How to improve technical SEO on Shopify with TinyIMG?

Technical SEO optimization is crucial for Shopify stores that want to achieve high rankings by making it easier for search engines to crawl their pages and understand their content. However, technical SEO requires coding knowledge, so beginner merchants may struggle ranking even with strong on-page and off-page SEO strategies.

That’s where TinyIMG comes into play – it helps optimize your store while taking care of the technical parts. You can easily add structured data, manage page indexing, fix broken links, and boost website speed without touching code.

In this guide, I’ll show you how to optimize technical SEO on Shopify with TinyIMG so you don’t miss out on opportunities to reach the highest rankings.

What is technical SEO on Shopify?

Technical SEO on Shopify is a type of SEO optimization that focuses on improving your website’s infrastructure. It covers areas like site structure, speed optimization, structured data, mobile-friendliness, SSL security, fixing crawl errors, and duplicate content issues.

Unlike on-page SEO or off-page SEO, technical SEO aims to optimize the website so that it’s easier for search engines to understand and index.

Shopify handles some parts of technical SEO by default, like sitemap creation or HTTPS implementation. However, advanced practices require technical knowledge. If you’re not familiar with coding, many tasks can be automated with TinyIMG, like adding different types of structured data or managing page indexing.

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Why is technical SEO important for Shopify stores?

Based on our experience with Shopify stores, merchants often overlook technical SEO, which limits their stores’ chances to rank higher in search engines. In reality, even if you focus on on-page SEO and optimize your content, you’re unlikely to get the best results without optimizing your store’s infrastructure.

First, technical SEO helps improve your store’s structure so that search engines can understand your content more easily. This helps them crawl and index pages better, improving your chances of ranking higher.

Plus, many of the technical SEO optimization aspects are direct ranking factors. For example, HTTPS has been a ranking factor on Google since 2014, while mobile speed optimization has been a ranking factor since 2018.

But technical SEO isn’t just about search engines – it’s also about creating a good user experience. This includes ensuring a clear and easy website navigation, a fast page load time, and no broken links that could increase bounce rates.

How to optimize technical SEO on Shopify with TinyIMG?

Optimizing technical SEO on Shopify involves tasks that require coding. However, most of them can also be automated using TinyIMG. Let’s review the best practices to follow.

Submit your sitemap to Google

When you have a clean site structure, you can submit your XML sitemap to Google. An XML sitemap is a text file with organized information about your site’s structure and URLs, acting like your site’s roadmap.

To submit a sitemap to Google, you’ll need to create a Google Search Console account and verify your website. You can then connect your account to TinyIMG and manage sitemaps straight from your Shopify Admin. Here’s how:

1. Open TinyIMG and go to Improve SEO > Use Search Console.
2. Click “Manage” under Sitemaps.
3. Insert your website’s URL together with “sitemap.xml” (like example.com/sitemap.xml).
4. Click Add and wait for the Status to say Active.

From our own experience, we’ve noticed that new Shopify pages get indexed within a few days of sitemap submission.

Use the Noindex tag when needed

The Noindex tag is used to tell search engines what pages to exclude from search results. It should be used sparingly to prevent accidentally removing valuable pages from search engines. Only apply the Noindex tag on pages that provide little to no value for your site visitors. On Shopify, this can be:

• Duplicate content pages
• Login or admin pages
• Internal search results
• Low-value filtered URLs (faceted navigation combinations that create thin content)

If you’re not familiar with coding, you can use the TinyIMG Shopify SEO app to manage page indexing. Here’s how:

1. Open TinyIMG, go to Improve SEO > Manage pages.
2. Open the types of pages you want to manage indexing for.
3. Click Deactivate on pages you want to disable indexing on.

Add structured data

JSON-LD structured data is a code format added to a site’s HTML that helps search engines and AI systems better understand the content of your pages. While auditing Shopify stores, we’ve noticed that stores often see a higher CTR on average when properly implementing structured data because of improved listings on search engines.

And we aren’t the only ones who have seen results. According to Google Developers, on 80% of pages on which The Food Network enabled structured data, the company saw a 35% boost in visits.

One example of how structured data helps is rich results – enhanced search results that display information about your page, such as reviews, ratings, returns, discounts, or other information.

Adding JSON-LD to your website requires knowing how to code. If you’re not into the technical part, you can simplify JSON-LD setup with TinyIMG. Here’s how to add JSON-LD to your website:

1. Open TinyIMG and go to Improve SEO > Set up JSON-LD.
2. Add information about your store and click Save.
3. Now, click Add Theme extension and enable the JSON-LD types. Press Save.

