Every website platform has its own SEO strengths, weaknesses and common pitfalls. We provide specialist SEO across all major platforms, tailored to how each one actually works.
Most SEO advice is written as if all websites work the same way. They do not. A Shopify store has fundamentally different crawl budget challenges from a WordPress site. A Next.js app has rendering considerations that a Magento installation does not. A Wix site has structural constraints that a custom-built platform is free of.
Applying generic SEO recommendations to a platform they were not written for produces generic results at best and active technical problems at worst. We understand the SEO implications of each platform we work with at a deep technical level, which means the recommendations we make are grounded in how your specific platform actually works.
Whether you are dealing with Shopify's duplicate URL structure, WordPress plugin conflicts affecting page speed, Magento's layered navigation creating crawl waste, or Next.js rendering issues preventing proper indexing, we have seen and solved these problems before. Platform-specific SEO is not a niche specialism it is the only way to do the job properly.
Select your platform to see the specific SEO challenges, common issues and how we approach optimisation on each one.
WordPress powers over 40% of the web and is the most flexible SEO platform available when configured correctly. The challenge is that flexibility cuts both ways poorly configured WordPress sites are some of the most technically problematic we encounter.
Shopify is the leading hosted eCommerce platform with well-documented SEO limitations baked into its architecture. Duplicate URLs, constrained URL structures and app-driven page speed issues all require platform-specific solutions.
Magento is the platform of choice for complex, high-volume eCommerce. Its default configuration creates significant SEO problems out of the box, and resolving them requires a deep understanding of how Magento generates and serves URLs at scale.
Wix has improved significantly as an SEO platform in recent years but still has structural constraints that affect what is achievable. Understanding which optimisations are possible within the platform and which require workarounds is essential for getting meaningful results.
Squarespace produces visually polished sites but its closed architecture creates SEO constraints that require a different approach. Many Squarespace users do not realise how much of their organic potential is being left unrealised due to platform-level limitations they cannot see.
Next.js is a powerful React framework that enables exceptional performance when configured correctly, but introduces rendering complexity that can devastate SEO if not handled properly. SSR, SSG, ISR and client-side rendering each have different SEO implications that need deliberate strategy.
Sanity is a headless CMS that gives development teams maximum content flexibility but separates content management from the frontend entirely. SEO for Sanity-powered sites requires thinking across the content model, the frontend framework and how the two interact at the point of delivery.
Vercel is the deployment and hosting platform behind many Next.js and headless sites. While Vercel itself is not a CMS, it introduces specific SEO considerations around edge rendering, preview deployments being indexed, redirect management and performance configuration that affect rankings.
A quick reference guide to the key SEO characteristics of each platform we work with.
| Platform | Technical SEO control | Page speed potential | Schema markup | Crawl management | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| WordPress | Content sites, businesses, blogs | ||||
| Shopify | SME eCommerce, DTC brands | ||||
| Magento | Large-scale eCommerce | ||||
| Wix | Small businesses, local services | ||||
| Squarespace | Creatives, portfolios, small businesses | ||||
| Next.js | Tech companies, headless builds | ||||
| Sanity | Content-heavy, editorial, enterprise | ||||
| Vercel | Headless, JAMstack, Next.js deploys |
Ratings reflect default platform capabilities. With specialist configuration, most platforms can achieve strong SEO results. The rating reflects how much work is required out of the box, not what is ultimately achievable with proper optimisation.
A platform migration done without proper SEO planning can wipe out years of accumulated rankings in a matter of days. Done correctly, it can be an opportunity to improve your organic performance at the same time as moving to a better platform.
New platforms often generate different URL structures. Without a complete redirect map in place on launch day, every changed URL becomes a dead end for Google and all the authority built up in those URLs is lost.
Staging environments and pre-launch testing commonly leave canonical tags pointing to old URLs or the staging domain. If these go live, Google ignores your new pages entirely.
Platform migrations often involve restructuring content. Pages merged, renamed or removed without proper handling lose all accumulated ranking signals, even when the content moves to a new URL.
Structured data from the old platform rarely transfers automatically. Launching a new site without schema means losing rich results immediately, even for pages that rank well.
Analytics that worked on the old platform often break during migration. Losing tracking continuity means you cannot measure the impact of the migration or identify problems quickly enough to fix them.
Full crawl and ranking inventory of the existing site. Every URL that drives organic traffic or has backlinks is identified and documented before any work begins.
Every old URL mapped to its new equivalent. Redirect rules written specifically for your new platform's configuration, whether that is an .htaccess file, vercel.json or Shopify redirects.
Staging environment review covering canonicals, robots.txt, noindex tags, schema, page speed and analytics configuration before a single line goes live.
Active monitoring on and immediately after launch day. Crawl errors, redirect failures and indexing issues identified and escalated to your development team before they compound.
Rankings and organic traffic tracked week on week for 60 to 90 days post-launch. Any drops diagnosed and addressed before they become permanent losses.
Next.js, Sanity and Vercel represent a different category of platform entirely. They offer exceptional performance and developer experience but introduce SEO complexity that traditional agencies are not equipped to handle.
Traditional CMS platforms like WordPress handle rendering server-side by default. Google receives fully rendered HTML when it crawls your pages and can read everything immediately. This is the simplest possible scenario for SEO.
Modern JavaScript frameworks change this fundamentally. A Next.js application can render pages on the server, at build time, at the edge, or entirely in the browser and the choice between these strategies has direct, significant consequences for how Google crawls, renders and indexes your content.
Headless CMS setups add another layer of complexity. When your content lives in Sanity but your frontend is Next.js deployed on Vercel, SEO decisions need to be made across all three systems simultaneously. The content model in Sanity determines what metadata fields are available. The Next.js app determines how that metadata is rendered. Vercel determines how it is cached and served at the edge.
We work with development teams building on these stacks to ensure SEO is built into the architecture rather than bolted on after launch, when changing fundamental decisions becomes expensive.
Pages rendered on each request. Google receives full HTML immediately. Best for frequently changing content but slower than static approaches.
Pages rendered at build time. Extremely fast, fully crawlable HTML served immediately. Ideal for content that does not change frequently.
Static pages regenerated on a schedule or on demand. Balances performance with content freshness. Requires careful cache strategy for SEO.
Content rendered in the browser by JavaScript. Google can render JavaScript but it is unreliable and slower. Should be avoided for content that needs to rank.
SEO metadata fields, Open Graph data, canonical URLs and schema markup need to be built into your Sanity content schema from the start. Retrofitting these after launch requires content re-entry and developer time. We specify what needs to go into the schema before the content model is finalised.
Next.js 13 and above uses the Metadata API rather than next/head. Titles, descriptions, Open Graph, robots directives and canonical tags all need to be implemented correctly and dynamically for both static and dynamic routes. We audit and specify these for every route type in your application.
Vercel's edge network introduces caching behaviour that affects how quickly Google sees content changes. Cache-Control headers, on-demand revalidation and how preview deployments are handled all have SEO implications that need deliberate configuration rather than default settings.
Static sitemaps do not work at scale on headless builds. We specify and review dynamic sitemap generation via the App Router or API routes, and structured data generation from your CMS content rather than hardcoded JSON-LD that developers have to maintain manually.
We work directly with your development team. Our technical recommendations are written in the context of your specific stack and are developer-ready not generic guidance that needs to be translated before anyone can act on it.
Generic SEO recommendations are written for no platform in particular, which means they are wrong for every platform in specific ways. Here are real examples of widely shared SEO advice that causes active harm when applied to the wrong platform.
On Shopify, collection pages are the primary ranking pages for commercial category searches. Noindexing them advice that makes sense for WordPress tag archives wipes out your most valuable organic entry points in a single change.
Next.js is a React framework. There is no plugin ecosystem in the WordPress sense. Schema markup must be implemented as JSON-LD in the component tree, via the Metadata API or through a library like next-seo. Recommending a plugin wastes developer time and signals that the agency does not understand the stack.
Blocking URLs in robots.txt prevents Google from crawling them but does not remove them from the index if they have already been indexed or are linked from elsewhere. On Magento, where layered navigation generates thousands of parameter URLs, the correct approach is canonicalisation and noindex, not robots.txt blocking.
Vercel uses its own edge infrastructure. Redirects are configured in vercel.json or via the Next.js redirects array in next.config.js. Sending a client to edit .htaccess when they are deployed on Vercel wastes time and reveals a fundamental misunderstanding of the deployment environment.
Wix has its own built-in SEO tools and does not support third-party plugins like Yoast. More broadly, Yoast's traffic light system rewards keyword density over content quality and has led entire generations of site owners to optimise for a plugin score rather than for search intent.
Squarespace loads significant platform JavaScript and CSS that users cannot remove or minify. Telling a Squarespace client to minify their CSS implies a level of control they do not have. The correct advice addresses what is actually controllable: image sizing, unnecessary blocks, font choices and third-party scripts.
Any SEO recommendation that does not account for the platform it is being applied to is, at best, incomplete and at worst actively damaging. Every piece of work we do is framed around what is correct and achievable on your specific platform, not a generic checklist applied regardless of your technical context.
Platform-specific SEO sits alongside our full range of SEO services. Here are the most relevant for businesses looking to improve their organic performance regardless of stack.
Deep technical audits covering crawlability, rendering, speed and indexing all assessed in the context of your specific platform and its known limitations.
Learn morePlatform-aware SEO audits that identify the specific issues your CMS or framework introduces, with prioritised recommendations your developers can act on directly.
Learn moreStructured data implementation that accounts for how your platform generates and serves HTML, from WordPress plugins through to Sanity portable text and Next.js head management.
Learn moreTechnical SEO, keyword strategy, content and link building delivered as a complete programme, with all work grounded in how your specific platform works.
Learn moreGA4 implementation configured correctly for your platform, whether that is a WordPress plugin, Shopify app, GTM on Next.js or custom event tracking on a headless build.
Learn more