Getting pages indexed by Google has always been a very popular topic on many forums. It seems that many people are having a hard time getting their pages indexed (both on-site and off-site pages).
Why is getting URLs Indexed by Google such a big deal?
Getting pages your create indexed by Google is important because if your page is indexed then it becomes a part of the “Google ecosystem” as it enters the massive database that the algorithms that power Google crunch to build ranking signals in their SERPs for things people search for.
If your site or pages are not indexed, then they are not really doing any good in terms of SEO or ranking signals – which means if you created the page for SEO purposes and for ranking signals… it has none! You need to get your pages indexed… both on-site and off-site pages.
On-Site Indexing and Off-Site Indexing
Getting URLs on your money page site (your main site that you are trying to rank), is easier as Google already has a set crawl budget for your site and if your site does not have spam pages or thin content – then you probably don’t need to do much other than some basic tweets, Facebook shares etc.
As of this writing Google Search Console is still not taking in any fresh requests for indexing pages on sites that you own. This is potentially a problem for many. However, to get pages on sites you own and controlled indexed is a fairly simple procedure of simply submitting your URL to Google for indexing from within your site dashboard within Google Search Console.
Getting off-page URLs indexed is where the challenge is, and you do need to get them indexed if you want them to pass down any link juice to the pages thy link out to.
Getting your Tier 1, Tier 2, Tier 3 etc. pages indexed should be a high priority in your SEO campaigns.
For those who don’t know…Tier 1 are pages that directly link to your main site page or money page. Tier 2 links to Tier 1 and so on. These could be Web2.0 posts, guest posts on other sites, forum pages, edu pages, wiki pages, etc.
Simply going out there and creating many Tier 1 etc. pages, without getting them indexed – in an effort to pass down link juice to the pages they links out to… has no relevance as they are not indexed and thus not part of the algorithm’s dataset that it crunches for search rankings.
Getting your backlinks indexed is a key ingredient in doing SEO. I hear of many people saying… just let Google index the page naturally and don’t go out passing any signals to Google crawler to come crawl your URL and index it. My reply is that while this is OK to do on a site your own and that has a good crawl budget, it may not always be the case.
I have seen many projects where links are not in the index… which means they are essentially worthless for any Google ranking SEO signals. This is why it is very important to try and “force” the Google crawl and index by passing (trust) signals to the crawler bot and algorithm.
How Do You Increase Your Chances of Getting Indexed By Google?
How does one go about ensuring that the pages they create (both on their site and on other sites as backlinks etc) get crawled indexed by Google?
Below are some factors, that I believe contribute to your indexing and therefore can help you getting indexed.
Have Good Content and Provide Value
Thin pages with no content don’t provide any value to Google for ranking signals (like forum profile pages even if they are not no-index pages).
The very first step is to make sure that the page is trusted by Google when it is crawled for evaluation on whether it should be indexed or not. Once indexed, the algorithm works on the page as it becomes part of the “Google’s ecosystem”.
The first thing to remember is that the page have substantial content, and not have thin content. That will make the indexing a lot esier as Google will believe the page has some value to offer to users / people who visit the page by finding it in the SERPs, or in terms of the trust and link juice it can pass down to other pages it links out to, because well… the page has good content.
Making sure your page is mobile friendly is also a plus sign for indexing, as Google is evaluating pages to see if they are mobile friendly / responsive.
Link out to other authority pages and sites on the topic you are writing about
This is another trust factor! By linking out to other related and authority sites you are entangling your page in the link clusters for content that you are writing about. Make sure there is congruence though between your page content and what you link to.
Embed A Youtube Video
This is a fantastic trick that many use. When you embed a youtube video within your page (preferably related to the content the page is about), you are increasing your chances of getting indexed. Just visit the page and watch the video in incognito mode / privacy mode and have a few friend and colleagues do the same. As they view the video, Google will know which page is serving the video embed and it will index that page as it becomes “aware” of the fact that people are watching a video on it… and so it is providing value.
Do note that the Youtube video does not have to be from your channel, but can be any video on Youtube that is related to the content on your page.
Ping Your URL
Head over to pingomatic, bulkpinger, pingfarm or other tools like that and get your URL pinged. Input your RSS feed as well, if you have one. By pinging your post it gets included into other RSS feeds and that gets your URL crawled quickly (not indexed, just the crawl). The indexing will happen as your page get trusted (trusted content, trusted domain, trusted off-page signals etc).
