Help search engines find your site

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Help search engines find your site

Last updated October 02, 2026 14:16

Tips to make your site appear in search results.

Use Squarespace's SEO-targeting features and other tools to increase your site's visibility to search engines.

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Attend a webinar

Sign up for our SEO with your Squarespace site webinar which covers SEO best practices and how you can use our built-in tools to make your site easier to find. We’ll explain SEO, how to choose keywords, and how to structure text headings.

Re-index your site after major updates

Search engines won't notice changes to your site right away. Google and Bing have search tools to help you manage your site's search presence. Whenever you make major changes to your site, ask search engines to re-index your content using these tools:

Customize page and site titles

Search engines rank your site content in this order:

  • Site title
  • SEO titles
  • Page titles
  • Blog post titles
  • Headings

Set default title formats for the homepage, collections (like blog, products, and calendar pages), and collection items (like blog posts and events). These titles appear in browser tabs and search results, so make them clear to both humans and search bots.

Add SEO titles and navigation titles

Each page on your site has an SEO title and navigation title. Edit these titles in page settings.

  • SEO titles - These appear in search results and browser tabs, and search engines index them. Have one for each page. SEO titles are a good place to promote keywords for search engines. You can also add SEO titles for individual collection items, like blog posts, products, and events.
  • Navigation titles - These create links in your navigation menus. Keep these short, like “About” or “Contact.”

Tip: If there's no SEO title, the page title displays in search results. In version 7.0, page titles appear on your site in some templates. Search engines see this text.

Add keywords strategically

As you add text to your site, include words and phrases that match the search terms people use to find sites like yours. These keywords help search engines show your site to the people looking for those search terms. Avoid keyword stuffing.

Your keyword strategy depends on your site and the visitors you're trying to reach. Add keywords in a clear, natural way that makes sense to humans.

Use headings

Use heading text formatting to organize page text. Like titles, search engines give rank headings highly. Clear headings that describe the page text make it easier for search engines to find the major themes of your site. At the same time, they help visitors skim your page and quickly find the information they're looking for. Use headings in descending order to funnel visitors from the broadest information to the most specific. Keep in mind:

  • Use the same heading sizes on the page and across your site.
  • Don't use the same text for multiple headings.
  • Add keywords to your headings.
  • If your headings are structured the same across pages, you can use the same type of heading multiple times on a page.
  • Avoid using headings to create formatting effects, like pull quotes. If you use headings to create pull quotes, ensure your quote includes content important to the page, like keywords.

Review an example of a well structured page

Here's an example of a well-structured page. Note that “Environment” and “Age” are assigned Heading 2, and “Water,” “Light,” and “Temperature” are assigned Heading 3:

A text block with headings varying in size structures the content of the block into clearly defined topics.

Add alt text to images

Alt text describes an image. This text displays when people hover over it, and makes your site more accessible.

Search engines use alt text to learn what's on the page, because bots can only read text. When images have alt text, search engines know what the image shows and they can include it in relevant searches.

When adding alt text, follow our alt text best practices.

Add tags and categories

Search engines scan tags and categories to learn what products, blog posts, or gallery images are about. Tags and categories describe the item clearly could help it appear in search results. Tags and categories also help visitors use your site, and appear in your site's search results.

Where you can add categories and tags

You can add categories and tags to these collection items: ;

  • Products
  • Blog posts
  • Gallery images

You can't add them to:

Start blogging

Add a blog to your Squarespace site. Posting often shows search engines your site is active. Even if you're a business and not a blogger, adding a blog page and updating it regularly with relevant content could help your SEO while building your brand.

When adding blog posts, use tags and categories, and structure your posts with Heading 1 and Heading 2 formatting. Squarespace formats blog post titles as Heading 1 on all version 7.1 sites and most version 7.0 templates.

As you write blog posts, think about your target audience and what they might search for to find a site like yours. Add content that would appeal to them, and add keywords to the post, especially in post titles and headings.

Reduce page load time

Page load time may affect your ranking in search results. When you can, reduce your page size for faster loading.

Add your physical location

If you're a business with a physical location, adding your address to your site could help visitors find you in location-based services. Add your location in:

Add site and page descriptions

You can add SEO descriptions for your site, individual pages, and some collection items. These descriptions may appear below the title or link in search results, depending on the search terms visitors use.

Visitors read these descriptions to decide whether to click the result. To make your site inviting, keep your descriptions short, relevant, and readable.

Page description appears below the site title and URL in search results.

Enable SSL

When you enable SSL, your custom URL starts with https. This means visitors access every page of your site with a secure connection. Search engines consider SSL important and may rank sites that don't have it enabled lower. To check if SSL is enabled for your site, go to the SSL panel and confirm it's set to Secure.

Learn how to optimize your site for AI-powered search engines

More people now search with ChatGPT, Google’s AI Overview, Gemini, Bing’s Copilot, and Perplexity. Learn how to improve your content’s reach and visibility in AI-powered search engines and chatbots.

More help

Because search engine technology changes often, and everyone's marketing needs are unique, Squarespace Customer Support can't assist with SEO strategy. We can't guarantee specific results like ranking changes or how your site appears in search results. To get more help with SEO:

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Help search engines find your site