. Problems here can silently suppress every other effort you make.
Performance
- [ ] Achieve good Core Web Vitals (Critical)
Google's ranking signals include LCP (Largest Contentful Paint), CLS (Cumulative Layout Shift), and INP (Interaction to Next Paint). Aim for green scores in PageSpeed Insights.
- [ ] Optimize and compress all images (Important)
Use modern formats like WebP or AVIF. Compress images before uploading. Add width and height attributes to prevent layout shift. Lazy-load below-the-fold images.
- [ ] Minimize render-blocking resources (Important)
Defer or async non-critical JavaScript. Inline critical CSS. Avoid loading large third-party scripts synchronously in the <head>.
Mobile
- [ ] Fully responsive across all devices (Critical)
Google uses mobile-first indexing. Test on actual mobile devices and in Chrome DevTools. No horizontal scroll, no text too small to read, no overlapping elements.
- [ ] Tap targets are large enough (Important)
Buttons and links should be at least 48px tall on mobile. Google flags small tap targets in Search Console under Mobile Usability.