Why Going Headless Can Be Great for Your Website's SEO

Intro

SEO is not just about keywords, content optimization, meta data, schema, technical SEO and other SEO jargon.

In today’s fast-paced digital world, speed also matters. Your website’s speed and performance can make or break its chances of grabbing a spot in the podium places of Google’s SERP.

Research by Backlinko found that the top 10 positions in Google’s SERP had an average page speed of 1.65 seconds.

Be it an eCommerce store, a content-heavy website or just a company website, having a website that's both fast and user-friendly is imperative.

Traditional website architecture is cumbersome and doesn’t fair very well against its contemporary competitor. Yes, we mean Headless.

Now, you must have surely heard the term "Headless Architecture" going around a lot these days.

Well, as it turns out, going headless can have some significant benefits for your website's SEO. In this article, we'll explore the concept of Headless Architecture, explain how it impacts SEO, and discuss the benefits of going headless for your website.

What is Headless Architecture?

Headless Architecture or Headless is indeed a very hot topic currently. If you're not familiar with the term you might be wondering what all the buzz is about.

Headless refers to a website architecture wherein the frontend (the part of the website that users see and interact with) and the backend (the part of the website that handles data storage and processes user requests) are separated from each other.

Both the frontend and backend are connected through APIs which makes communication between both ends possible and makes things happen.

Let’s take a simple example to understand this better. Imagine you are at a restaurant. The dining hall you are sitting in is the frontend, the kitchen is the backend and the waiters fulfilling your requests are the APIs.

This contrasts with traditional website architecture, where the frontend and backend are tightly woven together. Any changes you make in the backend will have a direct effect on the backend and vice versa. This makes traditional architecture rigid as it lacks flexibility and convenience to make changes easily.

Benefits of Going Headless

With headless being the buzzword these days, every other article on the internet must be telling you to go headless as it is so great. But why exactly is going headless so great? Let’s take a look at what’s in it for you if you decide to go with it.

Improved Performance

With headless architecture, because the frontend and backend are separate, the frontend can be optimized for speed and performance. This can result in faster page load times and better overall website performance.

According to a research by Google, websites that load in under 5 seconds have a 70% longer average session duration compared to websites that take longer than 5 seconds to load.

So, improving your website speed will for sure help you hit those analytics metrics you want.

Greater Flexibility

Separating the frontend and backend also means that you have more control over the design and functionality of your website.

For example, you can use different technologies for the frontend and backend, which can give you more flexibility to shape your website the way you want it, and tailor it as per your needs.

Additionally, the marketing team can make changes to the website without having to depend on developers. How great is that for us marketers?

Improved SEO

By providing clean, structured code and fast load times, headless architecture can have a positive impact on your website's search engine rankings.

This in turn will help you increase your business revenue. Afterall, isn’t that why we do marketing?

In fact, a case study by BigCommerce found that going headless resulted in a 400% increase in revenue and an 80% increase in conversion rates for one of their clients.

Better UX

A fast and user-friendly website is essential for providing your users with a good time. Separating the frontend and backend allows you to create a more seamless and user-friendly experience, but more importantly, happier users.

For example, you can use a separate frontend application to create a progressive web app (PWA), which can provide a more app-like experience for your users.

Reduced Costs

By choosing to go headless, you can use different technologies for the frontend and backend. This can help you save a considerable amount of money on development and maintenance costs.

For example, you can use a simple, lightweight frontend application like React or Vue.js, which can be faster and easier to develop than a traditional frontend.

Understanding SEO

Before we dive into the SEO benefits of going headless, it's important to understand what SEO is and how it works.

SEO, or search engine optimization, is the process of optimizing your website to rank higher in search engine results pages (SERPs). The higher your website ranks, the more traffic it's likely to receive.

As discussed in the beginning of the article, this involves a variety of techniques including on-page optimization: using relevant keywords, content optimization and meta tags, off-page optimization: like building high-quality backlinks, and technical optimization: i.e., improving site speed and crawlability.

At the base of all this comes how well you have designed and structured your website.

How Website Architecture Impacts SEO

Website Architecture is a major factor that impacts SEO performance. In a traditional website architecture, the frontend and backend are tightly bound together. This makes it difficult for you to optimize the website for speed and performance.

Continuing with a traditional architecture can lead to slower page load times, which can negatively impact your website's SEO performance.

The good news is that with headless architecture and its decoupled frontend and backend, you have the ability to enhance your website’s speed & performance, and thus your website’s SEO performance as well.

So how does website architecture impact SEO? In short, search engines like Google prioritize websites that have clean, well-structured code, fast load times, and good mobile performance, and headless is the way to go if you want Google to love your website and make it rank well.

