To index the pages of an internal search engine, we use Searchdexing. But this technique should not be used usually. Unless you understand his process correctly. But also if it is managed correctly in order to improve the SEO of your site.
That said, indexing your results pages from an internal search engine can seriously affect your ranking. It’s as if you had indexed pages of your site from your faceted filtering engine. However, if local SEO marketing services or search indexing for SEO is not done correctly, you will end up with several indexed pages. Except that these may have little content or duplicate content with the other pages of your site structure. That is, the other pages that have been designed for conversion.
On the other hand, if the Searchdexing is done well, you will be able to rank on long tail queries. So far, everything still seems pretty blurry. But don’t worry, we’ll get into the details right away.
Searchdexing, a strategy often criticized by the SEO community
For some, Searchdexing or indexing search pages is a strategy often criticized by the SEO community.
There are several reasons for this disparagement:
- Creating and implementing a Searchdexing strategy requires an effective search engine. This in order to be able to offer relevant results;
- fears of duplication of intent or internal duplication ;
- The generation of pages with bad intentions because of an uncontrolled searchdexing.
However, this method has many advantages for large sites. In particular e-commerce sites and media sites.
How to set up Searchdexing?
First of all, it should be remembered that you need a relatively large website before you can set up effective searchdexing.
E-commerce or media sites are often good candidates for the search indexing technique. In other words, this SEO strategy may not be relevant for a showcase site of 20 pages, among others. In addition, your website will need to have an internal search engine. This will be used by users.
Let’s take an example
On a sales site, Internet users often have the reflex to look for specific information or a product.
Like: “black furigana D30 jacket”, “men’s white shirt size 42” or even “communication agency specializing in Compiegne referencing”. And SearchDexing, for its part, will make high-potential keywords index able at the level of your site’s internal search engine.
As search engines are no longer content with just keywords, you have to opt for the quality of the content. They are now more attentive to editorial quality. Hence the importance of searchdexing. This method offers better optimization for indexed content, such as category pages.
Here are some tips for implementing an effective Searchdexing strategy
Step 1: extract queries entered by users
To set up a SearchDexing strategy, the first thing to do is to extract all the queries that have been entered by users.
That is, everything that has been registered on your search engine. Then comes the analysis phase to remove duplicates and eliminate syntax errors.
It is therefore necessary to choose the requests that generate business. Afterwards, you just have to create a menu page that lists all your searchdexing pages. This makes Google crawl and index them easier and faster.
It will promote the identification of your URLs .
For example, you can suffix a /ds/ directory to your URL. This technique will in turn facilitate the analysis of the impact of said pages on the referencing of your site. And for these new searchdexing pages to be relevant, their content should ideally be placed at the top of the page.
2nd step: combine this extraction with a lexical analysis
Secondly, after extracting the queries, they will have to be combined with a lexical analysis. You can also combine entered queries with business analysis.
Remember, the important thing is to focus on queries that drive search or business. And above all, be careful not to usurp on the pages of your site that already exist.
In practice, you will start by carrying out a test on your pages. Again, do a test on ten or a hundred pages, no more. The objective is to set up a first version of SearchDexing that works correctly. And this even if it requires manual installation.
The benefits of Searchdexing at link block and internal link level
In terms of referencing, we would like to remind you that the purpose of SearchDexing is the creation of pages that can respond to the real requests of Internet users. There is also the optimization side of your internal link structure.
Analyze your internal network
You must therefore make a first analysis of your linking.
We are talking here about the mesh between the different pages of your site . In other words, the insertion of links to the strategic pages of your website. There are now different tools to precisely analyze your internal linking. And the objective here is to strengthen your internal network.
If the analysis multiplies the angles of approach (crawled pages, pages by category, source pages of conversions), the optimization of the internal linking will be easier.
Family tree mesh
To better explain the importance of SearchDexing, we will take a concrete example.
