How To Fix Google Indexing Issues? The Complete Playbook For Resolving Google Indexing Issues

Indexing on Google is perhaps the foundation of modern SEO. So, if your web pages or site is not indexed by the search engine giant, then they will not show up in search results. 

The issue with zero visibility? A significantly drop in organic traffic, and that’s not really a great issue – I mean, I have faced this issue tons of times. 

In fact, for the longest time, I thought that if I wrote well, the indexing issue would solve on its own. Of course, that is easier said than done – and my boss isn’t really a patient man. 

And that is how my journey in indexing began – the idea? If I can fix the common indexing issues on my site, then my content will reach our intended target audience. 

More importantly, it will maximize the site’s visibility. Of course, it took me close to a year to figure it out, and it is only fair that I share my experience with everyone here. 

So here I am, all set to discuss how to fix Google indexing issues in detail with action steps for effective resolution. 

Stay tuned.

What Is Google Indexing?

Indexing on Google is a process by which the search engine giant’s crawlers, A.K.A Googlebots, examine and store data about a site within the search index. 

As a result, if any specific page is not indexed by Google, it will not show up on search engine result pages.

Naturally, these simple things make indexing a crucial step in the present SEO landscape. 

The Most Common Causes Behind Indexing Issues On Google:

Before I dive into the different solutions, it is vital to explain why your site is facing indexing problems in the first place. 

On that note, I’ve done my best to highlight all the possible causes behind indexing issues in a table to make things as simple as possible. 

How To Identify Google Indexing Issues?

So, with the help of the following tools, you can identify indexing issues on Google:

1. Google Search Console: 

This is perhaps my favorite tool – it has never failed to help me out! 

You just need to go through the ‘URL Inspection’ and ‘Coverage’ reports for problems like “Discovered – Currently Not Indexed,” or “Crawled – Currently Not Indexed.”

2. URL Inspection Tool:

Google Search Console’s URL Inspection Tool is an excellent resource. 

With it, you can inspect specific URLs to find out about their crawling status. Also, you can find out about their indexing status as well.

3. Site Search Command: 

This is perhaps the most basic way to do it – I did it at the beginning of my career, much before I knew how to use GSC. 

So, you can perform a website search on Google (e.g., site:yourdomain.com) and find out how many web pages have been indexed.

How To Fix Google Indexing Issues?

In this section, I’ve discussed more than ways to resolve indexing issues on Google – scroll down for a comprehensive discussion.

1. Submit Your Sitemap:

Your XML sitemap will help Google to understand your website’s structure. 

Now, to address and fix indexing problems, you have to do two things:

1. Update your sitemap and ensure it includes all essential pages. 
2. Then, submit the sitemap in the section for sitemaps in GSC. 

Pro Tip: For generating an accurate sitemap, you can use popular tools like Yoast SEO and Screaming Frog. Also, we recently launched a sitemap generator on one of our other websites (SEOGrowthEngine) that you can check out as well – it’s free!

2. Check Your Robots.txt File And Fix It:

Your site’s robots.txt file will tell Google which portion of your website to avoid or crawl. Also, note that misconfigured settings will block essential pages. 

Now, here’s how to go about it:

1. First things first – start with accessing your robots.txt file (yourdomain.com/robots.txt).
2. Check that none of your essential pages are blocked ( avoid Disallow: / for key pages).
3. Finally, use the Robots.txt Tester in GSC to test your site’s robots.txt file.

Pro Tip: Also, we recently launched a Robots.txt Tester on one of our other websites (SEOGrowthEngine) that you can check out as well – it’s free!

3. Remove Noindex Tags:

Noindex tags are for telling Google and other search engines not to index certain pages. 

So, while it is helpful for specific cases, it can end up causing issues if used on essential pages accidentally. 

Now, here’s how to go about it:

1. Check the source code of your site to find the noindex tag. 
2. Then, remove the noindex tag from the web pages you want to index. 

Example: <meta name=”robots” content=”noindex”>

4. Fix All Crawl Errors:

Crawl errors usually occur when search engines can’t access a page due to problems like server errors or broken links. 

Now, here’s how you can fix the different crawl errors: 

1. In GSC, review the overall report featuring Crawl Stats and check for possible errors. 
2. Then, with the help of tools like Screaming Frog or Ahrefs, fix the broken links. 
3. Finally, just ensure that your server is running properly; you might have 5xx errors. 

5. Boost Page Speed:

Pages that have a slow loading speed might discourage search engines from effectively crawling your website. 

On that note, here’s how you can improve the loading speed of your pages:

1. Start by compressing images with the help of TinyPNG or similar tools. 
2. Allow browsing caching. 
3. Enable Gzip compression. 
4. Minify JavaScript, HTML, and CSS files.
5. Use a CDN or Content Delivery Network.

Pro Tip: Tools like GTmetrix and Google PageSpeed Insights can help you to diagnose and solve speed issues.

6. Deal With Duplicate Content:

Duplicate content will confuse Google and other search engines about which webpage to index since the content is the same on more than one page.

As a result, getting rid of duplicate content is essential. 

Using canonical tags for indicating the version of the duplicate page you prefer is one way to go about it. (code: <link rel=”canonical” href=”https://yourdomain.com/preferred-page/”>)

Also, you can consolidate similar pages into a single, high-quality page. With the help of Copyscape or similar tools, you can identity and remove duplicate content. 

7. Improve Content Quality:

Low-quality content, including thin content, might not get indexed since Google typically prioritizes pages that offer value. 

As a result, the best thing you can do is modify existing low-quality content – expand all your thin content pages by adding useful and relevant information. 

And this has really worked for me, while I was working on solving the thin content issue on this site a few years back. 

While doing so, incorporate keywords that fit in naturally without impacting your article’s readability. Also, add infographics, videos, and images to improve the quality of your content.

8. Build Internal Links

I rely on internal linking always – it’s the kind of strategy that always works. Solid internal linking will help Google to easily discover more pages. 

To do this effectively, link to essential pages directly from your site’s homepage and high-ranking pages. 

Also, while doing so, use descriptive and relevant anchor text for context.

9. Request Indexing From Google Search Console:

Again, this is a method that we follow religiously. 

Since my team and I work on sites that we have painstakingly recovered after the 2024 Google March Update, we faced indexing issues because it wasn’t easy to win back Google’s trust. 

So, we started to manually request indexing. And it is very easy to do so – I’ve mentioned the steps below to make things as easy as possible!

1. Open Google Search Console and visit URL Inspection.
2. Now, enter your preferred URL and tap on ‘Request Indexing.’
3. Once you do that, you need to wait patiently for crawlers to re-crawl the page and index it.

10. Fix The Broken Links:

Broken links are responsible for disrupting crawling and hurting your site’s SEO strategy. Naturally, fixing them is the only option in this case. 

I’ve mentioned the steps to fix broken links below:

1. Find broken links with tools like Broken Link Checker or Screaming Frog. 
2. Remove or update broken links to ensure seamless navigation for Google’s crawlers. 

11. Resolve Security And HTTPS Issues:

This one’s a no-brainer, really. 

Google only prioritizes websites that are secure. As a result, you need to ensure your website has no security-related vulnerabilities and uses HTTPS. 

But if your site isn’t using HTTPS already, then install an SSL certificate. Also, check for any mixed content problems – like HTTP elements present on HTTP pages – and resolve them.