Technical SEO: Advanced optimization to improve your website’s speed and structure

Technical SEO is one of the most important areas within optimization for search engines. While content and links play a key role in rankings, site structure, loading speed, and crawlability are decisive factors for improving visibility on Google.

In a highly competitive digital environment, proper technical optimization can make the difference between a well-ranked website and one that fails to achieve its goals. That’s why this article analyzes the key aspects of technical SEO and the best practices to enhance performance and site structure.

1. What is Technical SEO and why is it essential?

Technical SEO encompasses all the optimizations that facilitate crawling, indexing, and overall performance of a website. Its goal is to ensure that search engines can correctly understand and interpret content, while also improving the user experience.

Some of the most important benefits of proper technical optimization include:

• Faster loading speed, which reduces bounce rates and improves user experience.
• Better indexing, allowing Google to find and rank content accurately.
• Optimized link structure, making navigation and authority distribution within the site easier.
• Greater security and stability, preventing technical errors that impact rankings.

Since Google prioritizes well-structured, high-performance sites, applying technical SEO strategies is essential to reach the top positions in search results.

2. Key factors of Technical SEO in 2024

2.1 Optimizing loading speed

One of the most important aspects of technical SEO is a website’s loading speed. Google has confirmed this factor directly affects rankings and user experience.

To improve loading speed, it’s recommended to:

• Optimize images, using formats like WebP and compression tools.
• Enable Gzip compression, reducing file sizes and boosting server efficiency.
• Minify CSS, JavaScript, and HTML files, removing unnecessary spaces to reduce page weight.
• Use a caching system, storing static versions of the site to speed up loading.
• Implement a Content Delivery Network (CDN), improving speed by distributing resources across global servers.

Website performance can be measured with tools like Google PageSpeed Insights or GTmetrix, which provide specific recommendations to optimize speed.

2.2 Crawlability and efficient indexing

For a webpage to appear in search results, it’s essential that Google can crawl and index its content properly.

Best practices for optimizing crawlability include:

• Proper use of the robots.txt file, allowing or restricting access to certain site sections.
• Creating a sitemap.xml, making it easier to index the most important pages.
• Avoiding duplicate content, by applying canonical tags to indicate the main version of a page.
• Optimizing URLs, ensuring they’re descriptive, short, and free of special characters.
• Optimized internal linking structure, helping search engines understand the relationship between pages.

Google Search Console is an essential tool for analyzing a website’s crawlability and detecting indexing issues.

2.3 Implementing structured data

Structured data allows search engines to better interpret a website’s content and display rich results.

Some advantages of implementing structured data include:

• Better representation in search results, with rich snippets that include images, star ratings, and other relevant info.
• Higher click-through rates (CTR), since enriched results are more attractive to users.
• Improved content understanding by Google, which helps with ranking and relevance.

To implement structured data, it’s recommended to use Schema.org and validate settings with tools like Google’s Structured Data Testing Tool.

2.4 Security and technical SEO

Google prioritizes secure sites in its search results. That’s why it’s crucial to apply security measures that protect both site integrity and user data.

Key security best practices for SEO include:

• Mandatory HTTPS use, ensuring data encryption and boosting user trust.
• Protection against DDoS and malware attacks, using security tools like Cloudflare or advanced firewalls.
• Regular updates of plugins and CMS systems, preventing vulnerabilities from being exploited.
• Proper server permission configuration, limiting access to critical files.

A secure website not only improves its Google ranking but also protects the company’s reputation and credibility.

3. Best practices to optimize website structure

A well-organized structure makes navigation easier and improves user experience, directly impacting SEO.

Some key recommendations for optimizing site structure include:

• Designing a clear, hierarchical link architecture, with well-defined categories.
• Keeping a reasonable number of depth levels, avoiding important pages being more than three clicks from the homepage.
• Using breadcrumbs, making navigation and site structure easier to understand.
• Avoiding broken links and 404 errors, fixing them with 301 redirects when necessary.
• Optimizing mobile usability, ensuring proper display across all devices.

Google rewards sites with a clear, well-organized structure, improving both indexing and rankings.