Did that title make you nervous?

It’s common—people tend to panic when they see the word “technical.”

But in this case, technical SEO simply refers to everything SEO-related that isn’t content. It’s about building a strong foundation that gives your content the best possible chance to rank for the keywords and topics your audience cares about.

Just like on-page SEO, technical SEO has evolved as search engines have grown more advanced. You can’t trick your way to the top anymore—but there are foundational best practices that absolutely matter in 2025.

Instead of diving into an overwhelming advanced guide, this post will walk you through the most critical areas of technical SEO—what they mean, why they matter, and how to fix common issues. Think of this as a beginner-friendly breakdown that gives you actual steps to improve your site.

Site Speed Still Matters — A Lot

Let’s start with something you’ve probably heard before: a slow website kills rankings, conversions, and user satisfaction.

Why Speed Impacts SEO

There are two main reasons:

  1. Google uses speed as a ranking factor — specifically metrics like Time to First Byte (TTFB), which measures how quickly the server starts delivering content.
  2. Users hate slow pages — and when they bounce back to the search results, it signals that your page didn’t meet their expectations (known as “pogo-sticking”).

You don’t just want a fast TTFB. You want the full page to load quickly. Surveys show 40% of people will leave if a page takes more than 3 seconds to load, and nearly half expect it in under 2 seconds.

Beyond SEO, speed impacts your business directly. A single second of delay can reduce conversions by 7%.

The Most Common Speed Killers

Zoompf’s analysis of top-performing sites found these to be the most frequent culprits:

  • Unoptimized images
  • Missing HTTP compression
  • Excessive CSS image requests (no image sprites)
  • Lack of caching (no expires headers)

But if you’re using WordPress, also consider these:

  • Too many plugins
  • No CDN for static files
  • Cheap, underperforming hosting

Step 1: Test Your Site’s Speed

Don’t guess—test.

Start with Google PageSpeed Insights. Enter your URL and review the results. A score above 80 is solid, but aim higher when possible. The tool will highlight critical issues (in red), moderate ones (in orange), and best-practice suggestions (in green).

For a second opinion, use GTmetrix. It gives more technical detail, including a “waterfall” view showing how long each element on your page takes to load. That helps you identify whether you have a slow host or a single problematic file dragging things down.

Your two key goals:

  1. Load time under 2 seconds
  2. Fewer, smaller page requests

Step 2: Fix What’s Slowing You Down

Start with images. Uncompressed images are the #1 cause of bloat.

  • Compress images before uploading using tools like Optimizilla.
  • Use a plugin like WP Smush or ShortPixel for automatic compression in WordPress.
  • Pick the right format: JPEG for smaller file size, PNG for higher quality. Use SVG for icons/logos when possible—they scale infinitely without pixelation.

Next: Use CSS Sprites.

A sprite combines multiple small images (icons, buttons) into one file. Instead of multiple requests, you make just one. You can use a free online sprite creator to generate the sprite and CSS instructions for positioning each element.

Additional tips:

Always test multiple URLs—not just your homepage. Long-form articles or pages with many images are more likely to have issues.

Mobile Usability Is No Longer Optional

Back in 2015, Google introduced its first mobile-friendly ranking update (dubbed “Mobilegeddon”). It didn’t massively shake things up at the time, but it laid the groundwork for today’s mobile-first indexing. Now, Google prioritizes the mobile version of your site when ranking and indexing.

Step 1: Test Your Site for Mobile Friendliness

Use Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test Tool. It gives a quick pass/fail verdict and identifies issues.

For broader insight across your entire domain, go to Google Search Console > Experience > Mobile Usability. This section will show you all mobile-specific issues Google detects on your verified site.

Step 2: Choose Your Mobile Design Approach

There are three primary ways to build a mobile-friendly website:

Option 1: Responsive Design (Best Choice for Most)

Responsive design adjusts your layout based on screen size. Instead of fixed widths, use percentages and media queries.

Example:

#body {
  width: 50%;
}

@media screen and (min-width: 600px) {
  #body {
    width: 40%;
  }
}

Responsive sites are simpler to manage and recommended by Google. This is the modern standard.

Option 2: Separate Mobile URLs (Rarely Used)

This approach uses m.example.com or example.com/mobile URLs. It requires managing two versions of every page and can cause SEO complications if not handled properly.

Use only if your mobile site needs significantly different functionality.

Option 3: Dynamic Serving

This serves different content on the same URL based on the visitor’s device. While it keeps links consolidated, it requires more complex server-side logic and testing.

Again, responsive design is almost always the better solution in 2025.

