Your website looks stunning. Your content is top-notch. Yet, traffic remains stagnant, and rankings refuse to budge. Sound familiar?
The culprit often isn’t your content strategy or keyword research—it’s the technical foundation holding everything together. Technical SEO issues are challenges within a website’s infrastructure that prevent search engines from effectively crawling, indexing, and ranking the content, and they’re silently draining your organic visibility.
The reality? 91% of web pages get no traffic from Google, often due to unresolved technical SEO issues. That’s not a small problem—it’s an epidemic affecting businesses of all sizes. At Nextenco, we’ve diagnosed countless websites where brilliant content never saw the light of day because fundamental SEO issues blocked search engines from even finding it.
Let’s cut through the noise and tackle the ten most damaging technical problems we encounter—and more importantly, how to fix them before they cost you another visitor.
1. Slow Page Load Speed: The Silent Traffic Killer
Users expect instant gratification. If your site doesn’t load quickly (typically 3 seconds or less), your users will go elsewhere. Page speed isn’t just about user experience—it’s a confirmed ranking factor.
The Fix:
- Compress and optimize images using modern formats like WebP
- Minimize HTTP requests by consolidating files
- Implement browser caching to reduce repeat loading times
- Use a Content Delivery Network (CDN) to serve content faster globally
- Reduce server response time with better hosting solutions
Test your site with Google PageSpeed Insights to identify specific bottlenecks. Don’t guess—let the data guide your optimization efforts.
2. Missing or Misconfigured SSL Certificate
Site security with HTTPS is more important than ever. When users land on an HTTP site, browsers display intimidating “Not Secure” warnings that send visitors running to competitors. Worse still, Google explicitly favors secure websites in its rankings.
The Fix:
- Install an SSL certificate from a trusted certificate authority
- Update all internal links to HTTPS
- Fix mixed content issues where HTTP resources load on HTTPS pages
- Set up 301 redirects from HTTP to HTTPS versions
This isn’t optional anymore—it’s table stakes for any serious website.
3. Poor Mobile Experience
Google primarily uses the mobile version of content for indexing and ranking. If your mobile experience is poor, your rankings suffer. With mobile-first indexing now the standard, your desktop site could be perfect, but if mobile users struggle, you’re invisible in search results.
The Fix:
- Ensure mobile and desktop content are equivalent
- Use responsive design that adapts to all screen sizes
- Test regularly with Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test tool
- Improve mobile page loading speed specifically
- Make buttons and links easily tappable
Think mobile-first, not mobile-as-an-afterthought.
4. Broken Links and 404 Errors
Broken internal or outbound links, commonly known as 404 errors, create a frustrating user experience and send negative signals to search engines. These dead ends also waste crawl budget, meaning Google might not fully index your site.
The Fix:
- Use tools like Ahrefs, Screaming Frog, or Google Search Console to scan for broken links regularly
- Implement 301 redirects from old URLs to relevant pages
- Remove or update outdated links promptly
- Monitor high-traffic pages more frequently
Regular audits prevent this from becoming a persistent problem.
5. Duplicate Content
Almost all the SEO professionals that we have talked to have marked duplicate content as a top technical SEO issue. When identical content appears in multiple locations, search engines struggle to determine which version to rank, ultimately diluting your ranking signals.
The Fix:
- Use canonical tags to indicate the preferred version of a page
- Consolidate similar pages into comprehensive resources
- Implement 301 redirects from duplicate pages to originals
- Ensure www and non-www versions don’t both exist without proper redirection
This SEO issue often stems from technical configurations rather than intentional copying.
6. Indexing Problems
If Google can’t index your pages, they simply don’t exist in search results. Not indexed pages are a big and common SEO mistake because they essentially disappear from search engine results. This makes it impossible for users to find them through organic search.
The Fix:
- Check index status regularly in Google Search Console
- Review robots.txt file for unintentional blocks
- Remove noindex tags from important pages
- Fix crawl errors preventing access
- Submit XML sitemaps to search engines
The problem isn’t always that pages can’t be indexed—sometimes, they’re accidentally blocked.
7. Core Web Vitals Issues
Core Web Vitals is a set of metrics that measure real-world user experience for loading performance, interactivity, and visual stability of the page. These three metrics now directly influence rankings:
- Largest Contentful Paint (LCP): Should occur within 2.5 seconds
- Interaction to Next Paint (INP): Should be under 200 milliseconds
- Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS): Should remain under 0.1
The Fix:
- Optimize images and use lazy loading for below-the-fold content
- Reduce JavaScript execution time
- Specify size attributes for images and videos to prevent layout shifts
- Prioritize loading of critical resources
The Economic Times optimized its Largest Contentful Paint (LCP) and Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS) to provide its readers with an optimal experience. The end result was improving CLS by 250% to 0.09, LCP by 80% to 2.5 seconds, passing Core Web Vitals, and last but not least – reducing bounce rates by 43% overall.
8. Missing or Improperly Configured XML Sitemap
An XML sitemap is a file that lists all the pages of a website and provides information about each one. It could be information about its recent update, how often it changes, and its priority on the website. The XML sitemap helps search engines efficiently crawl and index the website’s pages.
The Fix:
- Generate a comprehensive XML sitemap
- Validate it using XML Sitemap Validator or W3C Markup Validation Service
- Submit it to Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools
- Keep it updated with new pages and remove deleted ones
- Ensure it doesn’t exceed 50MB or 50,000 URLs
This straightforward step dramatically improves crawl efficiency.
9. Thin or Low-Quality Content
Pages with very little content often don’t rank well and can hurt overall site authority. Search engines want to deliver value to users, and pages with minimal information rarely accomplish that goal.
The Fix:
- Merge similar thin pages into comprehensive resources
- Add valuable, original information to existing pages
- Ensure each page answers a specific user query thoroughly
- Remove pages that serve no purpose to users or search engines
Quality beats quantity every single time.
10. Improper Redirect Chains
Redirect chains occur when one URL redirects to another, which redirects to yet another. Each redirect adds latency and wastes crawl budget. Multiple redirects can frustrate users and confuse search engines about the final destination.
The Fix:
- Audit your site for redirect chains using crawling tools
- Update redirects to point directly to the final destination
- Use 301 redirects for permanent moves
- Avoid temporary 302 redirects unless truly temporary
- Document all redirects for future reference
Clean redirect architecture keeps both users and search bots moving efficiently.
The Bottom Line
These SEO issues don’t announce themselves with flashing warnings. They lurk in the background, quietly eroding your search visibility and hemorrhaging traffic to competitors who’ve addressed these fundamentals.
The good news? None of these problems are insurmountable. Most require only systematic identification and methodical fixes. Regular technical audits catch issues before they compound into serious ranking losses.
Search engines reward websites that respect their crawlers and prioritize user experience. When your technical foundation is solid, your content finally gets the visibility it deserves.
Take Action Today
Don’t let technical problems hold back your digital presence any longer. A comprehensive technical SEO audit reveals exactly where your site needs attention—from page speed bottlenecks to indexing issues that keep your best content hidden.
Ready to stop losing traffic to fixable SEO issues? At Nextenco, we specialize in diagnosing and resolving the technical barriers preventing your website from reaching its full potential. Our team combines deep technical expertise with strategic insight to transform your site’s performance.
Contact us today for a thorough technical SEO assessment. Let’s turn those traffic losses into gains.
