Guides
In-depth guides
Longer walkthroughs for specific setups: real screenshots, code you can paste and the reason behind every step. The short fix page for each check lives under Learn.
All guides
45 guides, page 3 of 4.
- SEO13 min read
Orphan pages: finding them and linking them back in
An orphan page is one no other page on your site links to. Learn how they happen, how to find every one with your sitemap, a crawl and the bulk URL checker, and how to link them back or retire them.Updated 25 Sept 2026 - SEO12 min read
Page titles that rank and get clicked
Write title tags that Google keeps, that fit the result page and that earn the click. Length in characters and pixels, patterns per page type, brand placement, pagination, and where to set them in WordPress and Shopify.Updated 25 Sept 2026 - SEO11 min read
Pagination in 2026: rel=prev/next is gone, what now
Google stopped reading rel=prev/next in 2019 and most pagination advice still assumes it. What page 2 needs now: canonical, title and link rules, WordPress settings, and what to do with load more.Updated 25 Sept 2026 - SEO11 min read
Query parameters and canonicals for tracking links (utm, gclid)
Tracking parameters make a new URL for every campaign click. Keep them out of the index and the cache without breaking analytics, with canonical rules, cache configs and a per-parameter table.Updated 25 Sept 2026 - SEO13 min read
Redirect chains after a migration: finding every hop
Migrations leave redirects stacked on redirects. Learn why chains appear, how to find every hop with the redirect checker and the bulk URL checker, and how to collapse each chain into one 301 on nginx, Apache and WordPress.Updated 25 Sept 2026 - SEO12 min read
Redirects without chains: 301, 302, 307, 308 and one hop
Which redirect status to use when, why http → https → www → slash chains happen, and how to collapse them into one hop on nginx, Apache, Caddy, Cloudflare and WordPress, with a free redirect checker.Updated 25 Sept 2026 - SEO7 min read
robots.txt — test it before it hides your site
One Disallow line can remove a whole site from Google, and it happens every week when staging rules reach production. This guide explains what robots.txt can and cannot do, how to test a URL against it the way Googlebot does, what to put in it for a typical site, and how to handle AI crawlers.Updated 25 Sept 2026 - SEO11 min read
robots.txt patterns: wildcards, Allow, crawl-delay and the AI bots
How Google actually parses robots.txt (RFC 9309), with working patterns for parameters, file types and one-file exceptions, why crawl-delay does nothing for Google, and a clean policy for AI crawlers.Updated 25 Sept 2026 - SEO14 min read
Site migration checklist: domain, https and CMS moves without losing traffic
A before, during and after checklist for moving a site to a new domain, to https or to a new CMS, with the redirect map, the staging checks, the launch-day order and the bulk URL verification that catches the classic mistakes.Updated 25 Sept 2026 - SEO11 min read
Sitemap index files: splitting large sitemaps the right way
A sitemap stops at 50,000 URLs or 50 MB. This guide shows how to split it into an index with child files by type, date or language, what to leave out, and how WordPress and other CMSs do it for you.Updated 25 Sept 2026 - SEO11 min read
Sitemap lastmod: when to set it and when it hurts
Google uses the lastmod date in your sitemap to decide what to recrawl, but only while it stays honest. Learn when to set it, which date to use, the format, and how to spot a generator that fakes it.Updated 25 Sept 2026 - SEO13 min read
Soft 404s: pages Google treats as missing even though they return 200
A soft 404 is a page that says "not found" or shows nothing while answering HTTP 200. Learn how Google spots them, how to find yours with Search Console and the report, and the fix for each cause.Updated 25 Sept 2026
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