Here, we are going to base ourselves on a classic mesh, that is to say a linking in a family tree. This is common practice on e-commerce sites. Moreover, this architecture has the advantage of being clearer and more readable. Except that on an e-commerce site, prospects are rather attracted to the deep pages. But the goal is to attract them to the upper pages.
At this point, Search Indexing will provide more depth to your site. And this without your prospects going back to the home page. You will therefore obtain a finer mesh thanks to the indexing of the deep pages of your site. We are talking here about a horizontal type mesh which will relatively increase the conversion rate of so-called deep pages.
searchdexing link blocks
This is a block of links that can be placed on pages with identical or compatible tags.
For example, you can present a block of links with an H2 title and links with H3 anchors.
Increased conversion rate with long-tail queries
When talking about SEO for a website, there are several factors to consider. Lately, we talked about SXO or Search experience optimization .
Today, we show you another facet of optimizing your website. It is therefore important to choose your strategy carefully, but also not to bet only on generic keywords. Sure, it will increase the conversion rate, but not enough.
With Searchdexing, and by combining more complex keywords, you ensure the positioning of pages that generate conversions. In other words, the pages you want to make more visible will be better targeted on long-tail queries. And we all know that a well-referenced page offers a better conversion rate.
Optimized content
As with your category pages, content on searchdexing pages should be treated the same way.
You will need to create an optimized content block, in a strategic location. That is, at the top of the page, as we just mentioned. You then have the choice of separating the content into two distinct sections:
- Place the first part at the top of the page;
- Put a larger section at the bottom of the page.
As for writing title tags and Meta descriptions, you can do it manually. But to have a scalable system, it is better to move to automation.
How do I track content indexing?
In the first part of this article, we mentioned that you should try to search on a few pages of your site. This means that before going into production, you have to test the results in preproduction.
Start by launching a crawl of your preproduction before starting that of your site. There you will see the benefits of internal linking.
When everything is validated in pre-production, you can move on to the actual production. Just repeat the same method as for the preproduction. That is to say launch a crawl after putting your production online.
Monitoring parameters to monitor
When you go to the crawl analysis, you should monitor the following elements:
- Have the searchdexing pages been discovered?
- What are the Inarch and the depth of these pages?
- Are there any 3xx or 4xx errors?
Which pages link to searchdexing pages?
Some points are also to be monitored on the log analysis SEO experts, in particular:
- Analysis of Googlebot visits;
- Analysis of SEO visits in the logs;
- The Fresh rank, i.e. the number of days between a Googlebot hit and an SEO visit;
- The crawl frequency of searchdexing pages.
Of course, indexing on Google Search Console is to be closely monitored. Not to mention the traffic results on Google Analytics. And finally, do not forget to monitor the positioning of keywords.
What we can deduce
After the indexing follow-up, you might consider a wider deployment of your website.
This evolution can result in a regular visit from Google, the SEO visits of the pages and the conversions you get. You can also add some automation to make your search engine an active segment of your SEO strategy.
To conclude on searchdexing
Searchdexing is an SEO strategy to adopt for a better SEO of your website.
But it is only effective under certain conditions. If the indexing is related to a long-tail query that generates business, you can use it without any problem. In other words, if the query matches the optimized content, as well as the metadata, indexing the page will promote its appearance in the SERPs .
The objective is then not to massively index all of your search results pages. To choose the right pages to index, you have to focus on:
- the analysis of search intentions ,
- the results of your internal search engine,
- And the internal link structure.
And the most important thing is to optimize the content of your pages. This is to increase traffic, but also to gain additional conversions through the indexing of internal search pages.
In short, searchdexing is an interesting technique, but one that requires some expertise. On closer inspection, it is by no means a miracle solution for the SEO of your website.
In any case, remember that search pages have great potential for adaptation. The facilitation of indexing and mileage management is also there. We can deduce that whatever the causes of criticism of searchdexing for the SEO community, this technique will offer a site with a large number of pages the opportunity to position itself on the long tail.
Thus, search engines can easily index the pages of the site that respond to specific requests. And this by making them directly accessible on the SERPs.