My Site Isn't Showing on Google
“My site isn’t showing on Google” can mean two different problems with entirely different fixes: either your site isn’t in Google’s index at all, or it is but doesn’t rank. Work out which one first — it takes a minute.
First check: are you indexed?
Search Google for:
site:yourdomain.com
No results means your site has never been indexed. Results appear but the page you want isn’t among them? That page isn’t indexed. Neither is a “ranking problem”, and neither is fixed by ranking work.
If you’ve never been indexed: the four usual causes
1. The “discourage search engines” box is ticked. WordPress has this option under Settings → Reading, and it gets ticked during development and forgotten at launch. This is the most common cause I find, and the easiest to fix.
2. robots.txt is blocking. Open yourdomain.com/robots.txt. If it contains Disallow: /, you’re telling Google not to crawl anything.
3. The site is very new. A new domain takes time to enter the index. Adding the site to Search Console and submitting a sitemap shortens this noticeably.
4. A noindex tag. If a page is marked noindex, Google sees it but won’t list it. A setting toggled by accident in an SEO plugin can apply this to an entire page type.
If you’re indexed but not ranking
This is a different job. Ranking asks whether your page answers that query better than the competition. Check in order:
- Does the target phrase appear in the page title and the first paragraph?
- Is there genuinely enough content for that query, or three sentences?
- How thorough are the competing pages? If you say less than they do, Google has no reason to prefer you.
- Is the site technically sound — a technical SEO audit measures this.
Set up Search Console
The tool is free and lets you read, rather than guess, most of the answers above: which pages are indexed, which are excluded and why, which queries you appear for, and how many clicks you get. If it isn’t set up, that’s the first job.
Want me to look? I can map your indexing status and show you each blocker. Get in touch.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do I add my site to Google?
Add and verify the site in Search Console and submit your sitemap. There is no paid “submission” process; if someone offers one, it isn’t real.
How long until I appear?
With no technical blockers, new pages can enter the index within days. Reaching the top is a separate and much longer job — I compared ads versus SEO on another page.
Will running ads improve my organic ranking?
No, the two systems are separate. Ads buy today’s visibility and don’t influence organic position.
My business isn’t on Maps either, same problem?
No, that’s a separate system. Map results come from your Google Business Profile, independent of whether your site is indexed.
How do I work?
Work-hour packages
Tell me about your website and what you need on WhatsApp or by phone; we agree on a work block of somewhere between 5 and 40 hours and I start doing what is needed. What you get is not a calendar window — it is net working hours spent directly on your business. I can use 40 hours working three days straight, or deliberately spread it out and finish it over a year — whatever the work calls for. I do not spend my time estimating how long something will take, I spend it doing the work; every hour I spend has a lasting result on your site. We keep going for as long as you find it useful.
Why not monthly?
Is 40 hours a week?
On a fixed monthly fee both sides are watching the wrong thing: you watch a fixed cost, the other side watches how many more contracts like this they can line up. Working by the hour puts us both in front of the same thing — the real value of the work that got done. I know not having an upfront answer to "how much will this cost in total?" is the natural cost of this model. But instead of paying a fixed fee for months to a setup that is not producing results, you only pay for the qualified time spent on your work — and you see exactly where that time went, start to finish. That is why my clients keep coming back.