Who technical SEO is for
Every site needs its technical basics right, but some need much more attention than others. The Northamptonshire businesses we most often help with technical work are:
- Online shops with large catalogues and filtered navigation, from footwear and clothing to industrial supplies
- Logistics, engineering and manufacturing firms whose sites have been rebuilt several times over the years
- Professional firms that have merged or rebranded and now have two or three old domains pointing in different directions
- Any business planning a redesign, a platform change or a move to a new domain
- Sites that have lost traffic suddenly and do not know why
What is included, step by step
1Crawl. We crawl the whole site the way a search engine would, recording status codes, redirects, canonical tags, meta robots, page depth, internal links and duplicate content.
2Search Console and indexing review. We read the Page Indexing report to see which URLs Google has chosen not to index and why, and check sitemaps against what is actually live.
3Rendering check. We test key templates to confirm that content and links loaded by JavaScript are visible to search engines.
4Speed and Core Web Vitals. We measure real-user data where available and lab tests on mobile, then identify the specific causes: oversized images, render-blocking scripts, third-party widgets, slow servers.
5Structured data. We check and add schema for your organisation, services, products, articles, FAQs and breadcrumbs, and validate it.
6Architecture and internal links. We look at how important pages are linked, how deep they sit and whether link equity is wasted on low-value pages.
7Prioritised action list. Every issue is rated by likely impact and effort, with clear notes for your developer.
8Implementation support. We write tickets, answer developer questions, check fixes on staging and verify them once live.
Problems we find most often
| Issue | Typical cause | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| Pages not indexed | Leftover noindex tag or robots.txt rule after a redesign | Pages cannot rank at all |
| Duplicate URLs | Filters, tracking parameters, http and https or www versions | Diluted signals, wasted crawl |
| Slow mobile pages | Large images, sliders, chat widgets, heavy page builders | Poorer rankings and more people leaving |
| Redirect chains | Several rebuilds, each adding a layer of redirects | Lost link value, slower pages |
| Orphan pages | Pages with no internal links pointing to them | Rarely crawled or ranked |
| Broken structured data | Plugin conflicts or outdated markup | No rich results |
Site migrations
Replatforming or changing domain is where many businesses lose years of search visibility in a week. For a migration we map every old URL to its new equivalent, set and test redirects before launch, check that titles, content and internal links have carried over, submit new sitemaps and watch indexing closely for the following weeks. Most lost traffic after a migration comes from missed redirects or content that was quietly dropped, and both are avoidable with planning.
How long it takes
A technical audit for a typical small-business site takes one to two weeks. Large ecommerce sites take longer. How quickly fixes take effect depends on your developer and on how often Google recrawls the site, but indexing problems often show improvement within a few weeks of being fixed.
What drives the cost
- The size of the site, from a twenty-page brochure site to tens of thousands of product URLs
- The platform and how much access we have
- Whether we implement fixes ourselves or support your developer
- Whether a migration is involved
We quote a fixed price for an audit and agree implementation support separately, so you know exactly what you are paying for. If you just want the diagnosis, our SEO audit is the place to start.
Common mistakes
- Treating speed scores as the goal rather than real user experience
- Installing several SEO plugins that output conflicting tags
- Blocking CSS or JavaScript files in robots.txt
- Leaving staging sites open to search engines, creating duplicate copies of the live site
- Launching a redesign without redirect mapping
How we measure it
Technical work is measured by indexing coverage, crawl health, Core Web Vitals and, ultimately, organic traffic and enquiries to the pages affected. We record a baseline before any change, so you can see clearly what moved.
What you will need from us and from your developer
Most technical fixes are made in the site's code, theme or settings, so a developer is usually involved. We make that as easy as possible: each ticket says what is wrong, where, how to fix it and how to check it worked. Where you have no developer, we can make many fixes ourselves on WordPress and Shopify, or recommend someone suitable.
Related reading
Technical SEO matters particularly for ecommerce SEO, where filters and product variants multiply URLs. Logistics operators around Daventry often have older sites that need this kind of work, and our article on SEO for logistics firms on the M1 corridor covers common problems in that sector.
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between a technical audit and a full SEO audit?
A technical audit focuses on crawling, indexing, speed and site structure. A full SEO audit also covers content, local search and links.
Can you work with my existing web developer?
Yes. Most of our technical work is done alongside the client's developer. We write clear tickets and check the fixes.
Do I need technical SEO if my site is small?
Small sites need less, but basic problems such as noindex tags or slow pages still stop them ranking. A short check is usually enough.
Will a faster site rank higher?
Speed is one factor among many. A much faster site usually helps users and conversion, and can help rankings where competitors are close.
Which platforms do you work with?
WordPress, Shopify, WooCommerce, Magento, Squarespace, Wix and custom builds.