JSON-LD structured data is now added to your store. You can monitor whether your pages get rich results in Google Search Console > Enhancements (product snippets can be found under the Shopping report).

Identify and fix broken links

Broken links, or 404 pages, are an important part of technical SEO because they affect the user experience and search engine crawling. It’s a common issue on Shopify when discontinued products get removed without first creating redirects, which leads to wasted crawl budget and lost traffic.

If a user clicks on a page that returns a 404 error, it can cause frustration and increase the bounce rate.

Meanwhile, search engines like Google may even exclude broken pages from being indexed. According to Google’s December 2025 Critical update documentation, pages returning non-200 HTTP status codes, including the 404 broken pages, may be skipped from rendering.

To fix broken links, you need to create redirects to non-broken pages. For example, if you deleted a product, you could create a redirect to a category with similar products.

TinyIMG lets you create redirect rules so that you don’t have to manually fix each page every time an issue occurs. All you need to do is follow these steps:

1. Open TinyIMG and go to Improve SEO > Fix broken links > Redirect rules.
2. Click Add redirect rule and set the rule type, value, and where to redirect to.
3. Click Save.

Plus, it lets you set up broken link reports so you don’t miss any page issues in the future.

Set up IndexNow instant indexing

IndexNow is an indexing protocol that allows instantly notifying search engines about content changes, like new pages or updates. Note that this protocol is supported on the following search engines: Microsoft Bing, Naver, Seznam, Yandex, and Yep.

Meanwhile, Google still relies on regular crawling to discover new content or updates.

The easiest way to set up IndexNow on Shopify is to use a third-party app, like TinyIMG. All it takes is going to Improve SEO > Set up IndexNow > Activate.

That’s it – TinyIMG will automatically submit URLs for instant indexing.

Optimize for the Core Web Vitals

Core Web Vitals are performance metrics by Google that measure the loading time, interactivity, and visual stability of your pages. There are three important metrics that you can monitor using Google PageSpeed Insights:

• Largest Contentful Paint (LCP) – measures page load time and should ideally be under 2.5 seconds.
• Interaction to Next Paint (INP) – monitors responsiveness and should be under 200 milliseconds.
• Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS) – measures visual stability and should be below 0.1.

While performance may not directly affect search engine rankings, Core Web Vitals often show better user engagement metrics, especially on mobile.

For example, research by the Akamai cybersecurity company found that even a 1-second slowdown can cause an around 20% decrease in conversions on average.

To optimize Core Web Vitals metrics on Shopify using TinyIMG, you can use the following practices:

• Optimize images. Images can take up around 22% of total page weight based on Web Almanac research, so it’s important to optimize them. You can do it by compressing your images to reduce the file size. With TinyIMG, you can set up automatic compression by going to Settings > Overview and clicking Activate under “Automatic optimization.”
• Enable lazy loading. Lazy loading is a strategy used to load resources, such as images, only when the user needs them. With TinyIMG, you can enable lazy loading in one click by going to Improve speed > Set up lazy loading > Activate.
• Manage third-party scripts. Third-party apps may load scripts on pages where they aren’t necessary, making your site slower. You can disable the scripts on specific pages. If you don’t know how to code, you can use TinyIMG to disable different scripts with a click of a button by going to Improve speed > Manage scripts.
• Minify CSS and JavaScript files. CSS and JavaScript files can take up space if developers don’t optimize the code. You can use TinyIMG to automatically delete any comments or redundant characters that don’t affect code functionality by heading to Improve speed > Minify CSS/JS.

Extra technical SEO optimization tips on Shopify

TinyIMG isn’t a one-click fix for technical SEO – it’s a process that requires regular attention and optimization. For the best results, here are some extra technical SEO tips for Shopify stores to complement your TinyIMG strategy.

Create an SEO-friendly website structure

A website should be well-structured so that search engines can crawl and understand your content while users can easily navigate your site. Most popular Shopify stores that we’ve run audits for use a similar and simple website hierarchy:

Homepage → Category pages → Sub-category pages → Product pages

This creates a clear site structure, with each type of page accessible within just 3-4 clicks from the homepage.

Optimize your internal linking strategy

Internal linking affects how search engines understand your website and how well users can navigate it. When crawling your site, search engines like Googlebot follow links. If there are no internal links on your page, it can be harder for the crawler to find other important pages.

To improve your internal linking strategy, you should consider contextual internal linking, meaning adding links naturally within your content.

Let’s say you’re writing a blog post about how to brew pour over coffee. You can find natural phrases like “filter coffee machine” or “pod machine” to link internally to your category or product pages.