SEO Benefits of Going Headless

After having known how good headless can be for your SEO, you must be keen to know how exactly headless is going to boost your SEO efforts. Let’s have a look.

Improved Website & Page Speed

By optimizing your frontend for speed and performance, you can improve your website and its page speed, hence resulting in better SEO performance.

As mentioned earlier, websites that load faster tend to perform better in search engine rankings.

With headless architecture, you can reduce the size and complexity of your frontend code, which can lead to faster load times. For example, a case study by Semrush mentions how an eCommerce company was able to cut down their page load time from 7 seconds to 2.8 seconds by simply going headless.

Better Mobile Performance

With more and more users accessing the web through mobile devices, having a mobile-optimized website is essential for SEO.

Headless architecture can help you create a mobile-first website that performs well on any device.

Speed becomes ever more imperative when it comes to mobile phones as mobile users are often less patient and are looking for quick answers. Stats show us how a whopping 53% of mobile users would abandon a site that takes more than 3 seconds to load.

Better Page Structure and Crawlability

For your website to rank, it must be first crawled by search engines. Search engines rely on crawlers to identify and index your website and determine its relevance for various search queries.

While you have no control over crawling, as marketers you can definitely give some guidance to crawlers in the process. A website with clean, well-structured code makes it easier for crawlers to navigate, understand and index.

This in turn can lead to better search engine rankings and more organic traffic. For example, Brightly, an eco friendly and sustainable eCommerce store saw a 5% increase in organic traffic after going headless

Enhanced User Experience

Your entire online business or website depends on how good a user experience you provide your visitors. If your website has a bad UX then even a good business won’t perform well.

Even search engines like Google give high priority to UX. Search engines want people to find websites that are the most relevant to them, but also websites which are easy for them to browse through.

Going headless can help you create a more seamless and user-friendly experience for your visitors.

Easier Metadata Management

Meta data, another important aspect of on-page optimization, includes title tags and meta descriptions which tell users and search engines what your website is about.

With headless architecture, you can use a separate frontend application to manage your metadata, which can make it easier to update and optimize.

Many Headless CMS’s and Visual Website Builders have in-built SEO features from which marketers can easily manage their meta data and make all changes live in seconds with just a click of a button.

Marketers can simply do this on their own without having to depend on coders.

SEO-Optimized Content Model

Being in control means you can have it the way you want it. By adopting a headless architecture, you can tailor a content model that's optimized as per your SEO needs.

This means that you can structure your content in a way that makes it easy for search engines to understand and index.

For example, you can use structured data (eg: JSON-LD) to provide additional context to search engines about your content.

Potential challenges of going headless

Going Headless from scratch

Migrating to a Headless architecture and doing it from scratch can prove to be a colossal task.

Firstly, although very simple, doing it from scratch can be a tad bit complicated, and would require a lot of technical expertise to implement and maintain this new system. This also means dealing with separate frontend platforms, hosting services, CDNs, Headless CMS and Backend. Which can be a bit of a hassle.

Also, if you rely on third-party tools or services, you may need to ensure that they are compatible with your headless architecture. This can require additional integration work and testing. It can also become somewhat time-consuming because it requires more planning, development time, and the technical complexities involved may require additional testing and troubleshooting.

Does this make you think that you’re better off now rather than going Headless? Well, there is a way around everything after all. If migrating seems like a daunting task for you, then the best option for you is going with an integrated and fully composable platform like Experro.

Use Cases/Examples of Web Performance & SEO Optimization with Headless

Here are some real-world examples of websites that have seen improved web performance and SEO optimization with headless architecture.

Ranktracker

Always practice what you preach. The Ranktracker website is itself built on the Headless Architecture. Going headless was a super choice for Ranktracker and we do see the benefits of doing it.

eCommerce Websites

eCommerce websites can benefit greatly from headless architecture. For example, in an eCommerce leaders survey from 2020, it is stated that 62% of companies agreed that going headless can help them significantly improve engagement and conversions.

Content-Heavy Websites

Content-heavy websites (e.g., blogs and news sites) can be great beneficiaries of the headless architecture. The bigger the site or the more content it has, the slower it becomes. Adoption of the Headless approach can help such websites not compromise on their performance.

Conclusion

Going Headless is not a direct stairway to getting your website ranked on the top levels of Google’s SERP. However, it does help make your website more SEO-friendly, and this could contribute significantly to getting you there.

While headless architecture may not be the right choice for every website, it's worth considering if you're looking to improve your website's performance and SEO. After all, both people and search engines love a website that is fast and gives an amazing User Experience.

So, whether you're running an eCommerce website, a content-heavy blog, or a progressive web app, going headless could be just the solution you need to take your website's online performance to the next level.