Step 3: Avoid Common Mobile Mistakes

  1. Blocked CSS, JS, or images: Check your robots.txt file and allow these files to be crawled.
  2. Unplayable content: Avoid Flash. Use HTML5 for video.
  3. Faulty redirects: Redirect mobile users to the equivalent page—not just the homepage.
  4. Mobile-only 404s: Make sure both mobile and desktop versions work if using separate URLs.
  5. Interstitials and pop-ups: These frustrate users and can trigger ranking penalties.
  6. Cross-device link issues: Keep internal links within the mobile site if using separate versions.
  7. Slow mobile pages: Mobile users may be on weaker connections. Optimize speed accordingly.

Make It Easy for Search Engines to Crawl Your Site

A clear, organized website architecture helps search engines find, understand, and index your content faster. This has always been true, and in 2025, it still holds.

Step 1: Use HTML and XML Sitemaps

You need at least an XML sitemap. It provides a structured list of your URLs for crawlers.

  • Use Yoast SEO or Rank Math to generate XML sitemaps automatically in WordPress.
  • Submit sitemaps via Google Search Console > Sitemaps and Bing Webmaster Tools > Sitemaps.
  • Add your sitemap URLs to your robots.txt file for additional crawler access:
User-agent: *
Sitemap: https://yourdomain.com/sitemap.xml

Step 2: Silo Your Content

Siloing organizes your content by topic. This helps both users and search engines understand your site’s structure.

Examples:

  • /category/conversion-optimization/
  • /category/email-marketing/
  • /category/ecommerce/

Each category should link to its posts. Make sure no post is more than 3-4 clicks from the homepage. If your site is large, use faceted navigation (filters) to help users and bots drill down quickly.

Bonus: siloing reinforces topical relevance, which improves rankings.

Step 3: Fix Crawl Errors

Visit Search Console > Pages to find crawl issues. Look for:

  • Server errors (5xx)
  • “Not found” pages (404s)
  • Redirect loops

Fix broken links, create redirects where necessary, and validate fixed issues inside Search Console.

Redirects and 404s: Handle With Care

Redirects are essential, but misusing them can harm SEO.

301 vs. 302

  • 301: Permanent redirect — transfers ~90–99% of ranking authority.
  • 302: Temporary — passes no authority long-term.

Always use 301 redirects when permanently moving or consolidating pages.

Dealing With 404s

Every site will have broken links eventually. What matters is how you handle them:

  1. Create a custom 404 page — Include links to your most important pages.
  2. Redirect old URLs — If a page was moved or deleted, and it had links or traffic, redirect to the new equivalent.
  3. Use Search Console — Check the “Not Found” section under “Pages” to find all your 404s. You can also use Ahrefs to find broken backlinks pointing to your domain.

Fix or redirect them where possible. If the page doesn’t exist anymore and has no equivalent, let it 404—but use a custom page.

Eliminate Duplicate or Thin Content

Duplicate content confuses search engines and hurts rankings. It can also lead to quality issues under Google’s core ranking systems.

Step 1: Find Duplicate Content

Use:

  • Search Console > Enhancements > Duplicate without user-selected canonical
  • Siteliner – to scan for duplicate content across up to 250 URLs for free

Look for high-percent matches or multiple URLs pointing to the same content.

Step 2: Fix Duplicate Content

Here are your options:

  1. Delete the duplicates if they aren’t necessary.
  2. Add canonical tags to indicate your preferred URL.
  3. Consolidate content when possible instead of splitting into multiple thin pages.
  4. Shorten excerpts — If your blog or archive pages include long previews, reduce the word count or customize descriptions.

Example canonical tag:

<link rel="canonical" href="https://yourdomain.com/your-best-version/" />

Add Structured Data (Schema Markup)

Structured data helps search engines better understand your pages. It also enables rich results—which can improve your visibility and click-through rates.

Step 1: Choose Your Markup

Stick with Schema.org, the standard supported by all major search engines.

Examples of useful schemas:

  • Article
  • Product
  • Review
  • FAQ
  • How-To
  • Event
  • LocalBusiness

Step 2: Use Google’s Structured Data Markup Helper

Visit Google’s tool, enter your URL, highlight relevant elements (like titles, ratings, authors), and export the markup.

Alternatively, use plugins like:

  • Schema & Structured Data for WP & AMP
  • Yoast SEO (for basic article and breadcrumb schema)
  • Rank Math (offers rich support for product, review, and local schema)

Step 3: Test Your Markup

Paste your page into Google’s Rich Results Test to verify that your schema is valid and supported.

Final Thoughts

Technical SEO isn’t as intimidating as it seems. It’s just the part of SEO that deals with your site’s infrastructure—how fast it loads, how easily bots can crawl it, and how well it supports your content.

You don’t have to master everything overnight. Start by picking one or two areas that apply to your site—site speed, mobile usability, crawl structure, redirects, etc.—and make improvements. Then monitor your results to see how much of an impact those technical issues were having.

This is what separates average websites from search-optimized machines. And it’s how top-tier SEOs justify five-figure monthly retainers.

Now you know where to begin.