Martin Splitt

★★★ Is dynamic rendering with expanded accordions considered cloaking by Google?

Serving Googlebot a version with expanded navigation accordions or without cookie banners via dynamic rendering is not considered cloaking, as long as the user is not misled about the main content. Th...

May 27, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Is the hidden content behind an accordion or tab really taken into account by Google?

Google does not click on elements. If content is visible by default, Google does not know it can be hidden. Hidden content is not completely ignored, but may be considered less important if it is not ...

May 27, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Do JavaScript links really need to be <a> elements with href to be crawled?

For Google to follow links generated by JavaScript, they must be genuine <a> elements with a valid href attribute. Buttons, divs, spans with onclick, or <a> tags without href or with empty href are no...

May 27, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Do PWAs really receive the same SEO treatment as traditional sites?

For Google, Progressive Web Apps are primarily websites. The fact that it is a PWA has no particular impact on SEO. The same testing tools apply: Mobile-Friendly Test, Rich Results Test, URL Inspectio...

May 27, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Should you stop using Google Cache to diagnose your indexing problems?

Google Cache is a fallback feature when a site is offline, created long ago and not actively maintained. It sometimes displays the original HTML, sometimes the rendering, and sometimes an old version....

May 27, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Can Google really ignore part of your site without warning?

Google does not guarantee that it will crawl and index all pages of a site, nor the speed at which this will happen. Indexing does not mean that the page will be visible or useful in the results. Focu...

May 27, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Should you really worry about a low crawl rate?

A low crawl rate is not problematic if Google has already seen and indexed all the content. The crawl rate is neither an indicator of quality, demand, nor traffic. It has no direct impact on ranking o...

May 27, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Why does Googlebot still crawl using HTTP/1.1 instead of HTTP/2?

Googlebot still uses HTTP/1.1 for crawling. JavaScript optimization strategies must take this limitation into account, even though HTTP/2 offers multiplexing advantages for modern browsers....

May 27, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Should you really split your JavaScript bundles by site section for better SEO?

Rather than using a single massive JavaScript bundle, it's advised to split the bundles according to the logical sections of the site (blog, forum, shop) to avoid downloading unnecessary code and to i...

May 27, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Does Google really ignore Cache-Control headers for crawling?

Google generally ignores Cache-Control headers because many resources are under-cached. To force re-downloads, it's better to use versioned URLs with hash (e.g., app.abc123.js) rather than relying on ...

May 27, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Is dynamic rendering really risk-free for SEO?

Serving identical or similar content to bots without JavaScript is not seen as cloaking. If the content varies slightly, it is dynamic rendering, which is perfectly acceptable according to Google....

May 18, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Does dynamic rendering really slow down your server or enhance your crawl budget?

Dynamic rendering generally takes more time on the server side because an additional rendering step is added. However, it can save client-side API requests and potentially increase the crawl budget fo...

May 18, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Why does Google treat JavaScript redirects as 302s instead of 301s?

Google treats client-side JavaScript redirects as temporary redirects similar to 302s, not as permanent 301s. It's preferable to avoid them, but not critical if necessary....

May 18, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Can Googlebot really crawl hidden links in a hamburger menu?

If a mobile navigation only appears in the DOM after user interaction (clicking on the hamburger), Googlebot will not see these links. The links must be present in the DOM, even if they are visually h...

May 18, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Does Google really treat 301 and 302 redirects differently for SEO?

Google does not make a significant distinction between 301 and 302 redirect codes in terms of SEO handling, although their behavior differs for browsers (cached vs non-cached)....

May 18, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Should You Serve Lightweight Pages to Bots to Enhance Performance?

It is not recommended to serve bots pages without webfonts to gain performance. The added complexity (bot detection, extra code, potential bugs) far exceeds the minimal benefit. It is better to block ...

May 18, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ How can you effectively manage 404 errors in a SPA without risking deindexation?

For SPAs with client-side routing, Google recommends three solutions to signal a 404 error: redirect to a server URL with a 404 code, add a noindex tag, or use a soft 404 (automatically detected but l...

May 18, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Why is Googlebot missing your content loaded by Web Workers?

Googlebot does not handle Web Workers perfectly, particularly asynchronous streams. If a worker loads data asynchronously, it does not work reliably. Google is working to improve this support but reco...

May 18, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Is it true that hidden content in accordions is actually indexed by Google?

Content hidden behind accordions or tabs is indexable by Google as long as it is present in the DOM, even if it is invisible. However, the main content should not be hidden behind user interaction, an...

May 18, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Is it really time to ditch manual structured data implementation?

To implement structured data markup at scale, the best approach is to do it programmatically via the CMS or developers, rather than manually on a page-by-page basis. Google Tag Manager is an alternati...

May 18, 2020 ⚡ Analysis available