A framework you can implement before your next deploy

This checklist is built for developers shipping websites or major updates. You're the person in the pull request reviewing technical decisions before code merges. You may not own the SEO strategy, but you own whether that strategy can actually work.

Use this if:

• You're deploying a new site or major redesign
• You're implementing changes across multiple pages at once
• You need a shared standard so every deployment meets baseline SEO hygiene
• Your team skips technical SEO because it feels optional

This is not a deep-dive into SEO theory. It's a practical gate: did we break something? Did we miss something obvious? Can a search engine actually find and rank this?

These eight items determine whether a site can rank. Not whether it will—that depends on content and authority. But whether it can. Skip any one and you've given search engines a reason not to trust the site.

1. Robots.txt Allows Crawling

Verify your robots.txt isn't accidentally blocking Google from the main site or key asset directories (CSS, JavaScript, images). A common pattern: blocking /admin/ is right; blocking /assets/ is wrong. Check the file at yourdomain.com/robots.txt. Look for overly broad rules like Disallow: /.

2. Canonical Tags Are Set Correctly

Every page needs a self-referential canonical pointing to its own URL. For paginated content, the canonical on page 2 should point to page 2, not page 1. Duplicate or missing canonicals are one of the most common crawl wastes we see in audits. Most CMSs add these automatically; verify yours does.

3. Mobile Responsiveness Passes

Use Google's Mobile-Friendly Test. If it fails, Google sees your site as harder to rank. This isn't optional anymore. Verify <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1"> is in your head tag and CSS media queries handle small screens.

4. Core Web Vitals Are Green

Check Largest Contentful Paint (LCP), First Input Delay (FID), and Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS) in PageSpeed Insights. Sites with poor vitals rank worse. Most teams optimize here last and should optimize here first—it's often the fastest SEO win. Aim for green on mobile.

5. XML Sitemaps Are Valid

Generate a sitemap.xml with all indexable pages. Include only URLs you want ranked. Submit to Google Search Console. Invalid sitemaps get ignored; Google still crawls the site, but you've added friction. Test the sitemap at yourdomain.com/sitemap.xml to confirm it's well-formed XML.

6. Schema Markup Matches Content Type

Add the right structured data for your content. Article pages get Article schema. Product pages get Product schema with price, rating, availability. Local businesses get Organization and LocalBusiness. Generic or missing schema means Google has to guess what your page is about—and often guesses wrong.

7. Internal Linking Structure Is Logical

Key pages should be within two or three clicks from the homepage. Navigation should be consistent. Avoid orphan pages with no inbound links from your own site. Google uses link structure to understand page importance and topical relationships.

8. Indexation Status Is Correct

Check Google Search Console. Are all pages you want indexed actually indexed? Are undesired pages (staging, test, admin) blocked? A common issue: staging sites get crawled by Google before you launch. Verify staging is behind password protection or blocked in robots.txt.

Not all checklist items are equal. Some break ranking immediately. Others affect ranking over months. Prioritize in this order:

Must fix before launch (hour zero): Crawlability (robots.txt), canonicals, mobile responsiveness. These directly prevent ranking or cause Google to ignore your site entirely.

Fix in first two weeks: Core Web Vitals, XML sitemaps, schema markup. These affect ranking algorithmically but don't prevent crawling or indexing.

Fix in first 30 days: Internal linking structure, indexation verification. These improve ranking over time but don't stop your site from ranking.

The teams we've worked with that ship fastest implement checks 1–3 in their pre-deploy pipeline (automated), run checks 4–6 manually in testing, and monitor checks 7–8 weekly after launch. Most discover check 8 issues only after noticing ranking drops.

Manual checklists are useful once. Automated checks save time every deploy. Here's what automation looks like:

Robots.txt validation: Parse the file at build time. Flag blocked directories that shouldn't be blocked. Tools like node-robots-parser make this trivial.

Canonical audit: Crawl your staging site, verify every page has a self-referential canonical. Tools like Screaming Frog or custom Node scripts handle this. Alert on missing or incorrect canonicals.

Sitemap validation: Generate the sitemap, validate XML schema, verify URLs are live. Most static site generators do this automatically.

Schema validation: Use Google's Rich Results Test API or open-source schema validators. Flag invalid or missing schema before deploy.

Core Web Vitals: Integrate PageSpeed Insights API into your CI/CD pipeline. Fail the build if vitals are red. This forces the conversation earlier.

Indexation checking: After deploy, query Google Search Console API to verify indexation status. Alert if indexed pages are missing or unindexed pages appeared.

Teams using these tools report: two hours of manual checking per deploy becomes 15 minutes of automated feedback. Most catch issues before they ship.

Mistake 1: Checking these items once, then forgetting them. Technical SEO is a gate, not a one-time task. Each deploy carries risk. The teams that don't regress implement these as automated checks, not manual reminders.

Mistake 2: Prioritizing mobile less than desktop. Google indexes mobile-first. A site that passes desktop checks but fails mobile responsiveness will rank worse. Test on actual mobile devices, not just Chrome DevTools.

Mistake 3: Assuming your CMS handles everything. WordPress, Shopify, and other platforms ship with good defaults. But they need configuration. Verify instead of assuming. We've audited dozens of sites with 'best practices' platforms that were misconfigured.

Mistake 4: Fixing schema generic or incomplete. Adding schema is good. Adding it wrong wastes effort. Use structured data testing tools and validate against the schema.org spec for your content type.

Mistake 5: Checking before redesign but not before launch. Most checklist failures we see happen during the redesign cutover. Sites redirect incorrectly, new pages don't get indexed for weeks, or canonicals break. Verify the live site, not just staging.

Manual checklists work when you have one site. When you ship regularly, you need automation. These categories of tools handle the heavy lifting:

Full-stack crawlers: Screaming Frog, Sitebulb, and DeepCrawl audit all eight checks in one pass. Best for before-launch audits. Cost: typically $99–$200/month. Worth it for teams shipping high-traffic sites.

CI/CD integrations: Custom Node/Python scripts that validate robots.txt, canonicals, and sitemaps during build. Free if you write them; $50–$150/month if you use pre-built SaaS. Fastest way to catch issues early.

Performance monitoring: PageSpeed Insights, WebVitals, and GTmetrix provide Core Web Vitals data. Free tier available; premium monitoring starts around $30/month.

Search Console API: Programmatic access to indexation status, coverage, and enhancements. Free. Essential for post-deploy verification.

Schema validators: Google Rich Results Test, Yoast, JSON-LD validators. Free. Use before deploy.

The money page utilities that streamline technical SEO tasks walks through which tool fits which workflow. Most teams use a combination: crawlers for before-launch audits, CI/CD checks for ongoing enforcement, and Search Console for post-launch monitoring.