Make sure you also use descriptive and keyword-optimized anchor texts. Instead of generic phrases, like “find out here,” add links on relevant keywords.

Fix duplicate content issues

Duplicate content is a common technical SEO issue where the same or similar content can be accessed through multiple URLs. This can waste the crawl budget, dilute ranking signals, and cause Google to index the wrong page.

Common cases where duplicate content occurs on Shopify include collection pages with filters or product pages in different collections. For example, the same product can be accessed through /products/product-name and /collections/category/products/product-name URLs.

To fix duplicate content issues, you can use canonical tags. They help point duplicate URLs to the main page version. You can follow Shopify’s own guide on how to set canonical tags.

Use Hreflang for your international audience

If your Shopify store is targeting multiple regions, using hreflang tags is crucial to prevent competing versions of the same page in different markets. Hreflang tells search engines which version of a page to show to users based on their language and region. This way, users can see content in their own language.

However, if you’ve chosen the manual method to set up an international store, then you can add hreflang tags in Shopify by following these steps:

1. Open Shopify, go to Online Store > Actions > Edit code.
2. Open the theme.liquid file and find the <head> section.
3. Insert the hreflang tags based on the language you want and click Save. You can see an example of a UK website below.

Alternatively, you can use a Shopify app like GWA: Hreflang Manager. It simplifies hreflang tag setup by automatically adding it for you, so you don’t have to mess with code.

Minimize app bloat

Shopify stores that install loads of apps risk overloading their store. Since each app you install adds a script to your website, it can result in slower page loading times.

We recommend keeping no more than 5-7 apps to limit their impact on Core Web Vitals. If you feel like you need more, consider looking through all-in-one Shopify apps. Unlike single-feature apps, comprehensive apps prevent feature overlaps, keep your store light, and even save money.

Technical SEO aspects that Shopify handles automatically

Shopify has some built-in features that help with technical SEO optimization. Here are the main areas it automates:

• HTTPS. It’s a secure protocol that ensures your data is encrypted. All Shopify stores get free SSL certificates for all of their pages, meaning your website always runs on HTTPS by default.
• Breadcrumbs. Most Shopify themes already come with breadcrumb navigation, so users and search engines can easily follow the site’s structure.
• Sitemap. Shopify automatically creates and regularly updates the XML sitemap of your site, so search engines can crawl your pages efficiently. Still, you need to submit the sitemap yourself. 
• Robots.txt. It's a text file on Shopify that’s set up automatically and is used to tell search engine crawlers what they can access on your site. By default, Shopify disallows access to admin, checkout, cart, and similar pages. You can view it by adding /robots.txt to your domain, like yourdomain.com/robots.txt.

Shopify technical SEO limitations

While Shopify is great for SEO, it also comes with some technical SEO limitations that we’ve noticed over the years. Here are the main drawbacks that we usually encounter:

• URL structure. Shopify is limited when it comes to the URL structure, and there’s no easy fix for this. For example, a good URL structure for category and subcategory pages would look like this: “/shoes/sandals,” but on Shopify, it can only look like this: “/collections/shoes/collections/sandals/.”
• Structured data. Shopify automatically adds basic structured data, including for product pages or breadcrumbs. However, it’s pretty limited, and if you want to include more types of structured data, you need to do it yourself through coding or use a Shopify app like TinyIMG to automate the process.
• No server log file access. Server log file access allows tracking search engine crawler behavior and identifying issues, such as the page status they encounter and what pages they visit. Shopify doesn’t offer access to the server log file, but you can still get valuable insights with tools like Google Search Console.

Final thoughts

Our years of experience with different Shopify stores have shown that sites that invest in technical SEO see great results in terms of both indexing speed and conversion rates. Technical SEO optimization involves such tasks as implementing structured data for enhanced search engine listings, adopting sitemaps and IndexNow for search engines to discover pages faster, and more.

Most of these tasks, like JSON-LD or IndexNow setup, require some coding knowledge. However, beginner merchants can use Shopify apps like TinyIMG to simplify tasks. For example, you can set up IndexNow with a single click, add JSON-LD by embedding app features, or accelerate your site with one-click speed boosting features.

Make sure to always prepare a theme backup just in case, and monitor your results to know if your optimization strategies work.

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About the author

Kristina Jaruseviciute

Kristina is a Content Lead at TinyIMG responsible for informing and educating readers on all things Shopify-related. She covers a broad range of topics around SEO, AI visibility, website performance, and conversion rates to help merchants stand out in a competitive landscape.