Technical SEO: the basics that actually matter
by Marcel, Senior software engineer
A lot of website owners know the feeling: you have a good-looking site, but it just doesn't show up on Google. Often that's not down to the content — it's down to the technical side. Here are the most important technical SEO basics, explained in plain language.
The three pillars of SEO
SEO stands on three legs: technology, content and links. Content and backlinks get most of the attention — yet the technical side is the foundation. If that isn't right, the other two fizzle out. A search engine has to be able to read and understand your page before good content even gets a chance.
1. Can Google find your site at all?
Before a page can rank, it has to get indexed. For that, Google needs clear signposts:
- A sitemap listing all your important pages.
- A robots.txt that controls crawling.
- Clean, readable URLs without the clutter.
- Canonical tags that clearly assign duplicate content.
If those building blocks are missing, Google may well overlook exactly the pages you want to rank.
2. How fast does your site load?
Speed is a direct ranking factor — and a conversion factor on top of that. Google measures it through the Core Web Vitals: how quickly does content become visible, how quickly does the page respond, how stable is the layout while loading? Every second of load time costs you visitors. A technically lean site wins twice here.
3. Does your site speak the search engine's language?
With structured data (Schema.org) you tell Google directly what a page is about: is this an article, an FAQ, a local business, an offer? That increases your chances of rich results — the more eye-catching search listings with stars, expandable FAQs or extra info. We go through what that looks like in practice for an online store in our Shopware SEO guide.
4. Does everything work on a phone?
Google primarily evaluates the mobile version of your site. If it isn't properly optimized for phones, you lose rankings — no matter how good the desktop version looks.
Top tip
The first step is always a technical check. Only once you know where things are stuck does it make sense to optimize deliberately — instead of blindly turning knobs.
The good thing about technical SEO
Unlike content or backlinks, technical SEO is measurable and plannable. You can see exactly what's broken, fix it, and verify the result. That's precisely where we start: we remove the technical brakes that are costing you visibility, and create the best possible starting position for good rankings.
Wondering why your website isn't getting found? We'll run a technical SEO check and tell you concretely what's holding it back.