Before delving into the technical SEO topics, we’ll just remind you that SaaS is short for software-as-a-service, which is a cloud-based delivery model allowing users to access software with their browser. And while the market is growing rapidly, the need to stand out is bigger than ever. That’s why many B2B companies are looking for specific marketing strategies that include SEO and content marketing, with technical SEO for SaaS being a crucial part of the progress.
While the idea behind the concept of SaaS is to lower the installation costs and to provide easier scalability, accompanied by exceptional security, the goal to stand out is not always easy as it seems.
A strong online presence for SaaS companies means they build brand awareness, generate and convert leads, and provide ongoing customer support. And through the whole process, it’s important to have a fast-loading website that search engines can easily crawl and reward with a great rank on search engine results pages.
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Why Technical SEO for SaaS?
The SEO strategy is not only researching relevant keywords and incorporating them into the content.
Technical SEO is a set of best practices for increasing a website’s exposure in search engines. These practices concentrate on a website’s technical features, such as its code, structure, and speed.
And knowing that SaaS is a web-based software model, the site structure and speed become even more important.
When properly implemented, technical SEO can improve:
- Search visibility leading to more traffic and leads.
- User experience for better conversion rates.
- Security to protect your website from cyber-attacks.
By following the best practices of technical SEO, SaaS companies can improve their chances of success in the competitive online marketplace.
Understanding Technical SEO
While it sounds complex and difficult to understand, technical SEO is a set of rules and practices to help our website resolve the common tech issues that may prevent the SaaS website from getting a good ranking.
Essentially, these are the components of technical SEO:
Crawlability – Refers to the ability of search engine crawlers to access and index all of the pages on your SaaS website.
Indexability – Refers to the ability of search engines to show your pages in search results.
Technical errors – All issues with your website’s code or structure that prevent it from being crawled or indexed by search engines.
Mobile-friendliness – Refers to the ability of your website to be viewed and used on mobile devices.
Page speed – Refers to the time it takes for your website to load.
Security – The measures you have taken to protect your website from attacks.
Why is Technical SEO Important for SaaS Companies?
While technical SEO is important for every website, for SaaS, it plays a significant role in resolving all the technical issues that may affect search visibility and user experience.
As we know, SaaS websites may have many pages, making it difficult for the search engine bot to crawl and index them appropriately. Also, SaaS companies often have dynamic content on their websites, which, again, is not the easiest for the crawlers. And surely, we shouldn’t forget that a SaaS product may use third-party elements that add technical challenges.
Still, the fact that one SaaS website features many separate pages is enough to showcase the importance of technical SEO. As a result, you identify and resolve ongoing technical errors, optimize the website for mobile devices, improve website speed, and implement security measures to protect it from attacks.
It All Starts With SaaS Tech SEO Audit
You can’t start fixing the technical issues on your website before locating them. That’s why you need an all-inclusive technical SEO audit. Without it, you may run in circles and work so hard without achieving any results.
So, in order to perform a technical SEO audit, you’ll need to hire an SEO expert or an SEO agency to help you:
Check for the Duplicate Content
Spot the duplicate content on your website before Google does. If you don’t, search engines will be confused and incapable of deciding what version is the right one and what URL should rank higher in SERPs. It all negatively affects the SEO rankings because search engines “think” you don’t really pay attention to the content or users at all.
During the technical audit, the SEO expert will check on how you use the HTML tags and if any are missing on the important pages. Sometimes, SaaS companies misuse the tags (not on purpose) and confuse the search engines by using more than one H1 per page or not assigning any content hierarchy.
When you use a canonical tag, you tell the crawler what URL is the main copy to avoid crawling duplicates. But sometimes, these tags are used incorrectly too. During the audit, the SEO expert will check on how you use canonical tags in general and how it affects your current SaaS website rankings.
Example:
Let’s explain the canonical tag with these three URLs:
https://saasproduct.com/pricing/basic-plan
https://saasproduct.com/pricing/basic-plan/
http://saasproduct.com/pricing/basic-plan
They look very similar and open the same page, but search engines often might consider them separate pages with duplicate content, which is harmful to your website.
So, let’s assume the first URL is the preferred version. What you need to do is to add the canonical tag to <head> if each of the second and third URLs, to prevent duplicate indexing.
<head>
<link rel="canonical" href="https://saasproduct.com/pricing/basic-plan">
<!-- Other meta tags, titles, stylesheets, etc. -- >
</head>Understanding the Communication Between Browser and Server
At this point, the SEO expert will use tools like Screaming Frog and Ahrefs to discover how the website interacts with the server. When the browser accesses the server, it responds with a three-digit code indicating if the page is working or not.
Robots.txt
Robots.txt is a text file command that helps the crawlers understand what parts of the website they should or shouldn’t crawl. The technical auditor will check if it’s used properly to ensure all content elements are indexed properly.
Sitemap
A sitemap tells the search engines which pages to show on search results. The SEO auditor will check if you use the sitemap properly as part of the technical SEO audit and execution.
SaaS-Specific Technical SEO Factors
From the previous paragraphs, you learned that the technical aspects of SaaS websites must work perfectly in order to encourage visitors to stay and explore the content. Through the audit, on the other hand, an SEO expert detects the existing issues and helps you decide what you need to fix first.
