SEO Audit: Indexing Strategy for an Educational Software Company

The website contained approximately 780,000 pages, but only about 42,000 – 47,000 were indexed by Google at the time of the audit (roughly 5.3% of the total volume). Although the pages were technically sound and indexable, search crawlers were unable to reach them due to a weak internal linking structure.

Identified Technical Issues

• XML Sitemap Errors: While Google Search Console recognized the index file, most nested sitemaps returned "Couldn't fetch" errors.
• Lack of Internal Linking: The pages were not interconnected. Googlebot could only discover them via sitemaps, which were failing, causing the indexing process to stall.
• High Number of Orphan Pages: Almost all analyzed pages lacked inbound internal links, making them virtually invisible to search engines.

Implemented Strategic Action Plan

Step 1: HTML Sitemap Deployment

• A dedicated HTML page was created to list links to internal pages and search queries.
• Pagination was implemented to manage the large volume of links.
• A link to this sitemap was placed in the homepage footer to pass "link juice" and guide crawlers deep into the site’s architecture.

Step 2: XML Sitemap Optimization

• The URL limit per sitemap file was increased to 50,000 (Google’s maximum). This reduced the total number of files by 10x, significantly simplifying the crawling process.
• A redirect was set up from the default /sitemap.xml to the new /sitemap_index.xml.

Step 3: Internal Linking Architecture

• "Related Questions" and "Random Questions" blocks were added to every page, providing 5–10 internal links per page. This ensured that every crawler visit led to the discovery of multiple additional pages.

UX & SEO Quick Wins

• Anchor Text Optimization: "View Answer" buttons were replaced with direct text links using the question itself as the anchor. This improved keyword relevancy and optimized the vertical length of search result pages.
• Content Relevance Boost: A "Quick Learn" section was introduced on answer pages to increase word count and overall page value for search engines.

Conclusion

Following the implementation of these updates, the target pages successfully entered the Google index, achieving the project's primary objective. With the indexing bottleneck resolved and search visibility restored, the project was successfully completed.