cami_leisk Posted March 31, 2022 Posted March 31, 2022 Site URL: https://www.leighsuggs.com/ Hey I'm wondering if this is an issue that I can fix within Squarespace? I recently switched a client over from 7.0 to 7.1 and rebuilt her website with a few changes to the way it was organized and with a bunch of new content. We connected the old domain to the new site and canceled the old site. When I initially resubmitted the sitemap for the new site and requested indexing on all important pages, there was no issue and her ranking was excellent - showing up 1st in google search results. Now, her home page is not being indexed at all because of a soft 404 issue -- all other pages are being indexed with the exception of https://www.leighsuggs.com/ and https://www.leighsuggs.com/home -- both of which are active links as far as I can tell. And incidentally -- these are the most important pages to be indexed! I submitted a help request to google and their response was that the URL doesn't exist? Help. I've tried removing the home page as the page that people get directed to when there is a 404 message (to catch the old random links from her old site that may exist on various institutions websites) and that didn't help so I turned that back on. Anytime I request indexing within google search console it thinks for a little while and then says "Oops! something went wrong!" I've tried over and over again for the past week with no results. Attached is a screenshot of what it looks like within console. Anyone else run into this problem? Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Cami
Solution paul2009 Posted April 1, 2022 Solution Posted April 1, 2022 (edited) On 3/31/2022 at 6:00 PM, cami_leisk said: Her home page is not being indexed at all because of a soft 404 issue -- all other pages are being indexed As a first step, I suggest adding some relevant text-based content to the homepage and then request reindexing. I say this because the homepage doesn't contain any useful text content that can be indexed - at least none that I could see. Google wants to provide users with the best "answer" to their search "question" so, for the homepage to be indexed and considered valuable, it must contain useful information on the topic you want to rank for. As a minimum, Google has to know what the page is about, otherwise it will be considered "thin content". If the site doesn't contain enough authoritative information, it may not be enough to convince search engines that the site is worth indexing. I'm not an SEO expert, but search engines typically want to see more than 300 words on a page to rank it. If it were me, I'd add a lot more text content and then I'd re-submit the updated sitemap. Did this help? Please give feedback by clicking an icon below ⬇️ Edited December 3, 2023 by paul2009 cami_leisk 1 Me: I'm Paul, a SQSP user for >18 yrs & Circle Leader since 2017. I value honesty, transparency, diversity and good design ♥. Work: Founder of SF.DIGITAL. We provide high quality original extensions to supercharge your Squarespace website. Content: Views and opinions are my own. Links in my posts may refer to my own SF.DIGITAL products or may be affiliate links. Forum advice is completely free. You can thank me by selecting a feedback emoji. Buying a coffee is generous but optional.
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment