Is Weebly Good for SEO? A Comprehensive Analysis

With over 1.1 billion websites on the internet, a lot of these have been made with CMS (Content Management Systems) or website builders that are cheaper, easier to understand, and good for small businesses that are going online for the first time. Such a website builder Weebly is widely used to create websites in minutes, without requiring prior coding knowledge. 

Despite Weebly being convenient, the challenging part is to optimise your Weebly website for SEO. Many users struggle to improve their site visibility on search engines, which is essential for getting clicks, leads, and conversions.

If you have a Weebly website, read this guide to enhance your seo and drive better results.

Understanding Weebly’s SEO Capabilities

The good news is that Weebly has its in-built tools and apps designed to manage your website. Although basic, these tools can help you ensure an error-free website with primary hygiene checks:

1. Editable Technical SEO Components: With Weebly, you can customise your URLs, meta titles and descriptions for your pages anytime. Although this website builder doesn’t show if you are exceeding character count explicitly, you can manually check from a character count beforehand.

2. Keep a check on 301 Redirects: Broken links can negatively impact your website’s rankings, so you can keep tabs on them. So, whenever you are moving your pages or restructuring your content, you can set up 301 redirects and redirect traffic from old URLs to new ones. This is important so you can avoid 404 errors and maintain your search engine rankings.

Note: To set up a 301 redirect in Weebly, go to Settings > SEO and scroll down to the 301 redirects section. Next, add redirects by entering the old URL and selecting the new destination page.

3. Automatic Image Compression: Whenever you upload an image to your website, Weebly automatically compresses it, which is beneficial for your SEO. Large image files can take up more space, leading to increased load time and negatively impact your website performance. This can also lead to a better user experience, lower bounce rates, and most of all, improved user engagement. 

4. Sitemap Generation: A sitemap is used for search engine indexing to inform search engines about the important pages in your website. Since Weebly automatically creates a dynamic sitemap, you don’t have to create one and manually upload it on Google Search Console. Whenever you add or remove any pages, your sitemap updates accordingly.

Note: To see your sitemap on Weebly, add “sitemap.xml” after your website’s address, like – “www.abc.com/sitemap.xml.” You can submit your website to Google and help it index your pages more efficiently.

5. Mobile-First Designs: Mobile users make up for 63% of the world’s web traffic, making it paramount for websites to be mobile-responsive. All websites created on Weebly are mobile-optimised, which is a plus point for you as Google’s algorithms favour such websites. 

Why Weebly Makes for a Great Website Builder for SEO

This is why Weebly is chosen by millions of users to make an SEO-friendly website:

1. Comes with basic SEO Features: You can get your basic SEO checklist done with updating your meta titles, descriptions, and URLs. However, Weebly doesn’t handle sitemap submissions directly, so you will have to manage your sitemap through Google Search Console as part of a  more holistic practice.

2. User-Engaging Template: You can find decent templates on Weebly which will be easy to optimise for mobile users. Whether you need a blog website or an eCommerce store, Weebly can make the cut with appropriate sections for user engagement.

3. Fast, Easy, and Efficient: With Weebly, you can be an SEO checker, a website manager and a developer, all at once. Convenience is the main advantage of using Weebly, and it can help you get a cost-effective website if you are starting out and don’t need complex coding.

Limitations of Weebly for SEO

Although Weebly has a lot to offer in SEO, it does come with its sets of disadvantages:

1. Limited Integrations: You can’t install SEO plugins directly on Weebly like Yoast SEO or Ahrefs. Features like these are present in WordPress, where you can easily check the SEO score of any meta titles/descriptions or pages that you add. 

2. Limited Control over Technical SEO: You may miss out on certain SEO elements that Weebly doesn’t offer, such as canonical tags. Nevertheless, you can add them manually.
   
3. Dependence on Third-Party Apps: Weebly supports only H2 tags in its editor. For incorporating H3, H4, you will need to install a third-party app and add code manually, adding to your work. It also restricts the use of link attributes such as “rel” or “onclick,” limiting the ability to track your visitor interactions or incorporate any link strategies.

Weebly SEO vs. Other Website Builders

Here’s how Weebly stacks up against other website building platforms:

Best SEO Practices for Weebly Users

To make the most of your Weebly SEO strategy, follow these tips:

• Keep Your Technical SEO Updated: It’s crucial to keep your website optimised by focusing on your site speed, structured data, indexing, and its mobile friendliness. Also make sure to regularly review and update these for growing your search engine rankings consistently.

• Add Alt Text for Images: Images with alt text can improve overall accessibility and SEO. Don’t miss out on these whenever you are adding a new image on your website.

• Optimise your URLs: If you are including target keywords in your URLs for better search engines ranking, also make sure your URLs are short, clean, and descriptive. Short URLs are great for easy brand recall and also contribute to higher usability.

• Use Weebly’s own SEO Apps: Weebly’s SEO Booster and other apps can help you analyse and improve your website’s SEO. 

• Regularly Update Content: Make sure the content you are uploading is EEAT compliant, as it can help maintain search engine interest and improve rankings.

Final Verdict

It is clear that Weebly can help you get an SEO-ready website with basic support, if you are seeking a straightforward, simple website. If you are starting out with a website for your local business NZ, a digital portfolio or a blogging website, Weebly can be a great head start.

However for complex SEO integrations, you might find platforms like WordPress better in terms of optimisation.
Want expert assistance for your online business? Let an SEO agency in Auckland help you with this. Contact us for a free Weebly website consultation.