When you submit your URL to other RSS directory feeds, you will also increase its visibility and chances of getting indexed.
Submit Your Page URL or RSS Feed to other RSS Feed Mashups
There are some tools that let you push your URLs into common RSS feeds on other sites. This ensures that your content is syndicated across RSS networks and basically pushed more trust signals to your main URL, for Google to index the URL and content.
Send Out Tweets
Google has a direct pipeline into twitters data feed, because a lot of Twitter value is in the fact that it is able to provide live and breaking news / tweets etc… which is why getting tweet data from twitter at the moment they are created is important for Google as it indexes the tweets immediately. If you put your page URL out in multiple tweets (from different accounts), Google would see it as a trust signal and trending page and crawl and index the page.
Create a Google Property Page with a Backlink
Just create a page on any Google property like Google Docs or Google Sites and link to your page from the content. The page itself can be a thin page with less content, but must have the link to the URL you want indexed. So, you can create a Google Doc, Spreadsheet, Presentation slide etc etc. and simply insert a link (and a few other related links to again pass a trust signal).
Social Bookmarking
Dos this still work? Does it help getting pages indexed? I would say yes, but only on the popular social bookmarking sites.
Forum Posting
Posting your backlink on popular forums in your niche or other bigger general forum will help getting your URL indexed.
Web2.0 Links
This will also help, if the page you create gets indexed in the first place! So, if it doesn’t then you need to submit that page to get indexed so it passes down a trust signal to your URL that you want indexed.
Submitting a quick sentence or two on related topical pages on Quora.com will help your page get indexed (but be careful of submitting too many such posts as Quora is clamping down on link spam). Just provide a valuable answer to the original question, and slip in the link, but make sure to answer some without any links included as well, so your account does not get suspended for bulk incentivised submissions.
Facebook Shares
On publicly visible pages to Google, inserting your backlink will help passing down a signal of trust.
Using Backlink Indexer Services & Tools
Using paid indexing services will help you get your URLs indexed. These indexing services use their own internal logic and methods to help your pages get indexed (their own secret sauce), but they don’t guarantee indexing…only state that indexing will happen at a higher probability than if you were not to use the service.
This is true and they do increase the chances of your URLs getting indexed and are worth the investment.
They probably use a combination of the methods above. I have personally used some of these tools a lot and they do work well. The expensive ones may even have a direct connection with Google APIs for URL submissions (and so the cost to you to get each URL indexed).
Anyways, the costs for these tools are on a very inexpensive link credit based system – which are a one-off fee or a monthly subscription.
BacklinksIndexer
This one has been around for the longest time. Works very well and probably has the best submission logic implemented. The cost is on a monthly subscription based system, starting at $27 per month for 3000 URLs per month (100 per day).
Omega Indexer
This is good too. Seems to work well, and is not too expensive. I like the fact that its on a fixed credit based system that is inexpensive. Simply buy packs or credits as cheap as $20 for 1000 link submissions. You are not locked into any monthly subscriptions like with backlinksindexer.
Indexification
For about $18 per month they submit over 1.5 million links for indexing. This service seems to be targeting mass link builders. It also automatically plugs in with any mass link building or third party link building services via APIs so you don’t have to submit the link as it automatically pulls them from these tools and services once you configure your account.
Lindexed
Again, like Indexification they seem to be using the same methods, and are for mass link builders. They have a unqiue method called Ping Cloud which pings your URLs from various servers across the globe which they claim helps.
One Hour Indexing
This was a favourite. They claim to have very high indexing rates across the board. They are costly at 1000 daily submissions for $17 per month. They claim the following indexing rates over different time periods as shown on their website.
GSA SEO Indexer
This is a desktop tool and is a nice tool to have in your tool kit at just $20. It works by submitting your URL to “thousands of whois and statistics websites resulting in many backlinks.” … as it says on their site. A must have for every beginner or power SEO user. They even have a trial version if you want to take this for a spin before deciding.
Checking To See if Your URL / Page is Indexed
You can bulk check to see if your links are indexed using an extension within Scrapebox tool.
If you want to individually check, simply search on Google for “site:https://youpageurl.com/etc”
Alternately, you can simply do a search for the Title in quotes in Google, or any text on the page in quotes.