Why your website is not showing up on Google

01First, work out which problem you have

“I don’t show up on Google” can mean two very different things. One: Google does not have your page in its index. The other: it has it, but it ranks somewhere nobody sees it. The first is a technical or discovery problem; the second is a ranking problem.

1. 1

   Search Google for: site:yourdomain.com. If results appear, your website is indexed, at least in part. Google warns that this search does not always show every indexed URL.

2. 2

   Search for your exact business name. If it does not appear even then, it is an indexing problem.

3. 3

   Go to Search Console and use URL Inspection on your home page. It will tell you whether it is on Google.

If you do not have Search Console yet, start by setting up your website.

02Cause 1: the site is new or has very few links

Google discovers most pages by following links. A newly published site with no links from other sites can go unnoticed for a while. Google says it can take a few weeks to detect a new site or changes to an existing one.

• Register the site in Search Console and submit the sitemap.
• Link your pages to each other and earn natural links (your Google listing, profiles, associations).
• Request indexing of the key URLs with URL Inspection.
• Do not buy links: it goes against Google’s spam policies.

03Cause 2: something is stopping Google from crawling or indexing

Google sets three technical requirements: Googlebot is not blocked, the page returns a 200 status code and it has indexable content. They fail for very specific reasons:

• A WordPress setting: under Settings > Reading, the search engine visibility checkbox (“Discourage search engines from indexing this site”) adds a noindex tag. It is common to leave it ticked after building the site. WordPress notes that it is up to search engines to honour the request.
• A noindex tag: whether in the code or in an HTTP header, it tells Google not to index that page. It shows up in Search Console’s indexing report.
• robots.txt: a “Disallow: /” rule blocks crawling. Note: if you block a page with robots.txt, Google cannot see its noindex, and the URL can still appear if other sites link to it.
• A login or content behind a form: Google cannot get in.
• Server errors or pages that return a status code other than 200.

04Cause 3: there is no content to index, or it does not convince

Google warns that content built only with special technologies, or available only as images or video, can be hard to crawl. Text written inside an image does not count as text.

There are also pages that Google knows about and sets aside. In Search Console you will see statuses such as “Discovered – currently not indexed” (it has found it but not crawled it) or “Crawled – currently not indexed” (it has crawled it and not indexed it, and may do so later). Google says indexing is not guaranteed, and that low-quality content can be left out.

• Check that each page adds something of its own and does not repeat other pages.
• Avoid duplicate or near-identical content across pages.
• Add concrete information: what you offer, for whom, where, terms.
• Improve loading and the mobile version, which are part of the page experience.

05Cause 4: you are there, but not where you expect

If your website appears when you search its name but not when you search your service, it is a ranking matter, not an indexing one. Google orders pages with automated systems that look at many factors, and you are competing with other sites that may answer that search better.

Here the job is to create a page per service, improve the content and work on your area if you are a local business. The steps are in how to rank your website on Google.

06What not to do

• Do not pay anyone who promises “guaranteed inclusion” on Google: Google does not accept payment for crawling or ranking.
• Do not submit the same URL a hundred times: requesting indexing speeds nothing up and there are daily limits per property.
• Do not change the whole website at once without knowing the cause: you could make the problem worse.
• Do not ignore what Search Console says: it is the official source.

If you still cannot see the cause after checking all this, a prioritised SEO diagnosis usually saves time.