You've built your website—whether it's a portfolio, a freelance business site, or a personal blog. You've pushed the code, and it's live. But you're not done yet.
Building the site is only half the battle. To verify that people can actually find your site and to understand how they use it, you need to take a few critical next steps: setting up analytics, registering with search engines, and auditing your performance.
Here is your checklist for what to do next.
1. Analytics: Know Your Audience
You can't improve what you don't measure. Analytics tools help you track visitor numbers, user behavior, and traffic sources.
Google Analytics 4 (GA4)
Google Analytics is the industry standard for web tracking.
- Go to Google Analytics and click "Start measuring".
- Create an Account: Enter your account name (e.g., "My Portfolio").
- Create a Property: Enter your website name and time zone.
- Get Tag: Choose "Web" as your platform, enter your URL, and create the stream.
- Install Code: Copy the global site tag (
gtag.js) provided and paste it into the<head>section of every page on your website.- Note: Data collection starts almost immediately after you install the code.
2. Search Engine Visibility: Get Indexed
Just because your site is live doesn't mean Google knows it exists. You need to explicitly tell search engines about it.
Google Search Console (GSC)
This is the most important tool for SEO. It tells you how Google crawls and ranks your site.
- Go to Google Search Console.
- Add Property: Select "URL prefix" or "Domain" (Domain is better but requires DNS verification).
- Verify Ownership: Follow the steps to verify you own the site (usually by adding a TXT record to your DNS or uploading an HTML file).
- Submit Sitemap: Once verified, go to the "Sitemaps" tab and submit your
sitemap.xml. This is crucial for getting indexed quickly.
Bing Webmaster Tools
Bing powers search for Microsoft, Yahoo, and DuckDuckGo.
- Go to Bing Webmaster Tools.
- Import: You can skip the manual setup by clicking "Import from Google Search Console". This syncs your sites instantly.
DuckDuckGo
DuckDuckGo does not have a separate submission portal. It primarily uses Bing's index. By submitting your site to Bing Webmaster Tools, you are automatically optimizing for DuckDuckGo.
3. Performance & Auditing: Stay Fast
A slow site hurts your SEO and frustrates users. Use these tools to audit your quality.
Google PageSpeed Insights & Lighthouse
These are auditing tools, not accounts you "add" your site to.
- PageSpeed Insights: Go to PageSpeed Insights, enter your URL, and hit Analyze. It will give you a score out of 100 based on core web vitals.
- Lighthouse: Open your website in Chrome, press
F12(DevTools), go to the Lighthouse tab, and click "Analyze page load".
Target Goal: Aim for all green scores (90+) for the best user experience.
4. Technical Essentials
To make the steps above work smoothly, ensure your site has these two files:
- sitemap.xml: A file that lists every page on your website so search engines can read it.
- robots.txt: A text file that tells search engine crawlers which parts of your site they are allowed to visit.
Summary: Don't just publish and pray. Install Analytics to track growth, submit your sitemap to Search Console to get found, and audit your speed to keep visitors happy.
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