Still, the technical SEO focus is on:
Mobile Responsiveness and its Impact on SaaS User Experience
Many users access online content through their phones. In order to stay relevant in today’s SaaS landscape, companies should ensure their websites are completely functional on mobile and desktop, too, across various screen sizes.
Google’s mobile-first indexing gives priority to mobile-friendly websites. That means your SaaS product must work perfectly on every device and still load fast while maintaining friendly navigation.
Site Speed Optimization for Reducing Bounce Rates
We mentioned the site speed a few times because it’s a critical aspect of technical SEO. Slow websites increase bounce rates and negatively affect your engagement and search engine rankings. For SaaS companies whose target audience expects swift interactions, optimizing site speed becomes an essential element.
So, starting with image optimization, then browser caching, minimizing the CSS and JavaScript files, and leveraging CDNs (content delivery networks), you can significantly improve the site’s loading time. That way, your SaaS website can retain users and improve conversions while ranking well on search engines.
Structured Data for Enhanced Search Engine Visibility
Structured data is also known as schema markup. This way, you provide search engines with enough context on your website content. As a result, you get enhanced search engine results.
So, when a SaaS company implements structured data as part of its technical SEO efforts, it can improve visibility for the product and its features. This not only attracts website visitors but ensures search engines understand what your product is about and what value you offer to your target audience.
There are a number of different types of structured data, but some of the most common ones for SaaS companies include:
- Product schema to mark up product information, such as the name, price, and description of a product.
- Event schema to mark up events, such as webinars or conferences.
- Local business schema to mark up your business’s contact information, location, and hours of operation.
SSL Certificates and Security for SaaS Websites
Website security must always be your top priority because SaaS websites handle a large amount of sensitive user data, including payment details and personal information. So, consider implementing SSL certificates for an additional security layer on your site.
SSL certificates encrypt data sent between your website and the browsers of your users. This adds to the security of your user’s data, such as passwords and credit card details. They’re also boosting confidence in SaaS businesses, knowing that users may avoid entering their personal information if there is no SSL certificate on your site.
Both website visitors and search engines must understand the architecture and navigation of your SaaS site. The technical SEO will help you reorganize the current structure if needed, making it more engaging and intuitive. As you know, SaaS websites have plenty of pages, so it’s important to navigate the users smoothly, to easily find the information or feature they’re looking for.
Importance of Clear and Intuitive Site Structure for SaaS Sites
If you aim for a perfect user experience, pay attention to structure and organization on the website pages. Also, from an SEO perspective, a clear hierarchy means search engines can effectively understand the content, resulting in better indexing.
So, SaaS companies must ensure their website structure is logical with well-organized categories, subcategories, and internal links guiding the users through the site to the sales pages – where ultimately, profit happens.
Internal Linking Strategies for User Engagement and SEO
As part of the technical SEO for SaaS, internal linking is both an on-page and technical strategy that helps with discovering related content and distributing link authority across the website.
Internal linking can be utilized effectively on SaaS websites to guide readers from informational content to product pages, supporting a journey that ultimately leads to conversion. Furthermore, internal links help search engine crawlers grasp the relationships between sites, which leads to enhanced indexation and ranking potential.
Best Practices for URL Structure and Hierarchy
URLs are also an important part of SaaS technical SEO because they provide clear navigation paths and improve the user experience. Additionally, search engines understand the hierarchy on your website, especially if you incorporate the best URL practices that reflect the page’s content perfectly.
Here are some best practices for URL structure and hierarchy:
- Use keywords in your URLs.
- Keep your URLs short and concise.
- Avoid using special characters in your URLs.
- Use a consistent URL structure throughout your website.
Examples of good SaaS URLs:
Let’s say we have a domain saasproduct.com, and we need to set a good URL hierarchy. Here are a few examples:
Good URLs (they’re clear, concise, and descriptive):
https://saasproduct.com/features/user-authentication
https://saasproduct.com/blog/tips-for-secure-saas-authentication
https://saasproduct.com/pricing/basic-plan
Bad URLs (unclear with lack of descriptive elements):
https://saasproduct.com/page1
https://saasproduct.com/post123
https://saasproduct.com/423jk6
Conclusion on SaaS Technical SEO
Technical SEO, obviously, is an important part of a SaaS company’s marketing strategy. It’s not just about the code – in the SaaS realm, tech SEO delivers exceptional digital journeys, improved rankings, and more conversions. No matter how Google or other search engines’ algorithm changes, technical SEO for SaaS is the recipe for an online victory.
So, let’s summarize the most important takeaways from this article:
- Technical SEO is a common practice for optimizing the technical aspects of a SaaS website
- SaaS companies rely on technical capabilities to generate leads and sales
- The main technical SEO for SaaS elements are crawlability, indexability, technical errors, mobile friendliness, page speed, and security
- SaaS companies should implement mobile responsiveness, site speed optimization, structured data, and SSL certificates
- URL structure is essential for SaaS SEO
- A clear and intuitive site structure and internal linking strategies can also help to improve the SEO of a SaaS website
By following the best practices of technical SEO, SaaS companies can improve their chances of success in the competitive online marketplace.
