SEO report for www.mercurynews.com
https://www.mercurynews.com/ · checked Sun, 01 Nov 2026 20:25 GMT
Fix these first
- Title tagcritical
“The Mercury News - Bay Area news, sports, business, entertainment, lifestyle and commentary”
Fix: Write a unique title of roughly 50–60 characters with the main search phrase first.
On WordPress: Edit the page and scroll to the Yoast SEO or Rank Math box (install one of these free plugins if you have neither), then fill in the SEO title.
- Render-blocking resourceshigh
17 blocking script(s) and 10 stylesheet(s) in <head>.
Fix: Add defer to scripts, inline critical CSS and load the rest asynchronously.
- H1 headingcritical
2 H1 headings – one clear H1 is best practice.
Fix: Use one H1 that states the page topic with its main keyword.
On WordPress: Most themes show the page title as the H1. In the editor, make sure no other block uses Heading 1 – use Heading 2 for sections.
- Heading structuremedium
120 headings for 1609 words – a lot for the amount of text.
Fix: Use H2s for main sections and H3s inside them, without skipping levels.
- Scripts & third partiesmedium
70 script tag(s); files loaded from 18 other domain(s): i.imgur.com, htlbid.com, fonts.googleapis.com, cdn.jsdelivr.net, cmp.osano.com, ajax.googleapis.com….
Fix: Remove unused tracking and widget scripts; every third party adds connection time.
- Imagesmedium
43 image(s).
Fix: Give every image width and height, lazy-load images below the fold (but not the main image) and serve WebP/AVIF.
On WordPress: Install a free image optimiser plugin (such as EWWW Image Optimizer or Smush) to shrink images and serve WebP.
- Form labelsmedium
1 of 2 form field(s) have no label.
Fix: Give every form field a <label> or aria-label (a placeholder isn't a label).
- Tap-to-contactmedium
No tel: or mailto: links.
Fix: Add a tap-to-call or tap-to-email button so phone visitors can contact you instantly.
Real-world speed Google PageSpeed
Loading Core Web Vitals from Google… this can take up to 30 seconds.
Authority & backlinks
Looking up which websites link to mercurynews.com…
Indexing & crawling 100%
Can search engines reach, read and index this page?
- ✓
Status codecritical
The page returned HTTP 200.
- ✓
Indexablecritical
No noindex instruction – the page can appear in search.
- ✓
robots.txthigh
robots.txt found.
Googlebot is allowed to crawl this page.
- ✓
XML sitemaphigh
Sitemap index found at https://www.mercurynews.com/sitemap.xml listing 9,032 sitemaps.
Declared in robots.txt.
No lastmod dates – add accurate ones so search engines know what changed.
- ✓
Canonical URLhigh
Canonical: https://www.mercurynews.com
Points to this page (self-referencing).
- ✓
Redirectshigh
1 redirect before the page loaded.
https://mercurynews.com/ → https://www.mercurynews.com/
A single redirect to your preferred address is normal; just make sure your own links use the final address.
- ✓
www / non-wwwmedium
mercurynews.com redirects to www.mercurynews.com.
Search snippet & sharing 46%
How the page looks in Google results and when shared.
- ✗
Title tagcritical
“The Mercury News - Bay Area news, sports, business, entertainment, lifestyle and commentary”
About 841px of Google's ~580px desktop width – it will probably be cut off.
Repeated words: news.
Fix: Write a unique title of roughly 50–60 characters with the main search phrase first.
On WordPress: Edit the page and scroll to the Yoast SEO or Rank Math box (install one of these free plugins if you have neither), then fill in the SEO title.
- !
Meta descriptionhigh
177 characters, ~1109px of ~990px.
Long – Google will probably truncate it.
Google sometimes rewrites descriptions to match the search; a good one is still used most often.
Fix: Write a 140–155 character description that answers the searcher's question and invites the click.
On WordPress: Edit the page and scroll to the Yoast SEO or Rank Math box (install one of these free plugins if you have neither), then fill in the meta description.
- ✓
Faviconlow
Favicon linked (Google shows it next to results).
- ✓
Languagelow
lang="en-US"
Content quality 53%
Is there enough clear, useful text that matches what the page targets?
- ✓
Word countmedium
1,609 words of main content (inside <main>).
Google has no minimum word count – this is a rough guide to whether the page answers the question in full.
- ✓
Readabilitymedium
Flesch reading ease 57 (fairly easy), about 13 words per sentence.
- !
Topic focushigh
6 of 9 title keywords appear in the main content (missing: entertainment, lifestyle, commentary).
Fix: Use your main title phrases naturally in the opening paragraph and headings.
- !
H1 headingcritical
2 H1 headings – one clear H1 is best practice.
Fix: Use one H1 that states the page topic with its main keyword.
On WordPress: Most themes show the page title as the H1. In the editor, make sure no other block uses Heading 1 – use Heading 2 for sections.
- ✗
Heading structuremedium
120 headings for 1609 words – a lot for the amount of text.
Levels are in order.
1 empty heading(s).
Fix: Use H2s for main sections and H3s inside them, without skipping levels.
- ✗
Text-to-code ratiolow
4% of the HTML is visible text.
Fix: Trim unused markup, inline scripts and builder bloat.
AI search readiness 78%
Can ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity and Google AI Overviews read, understand and cite this site?
- !
AI crawler accesshigh
robots.txt blocks search crawlers: OAI-SearchBot (ChatGPT search), ChatGPT-User (ChatGPT browsing), Claude-SearchBot (Claude search), Claude-User (Claude browsing), PerplexityBot (Perplexity), Applebot (Siri & Spotlight).
Training-only crawlers blocked: GPTBot, ClaudeBot, Google-Extended, Applebot-Extended, CCBot, meta-externalagent. That's a licensing choice – these companies document them as separate from their search crawlers.
Fix: Allow Googlebot, Bingbot, OAI-SearchBot, Claude-SearchBot and PerplexityBot so search and AI tools can cite you (you can still block training-only bots such as GPTBot or Google-Extended).
On WordPress: Edit robots.txt in Yoast (Yoast SEO → Tools → File editor) or Rank Math (General Settings → Edit robots.txt) and remove the lines blocking AI crawlers.
- ✓
Snippet controlshigh
No snippet restrictions – search and AI answers can quote this page.
- ✗
llms.txtlow
No /llms.txt file. It's an optional, emerging convention – few AI tools are confirmed to read it yet, so this is low priority.
Fix: Optionally add /llms.txt: a short Markdown summary of who you are with links to your key pages.
- ✓
Question-led contentmedium
3 heading(s) phrased as questions, e.g. “The top 10 horror movies of 2026: What ranks above ‘Obsession’ on our ”.
- ✓
Entity clarityhigh
Identified as: NewsMediaOrganization, LocalBusiness.
2 official profile link(s) (sameAs).
- ✓
Freshness signalsmedium
The page shows when it was published or last updated.
- !
Trust pages (E-E-A-T)medium
Links found to about and contact; missing privacy.
Fix: Link to About, Contact and Privacy pages from every page – they help visitors, Google and AI tools see who stands behind the content.
Structured data 100%
Machine-readable facts for rich results and AI.
- ✓
JSON-LD present & validhigh
2 JSON-LD block(s): NewsMediaOrganization, LocalBusiness, PostalAddress, GeoCoordinates, OpeningHoursSpecification, ContactPoint, QuantitativeValue.
All blocks parse correctly.
- ✓
Required propertiesmedium
Key types include Google's required properties.
Links 65%
Internal linking, anchor text and broken links.
- !
Internal linkinghigh
273 internal and 43 external links.
Fix: Link to your most important pages from this page with descriptive text.
- !
Anchor text qualitymedium
Same text used for different pages: “marketplace”.
Fix: Make every link text describe its destination, e.g. “logo design prices” instead of “click here”.
- ✓
Broken links (sample)high
Checked 12 internal link(s).
No broken links found.
- !
Internal links to http://medium
3 internal link(s) use http:// – each one goes through a redirect.
Fix: Update internal links to use https:// (or relative links).
Performance 43%
Speed signals from the HTML and server. Real-user Core Web Vitals load below.
- ✓
Server response (TTFB)high
84 ms until the first response from our checker, including connection setup (Google rates TTFB good under 0.8 s, poor over 1.8 s).
- !
HTML sizemedium
286 kB of HTML.
Fix: Remove inline bloat, base64 images and unused markup.
- ✓
Compressionmedium
Compressed with br.
- ✗
Render-blocking resourceshigh
17 blocking script(s) and 10 stylesheet(s) in <head>.
Fix: Add defer to scripts, inline critical CSS and load the rest asynchronously.
- ✗
Scripts & third partiesmedium
70 script tag(s); files loaded from 18 other domain(s): i.imgur.com, htlbid.com, fonts.googleapis.com, cdn.jsdelivr.net, cmp.osano.com, ajax.googleapis.com….
Fix: Remove unused tracking and widget scripts; every third party adds connection time.
- ✗
Imagesmedium
43 image(s).
40 without width/height – can cause layout shift (CLS).
40 image(s) after the first three aren't lazy-loaded.
35 use WebP/AVIF or responsive srcset.
Fix: Give every image width and height, lazy-load images below the fold (but not the main image) and serve WebP/AVIF.
On WordPress: Install a free image optimiser plugin (such as EWWW Image Optimizer or Smush) to shrink images and serve WebP.
- !
Cachinglow
Cache-Control: private
Fix: Set Cache-Control so browsers and CDNs can reuse the page.
- i
HTTP/3low
Couldn't be confirmed from our server – the alt-svc header that advertises HTTP/3 isn't always visible to it. Your site is on Cloudflare, which offers HTTP/3 under Network settings.
Security 92%
Visitor safety signals that browsers and Google check.
- ✓
HTTPScritical
Secure HTTPS with no mixed content.
- ✓
HTTP → HTTPS redirecthigh
http:// redirects to https://.
- ✓
HSTSmedium
HSTS: max-age=31536000;includeSubdomains
- ✗
Security headerslow
Present: CSP.
Fix: Add X-Content-Type-Options, Referrer-Policy, Permissions-Policy and X-Frame-Options (or a CSP).
- ✓
Server fingerprintlow
No X-Powered-By header (server: cloudflare).
Mobile & accessibility 67%
Usable on phones and by everyone – Google indexes the mobile version.
- ✓
Mobile viewportcritical
viewport: width=device-width, initial-scale=1
- ✓
Image alt textmedium
All 43 images have alt text.
- ✗
Form labelsmedium
1 of 2 form field(s) have no label.
Fix: Give every form field a <label> or aria-label (a placeholder isn't a label).
- ✓
Link nameslow
Every link has a readable name.
- ✗
Tap-to-contactmedium
No tel: or mailto: links.
Fix: Add a tap-to-call or tap-to-email button so phone visitors can contact you instantly.
Local SEO 50%
Signals that help you appear in Google Maps and 'near me' searches.
- ✓
LocalBusiness markuphigh
LocalBusiness markup includes: address, telephone, geo, openingHoursSpecification, areaServed, url.
- ✗
Contact details on pagemedium
No phone number found.
No postcode found (fine for service-area businesses).
Fix: Show the same business name, area and phone/email as your Google Business Profile.
- ✗
Map & directionslow
No map or directions link.
Fix: Add a Google Maps directions link so customers can find you.