Are Crawl Issues or Errors Hurting Your SEO? 5 Common Problems and How to Fix Them

 

You’ve built an amazing website with valuable content, but search engines struggle to crawl and index your pages properly. As a result, your rankings suffer, and your organic traffic takes a hit. 

Crawlability is critical in SEO — if search engines can’t efficiently navigate your site, they won’t rank your pages. And, crawl issues can waste valuable resources and prevent the indexing of important content.

But the good news? Most crawl issues are fixable. In this guide, I’ll cover five common crawl issues and how to resolve them to keep your site visible in search results.

1. Broken Links (404 Errors)
2. Server Errors (5xx)
3. Misconfigured Robots.txt

• • Accidentally Blocking Important Content
  • Blocking the Wrong File Types
  • Final Tips for an Error-Free robots.txt File

4. Missing XML Sitemap
5. Bad Site Architecture

Final Thoughts

Quick Solutions

FAQ: How Do I Ensure All My Website Pages Are Indexed by Search Engines Like Google?

1. Broken Links (404 Errors)

A 404 error occurs when a webpage can’t be found at its intended URL, and results in a 404 server response code. This often happens when a page has been moved or deleted without proper redirection. 

For website visitors, encountering a 404 page is frustrating; it interrupts their journey and may discourage them from exploring further. 

While a 404 error itself doesn’t directly prevent search engines from crawling and indexing other content on your site, a large number of 404 errors can negatively impact crawl coverage and potentially lead to reduced indexing of valuable content.

While Google says that 404 errors won’t directly harm your rankings, they can have indirect consequences. 

If a search engine finds a 404 page instead of useful content, it wastes crawl resources. Moreover, any external links pointing to the missing page lose their value, as the link equity gets wasted.

The good news is that these are easily fixed. Here are two simple but effective solutions to address 404 errors:

 

1. Use SEO audit and crawling tools. Identify the source of 404 errors (internal or external), and then try to update the problematic link. For example, if the 404 was caused by an incorrect internal link, the link should be updated to eliminate the 404 error.
2. Implement 301 redirects. A 301 redirect is an HTTP status code that signals a permanent move from one URL to another. By redirecting users and search engines from the outdated page to a relevant new one, you maintain the user experience and preserve the SEO value of inbound links. 

Bonus: Create a custom 404 page. Even with redirects, some 404s are inevitable. A custom 404 page ensures users aren’t left stranded. Include a friendly message, helpful links to other parts of your site, or even a search bar to guide users to relevant content. This keeps visitors engaged and signals to search engines that your site is well-managed.

 

Regularly audit your site for broken links using tools like Google Search Console or Screaming Frog to catch and address 404 errors promptly. By staying proactive, you’ll improve user experience, preserve SEO equity and keep your site running smoothly.

Related: How do I quickly find and fix broken links on my site?

2. Server Errors (5xx)

Server errors (HTTP status codes in the 5xx range) occur when a server is unable to process a request. These issues can block search engines from accessing your site, which can potentially harm SEO performance.

 

Common 5xx errors can include:

• 500 Internal Server Error: This is a catch-all error that indicates a server-side issue.
• 502 Bad Gateway: This occurs when a server that’s acting as a gateway gets an invalid response from another server.
• 503 Service Unavailable: This indicates temporary downtime, which is often caused by maintenance or traffic overload.

While some server errors may resolve on their own, multiple occurrences can signal that it’s time to dig deeper to find the root cause.

Here’s how to identify and resolve these errors:

1. Use monitoring tools. Use things like server logs and monitoring tools to detect errors as they happen, so you are alerted to potential problems. Google Search Console can provide insights into recurring server errors. 
2. Look for common culprits. Frequent causes of these errors can include outdated or incompatible plugins, issues in your site’s code (like broken scripts or typos) or server misconfigurations. 
3. Fix errors. Depending on the root cause, you might need to do things like tweak your server settings, update your software or get help from your hosting provider.

For more, check out my article on Search Engine Land: The ultimate guide to HTTP status codes for SEO.

 

Related: How can I identify and fix recurring server errors on my website?

3. Misconfigured Robots.txt

A robots.txt file can improve your site’s crawl efficiency. But a misconfigured one can lead to crawling and indexing issues that can harm your SEO. 

 

Robots.txt uses directives to communicate with search engines. It’s common for SEO problems to stem from misconfigured robots.txt directives. 

Here’s how you can troubleshoot and prevent common mistakes here:

Accidentally Blocking Important Content

One error that can happen more often than you think is accidentally blocking an entire site or critical pages. For instance, developers sometimes disable crawling during site development and forget to remove the restriction after launch.

Example of accidental blocking:

User-agent: *

Disallow: /

This directive completely prevents all bots from crawling the site.

How to fix: Ensure your robots.txt allows search engines to crawl essential content:

User-agent: *

Disallow:

Before launching a site, test your robots.txt file using Google’s robots.txt report.

Blocking the Wrong File Types

If you want to prevent search engines from indexing PDFs, images or videos, a common mistake is forgetting to use wildcard characters.

Incorrect robots.txt directive:

User-agent: *

Disallow: /files/

This blocks all files in that folder, but what if you only want to block PDFs?

How to fix: Use the $ wildcard to block specific file types.

User-agent: *

Disallow: /*.pdf$

This prevents Google from crawling all the PDFs on the site.

