Crawled – currently not indexed, are you seeing this in your Google Search Console Report? This can be very confusing and frustrating, in this blog post we’ll break down what this means and how to get your content indexed.
What is crawled - currently not indexed and what does this mean?
When this error occurs Google has discovered your page, even crawled it, but has determined that it’s not going to index the page. This is not a fun error to receive, as you spent time creating the content, optimized for SEO, published it, then Google states that it’s not going to index this.
For most websites, this error is one of the most common errors we see within Google Search Console.
In our experience, this can be from a variety of issues, mostly around the nature that the content isn’t unique enough, the website isn’t a true authority for this subject, or the website doesn’t have enough backlinks to prove the site is a known entity.
Content Issue
First of all, I would recommend reviewing the content. Does this content deserve to be ranked by Google? For every piece of content written, this is a really good question to ask yourself. Google is in the business of sending users to pages that answer their questions. Google isn’t going to send users to poor experiences otherwise it will hurt its credibility.
With that, review the content. Does it answer the question of the search query you’re looking to address? If that’s true, then ask yourself, is this content unique?
Review other websites that are ranking for this given topic and keyword. If your content is saying the exact same thing as everyone else, there is no reason for Google to index the content, as this content is already covered.
This is a huge downfall for AI generated content, it spits out content that already exists, so the chances of ranking for this content is minimal, and if you are ranking, it’s not going to be in a top position.
If your content is the same as the other search results, think of how you can add additional value, this could be in the form of:
- Individual experiences and unique perspectives on this topic
- Case studies
- Proprietary data
- Unique images or helpful infographics
- Supplementary video
If you identified that your content isn’t unique and acted upon the above suggestions, you should reindex your page via Google Search Console. If that doesn’t fix the issue, let’s explore a potential topic authority issue.
Topic authority issue
If your content is around a topic that your website doesn’t specialize in, that could be why it’s not indexed.
For example, at Rise Marketing Group, if we wrote a blog about the best sails for a recreational sailboat, and posted on our website. This would never get indexed nor have meaningful rankings. This article could be well researched, offer unique perspectives, etc. but the issue is that our website doesn’t specialize in sailing. It specializes in digital marketing and Google has realizes this. If we write about topics where we’re not a proven entity, Google will be reluctant to rank it.
If you’re writing content that’s off topic from the website, I would ask yourself if this is an area you want to cover. If so, I would start writing other content on this topic and eventually these pages will start to rank as you’re building up topical authority.
Bonus tip – be sure to link related blog posts on this topic, which further helps Google understand your level of expertise in this space.
If you reviewed this and you’re still not getting indexed, time to review your backlinks.
Domain authority issues
Finally, this could be a domain authority issue, measured by how many relevant backlinks your website has. If you have unique content, and some level of topical authority, you might not have enough domain authority to rank.
For decades, to rank on Google, and now to be cited within AI tools, you need other websites to link to you. This shows that you’re a proven entity and that other websites find your content valuable, so much that they’re linking to you.
If your website has a low domain authority, you need to start getting other websites to link to you. There are a variety of ways to do so, which we cover in our link building blog post, which includes:
Directories
This is an easy one, whichever industry you’re in, run a Google Search for “your industry” + directories. Through this you’ll find a bunch of directories you can build a listing for your business.
Guest Blog Posts
A significant amount of websites accept written content to post on their site, which can include a link as well. It’s a win for the blogs as they’re getting free, qualified content and sometimes a small payment to post on their website. It also is a win for website owners looking to build the domain authority for some backlinks. However, before you write for any website, make sure it’s contextually relevant, has real traffic and has a domain authority higher than your website.
These links can go directly to your homepage, category page, or build a few links to the page you’re looking to get indexed. If you do the latter, this will likely push this to get indexed.
Need help with your SEO?
If you need help getting your site indexed, or are looking for more organic traffic and higher rankings, Rise Marketing Group’s SEO team can help. Submit a contact form and we’ll schedule a free consultation on how we can grow your business through SEO.
