Can you get SEO right with a simple static site?

Hello!
The short answer is no. 🤓

A well optimized static page will perform just as well SEO wise as one made with Webflow, Wordpress or any other (even better in terms of loading speed).

90% of SEO is content that solves well the user's search intent and the authority of the website within the sector.

Yes, it is possible to achieve good search engine optimization (SEO) with a simple static site. While dynamic and content management system (CMS) platforms offer more flexibility and advanced features for SEO, a well-optimized static site can still perform well in search engine rankings.

Here are a few considerations to help optimize a static site for SEO:

Content: Focus on creating high-quality, relevant, and unique content that aligns with your target keywords and provides value to your audience. Incorporate relevant keywords naturally within your content, including headings, titles, and meta tags.

On-Page Optimization: Optimize your static site's on-page elements such as title tags, meta descriptions, and URL structure. Ensure that they accurately reflect the content and include relevant keywords.

Page Speed: Improve your site's loading speed by optimizing images, leveraging browser caching, and minifying code. Faster loading times enhance user experience and can positively impact your site's SEO.

Mobile Responsiveness: Ensure that your static site is mobile-friendly and responsive across different devices. Mobile usability is a crucial ranking factor, and search engines prioritize mobile-friendly sites.

URL Structure: Use descriptive and keyword-rich URLs for your static site's pages. Clear and concise URLs are easier for search engines to understand and can contribute to better rankings.

Backlinks: Although a static site may have limitations in generating dynamic content for link building, you can still pursue relevant link-building opportunities. Reach out to other websites or blogs in your niche for guest posting or partnership opportunities to acquire quality backlinks.

XML Sitemap: Create an XML sitemap for your static site and submit it to search engines like Google. This helps search engines discover and index your pages more efficiently.

Social Media Integration: Promote your static site's content through social media channels. This can increase visibility, generate traffic, and potentially attract backlinks.

Remember that while these optimizations can improve your static site's SEO, there are other factors involved in search engine rankings, such as competition, user behavior, and algorithm updates. Regular monitoring, analysis, and adjustments based on SEO best practices are essential to maintain and improve your site's visibility in search results.

Completely unrelated, but the AI-generated human in your intro video is extremely creepy 😨

static pages are good for seo so what you are doing is fine. Couple of observations

1. Your blog is attempting to load all the articles at once which is slow for users it would be good if you can paginate it.
2. Add related content to your blog i.e. show other articles in your blog related to the current article this has two advantages, one is you are able to retain user longer on your website and two is it is better for seo as it make se job easier in finding realted content.
3. TOC would be good for users
4. Add sharing button to different social media so that users can share it with their friends this will help in backlinks.
5. You have already added og and twitter cards also add json-ld. just look for technical seo you will get the list of other meta tags.

All these options are configurable from jekyll you don't have to code them by yourself look for other themes that implement these features and use them in your blog.

I would say it's an advantage to have a static website (the fastest option) and very simple tech stack for indexing.

Having said that, I hope you have some CMS (maybe use Wordpress server to host your articles and just query them via api to show on your domain) so that you can quickly churn out content. I see you only have around 30 pages indexed with google - can type site:mysite.com to check.

I was running a large Next.JS website (100k pages) and with this 'cool' tech stack, I had these issues:

• JS execution depleted your crawl budget faster than simple tech stacks. Basically, google never really indexes our site fully.
• Also, JS gives you enough rope to hang yourself. Specifically, there's a lot of JS mistakes that can bite you. It's best to assume that google CANNOT render JS (to check how google sees your page: https://search.google.com/test/mobile-friendly). We did a lot of Conditional Rendering {isActive && <YourComponent/>} and google was never able to see our content.
• Had issues with google finding internal links (must specify href in Link component), image component (back then) caused CLS issues, etc. etc.

Yes definitely!!! Static websites can be SEO-friendly and website builders and blog tools come with SEO focused features and plugins. You can get the offer on built-in optimization options such as customizable meta tags, XML sitemaps, canonical URLs, and SEO-friendly URLs, making it easier to optimize your content for search engines.

A site like yours has a great advantage, compared to CMS and builder ones, which is speed. Being the site light and agile, if well optimized and responsive, you are in advantage compared to other platforms.
Implement schema markup, keep testing Google Speed insights and Search console, and you own your destiny (or at least your website's ) ;-)

Your page is good, I personally don't think there is anything that will pull you down.
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The only benefit of those platforms is that you don't have to code (for whom so every this is as for me not able to code is boring) also they come with a lot of plugins/extensions which can make your life a little easier like Yoast SEO for WordPress.

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You need to just need to add meta tags and some little changes.
In those platforms, they might give you a form where you can enter let's say the page title whereas in your case you will have to just go and edit the
<title>{YOUR_TITLE_HERE}</title>.
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I don't think this at all makes it difficult, its just pretty much the same thing.
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And if this feels repetitive, just note entering stuff on the page for SEO will be just a small part, finding keywords, and maintaining them will be the major part and you need to do that for WordPress too.
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I don't think you should really think about this.