Final Tips for an Error-Free robots.txt File

• Use the correct syntax (e.g., Disallow: not disallow:).
• Be mindful of wildcard usage (* and $ can refine your rules).
• Test your file in Google Search Console before making it live.
• Remember that blocking a page in robots.txt does not remove it from search results.

For more, check out What Is robots.txt? A Beginner’s Guide to Nailing It with Examples. 

4. Missing XML Sitemap

An XML sitemap is a file that lists all the URLs of your website’s pages, images and videos to give search engines like Google and Bing a roadmap to your content. This facilitates more thorough crawling and indexing of your site.

Benefits of an XML sitemap include:

• Improved crawl efficiency: Sitemaps can help search engines discover your site’s content, which can enhance crawl efficiency.
• Faster indexing of new content: Sitemaps alert search engines of new or updated webpages, which potentially leads to quicker indexing (compared to waiting for bots to find content through internal links).
• Identifying site issues: Submitting a sitemap lets you monitor how search engines see your site, which can help identify and resolve indexing problems.

If you don’t yet have an XML sitemap, here’s how to create and submit one:

1. Generate the sitemap: Use tools like XML sitemap generators or plugins to create your sitemap. Once you have created the sitemap file, upload it to the root of your website (for example, https://www.your-domain-name.com/sitemap.xml). 
2. Submit it to search engines: After creating the sitemap, submit it through platforms like Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools to inform the search engines about your site’s structure.

Regularly updating your XML sitemap is an SEO best practice that ensures that search engines can crawl and index your most important content.

For more, check out: What Is an XML Sitemap and How Do I Make One? 

5. Bad Site Architecture

A well-organized site is very important for both user experience and SEO. 

On the other hand, a disorganized site can hinder search engines from discovering important pages, and this can negatively impact your site’s visibility in the search results.

Enter SEO siloing. 

This SEO technique involves grouping related content into hierarchical categories, or “silos,” which helps establish clear thematic relevance across your website.

The benefits of SEO siloing include:

• Enhanced relevance: By organizing content into silos, your website demonstrates subject matter expertise, which makes it more relevant to search queries.
• Improved crawling: A clear hierarchical structure is another way to help search engine bots navigate and index your site more effectively. 

Here are the major steps to implementing SEO siloing:

• Identify the core themes: Determine the main topics that your website covers based on services, products, keyword research and user intent.
• Create hierarchical categories: Organize your content into categories and subcategories that reflect these core themes to establish a clear hierarchy.
• Create authoritative content: Write expert content on the topic that is helpful to the audience and answers the common questions they have during the customer journey. 
• Optimize internal linking: Ensure that webpages within the same silo are interlinked to reinforce the thematic connections and help with navigation.

 

When your website has a logical, hierarchical site structure through SEO siloing, you create a better user experience and the ability for more search engine visibility — all of which lead to better SEO performance.

For more, read: 

• SEO Siloing: What, Why, How 
• A Jam-Packed Guide on Internal Linking for SEO 

Final Thoughts

Crawlability is the foundation of good SEO. If search engines can’t efficiently crawl your site, they won’t be able to index your content — meaning your rankings and organic traffic will suffer.

The good news is that common crawl issues have a clear solution. 

So, monitor your site and proactively address crawl issues for better rankings, improved user experience and increased organic traffic. 

Ready to take your website’s performance to the next level? 

Contact Us for a Free Consultation!

Quick Solutions

• How do I quickly find and fix broken links on my site?
• How can I identify and fix recurring server errors on my website?

FAQ: How Do I Ensure All My Website Pages Are Indexed by Search Engines Like Google?

Indexing is the process where search engines store and organize the content of your website in their database. This makes it available for retrieval during search queries. 

Without proper indexing, your pages will not appear in search results. 

One goal of SEO is to ensure all of your important website pages are indexed by search engines like Google to improve visibility in the search results.  

To achieve this, technical SEO comes into play. Technical SEO forms the foundation of a well-indexed website.

You’ll want to focus on things like a well-structured sitemap/XML sitemap and robust internal linking strategy.

And, look at resolving issues such as misconfigured robots.txt files, incorrect meta tags or server errors. 

Regularly auditing your website can help identify and resolve these issues. 

Additionally, ensuring that your website is mobile-friendly and has fast loading times can enhance crawlability and indexing.

Technical SEO is a factor in addressing other issues impacting website content. For example, pages with duplicate, near-duplicate or thin content are less likely to get visibility in search. 

Action Plan

1. Log in to Google Search Console and/or Bing Webmaster Tools, and verify ownership of your website if you’ve not already done so.
2. Navigate to the Coverage report in Google Search Console and review the details of excluded and crawled pages. Identify patterns in indexing errors or warnings.
3. Audit your robots.txt file for disallow rules blocking critical pages; check for ‘noindex’ meta tags on important pages and remove them if unintended.
4. Ensure your XML sitemap includes all critical pages, and validate your sitemap using search engine testing tools.
5. Submit the validated sitemap to Google and Bing.
6. Conduct a technical SEO audit of your website using crawling tools like Screaming Frog to simulate search engine behavior.
7. Identify and resolve server errors such as 5xx or 4xx status codes.
8. Optimize page load speeds for faster crawling.
9. Create high-quality, unique content for all pages, and be sure to avoid duplicate content across your website.
10. Implement a clear internal linking structure, and link from high-authority pages to critical pages within your site. Use descriptive anchor text for internal links.
11. Regularly monitor the indexing status of your pages via Google Search Console.
12. Address and resubmit any pages that remain unindexed after correction.
13. Test your site on different devices to ensure mobile-friendliness.