Solutions

Technical SEO & Site Speed for Service Business Websites

Good content can’t rank if Google can’t crawl it, won’t index it, or loads it so slowly on a phone that customers leave first. Those problems are invisible from the outside. The site looks fine, and the calls just don’t come.

Search Lift’s technical SEO service finds what’s stopping search engines and customers from reaching your pages: indexing and crawl problems, slow mobile performance, Core Web Vitals, broken structured data and risky redirects. Then we fix them, starting with the pages that bring in work.

Signs your website has a technical SEO problem

Search Console says pages are “Crawled – currently not indexed” or “Discovered – currently not indexed”.
Google shows a different version of your page than the one you chose: the www version, an old URL, or a duplicate.
Your site feels slow on a phone, or the layout jumps while it loads.
Rankings dropped after a redesign, a new theme or a platform move.
Service pages exist, but Google keeps ranking your homepage, or nothing at all, for those services.

Any one of these can hold back everything else you do in SEO. Not sure where you stand? The free Search Gap check is a quick first look.

What our technical SEO covers

Crawling and indexing. robots.txt, noindex tags, canonicals, redirect chains, XML sitemaps, orphan pages and internal links, checked against what Search Console actually reports.
Site speed and Core Web Vitals. Loading, responsiveness and layout stability on real phones, not just a desktop score.
Mobile performance. Google indexes the mobile version of your site, so that’s the version we optimise first.
Structured data. Organization, LocalBusiness, Service, FAQ, breadcrumb and article markup that matches what’s on the page.
Site structure. One clear URL per service and location, sensible navigation, and one canonical version of every page.
JavaScript and rendering. Making sure important content is in the HTML that search engines and AI crawlers receive.
SEO-safe redesigns and migrations. The SEO side of a rebuild or platform move, so rankings survive it.

Core Web Vitals: LCP, INP and CLS, and what usually breaks them

Google measures page experience with three Core Web Vitals and recommends these targets:

Largest Contentful Paint (LCP), within 2.5 seconds. How fast the main content appears. Common culprits: a slow server, oversized hero images, render-blocking CSS and fonts, and full-screen loaders or sliders.
Interaction to Next Paint (INP), under 200 milliseconds. How quickly the page responds to a tap. Common culprits: heavy JavaScript, page builders, chat widgets and third-party tracking scripts.
Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS), under 0.1. How much the layout jumps. Common culprits: images without set dimensions, late-loading fonts, cookie banners and ads that push content down.

Search Console’s Core Web Vitals report uses real-user data, so that’s what we fix against. Lab tools like Lighthouse help us find the cause. We don’t chase a perfect score for its own sake. Google says good Core Web Vitals align with what its ranking systems reward, but relevant, helpful content still comes first.

Crawling and indexing fixes

If a page isn’t indexed, it can’t rank, however good it is. We use Search Console’s page indexing report and URL Inspection to find out why each important page is missing, then fix the cause rather than just pressing “Request indexing”.

Duplicate and variant URLs (www and non-www, http and https, trailing slashes, parameters) consolidated with redirects and canonicals.
Thin or near-duplicate pages merged, improved or kept out of the index.
Internal links added so important pages aren’t buried or orphaned.
Sitemaps that list only the pages you want indexed, with honest last-modified dates.

More in our guide to why Google crawled your page but won’t index it.

Mobile performance for customers searching on the go

Local customers often search on a phone, on mobile data, while they need something fixed. We test on a throttled mid-range phone profile, not a fast office connection, and fix what slows that customer down: heavy images, unused scripts, blocking fonts and pop-ups that cover the page. We also check the basics that turn a visit into a call: a visible phone number, tap targets that are easy to hit, and forms that work on a small screen.

See 7 reasons your website is slow on mobile.

Structured data that matches your page

Schema markup helps search engines and AI tools understand who you are, what you offer and where. We add and validate Organization or LocalBusiness, Service, FAQ, breadcrumb and article markup, and keep it consistent with your Google Business Profile. Following Google’s structured data guidelines, we only mark up information that’s visible on the page. No fake reviews or ratings, ever.

Redesigning or moving platform? Keep your rankings

We don’t sell website builds. If you’re redesigning, changing platform or moving domain, we handle the SEO side alongside whoever is building it: a map of every URL that gets traffic or links, a 301 redirect plan that follows Google’s site-move guidance, checks that content and internal links survive, and Search Console monitoring after launch so problems are fixed in days, not discovered months later.

How a technical SEO project runs

Crawl and measure. A full crawl of your site, Search Console indexing and Core Web Vitals data, and lab tests of your key pages on mobile.
Prioritise. Issues ranked by their effect on the pages that bring in customers, not by how many warnings a tool shows.
Fix. We implement fixes directly where we have access, on WordPress, most CMSs and custom-coded sites, or write precise tickets for your developer.
Verify. Re-test, re-inspect in Search Console and check the fix held.
Monitor. Indexing, speed and errors keep being watched, because plugins, themes and new pages can undo good work.

How much does technical SEO cost?

Technical SEO work is quoted per project, because a ten-page site and a large multi-location site are different jobs. You get a written proposal with the scope and price before work starts.

Search Gap Audit, $297 one-time. Find out what’s holding your site back before you spend money fixing it.
Fix Sprint, $797 one-time. A focused 2–3 week push that includes priority technical and on-page fixes and up to 3 revenue pages improved.

See all plans and prices.

FAQs

What is technical SEO?

It’s the work that makes a website easy for search engines to crawl, index and understand, and fast for people to use: indexing and crawl fixes, site speed and Core Web Vitals, mobile performance, structured data and site structure. It supports content and links rather than replacing them.

Do Core Web Vitals affect Google rankings?

Google says good Core Web Vitals align with what its core ranking systems reward, but relevant, helpful content still matters more. In practice, speed matters most when a slow or jumpy page is costing you visitors and calls.

Why is my page “crawled – currently not indexed”?

Google fetched the page but chose not to index it yet. Common reasons are thin or near-duplicate content, weak internal links and a site Google doesn’t yet see as important. Fix the cause first; requesting indexing on its own rarely helps. Our guide explains why Google crawled your page but won’t index it.

Can you speed up my website without rebuilding it?

Usually, yes. Oversized images, heavy fonts, too many plugins and render-blocking scripts cause most slow sites, and they can be fixed in place. If the theme or platform itself is the bottleneck, we’ll tell you before you spend money on fixes.

Will I lose rankings if I redesign or move my website?

Not if the move is planned properly. Losses usually come from changed URLs without redirects and from removing content that was ranking. We map every URL that matters, set up 301 redirects and monitor Search Console after launch.

Do I need a perfect PageSpeed Insights score?

No. Aim to pass Google’s Core Web Vitals targets for real users: LCP within 2.5 seconds, INP under 200 milliseconds and CLS under 0.1. Past that point, your time is usually better spent on content and links.

Start here

Is something technical holding your site back?

Run the free Search Gap check. We’ll show you where your site is losing visibility on Google, Maps and AI answers, and whether the cause is technical.

Find My Search Gap Talk about technical SEO