Optimizing Google’s Crawling: Why Hosting Resources Elsewhere Might Just Save You
If you’ve ever tried to understand how Google’s crawling and indexing works, you know it’s not exactly the most straightforward process. Recently, Google Search Central launched a series called “Crawling December,” which breaks down some of the more obscure aspects of crawling — those little nuances that don’t get much attention but can actually have a big impact on how Google sees your website. The first post explores something called “crawl budget” and sheds light on how we might manage resources better to make our sites more crawl-efficient. Let’s unpack this in a less robotic and hopefully more relatable way.
The Basics of Crawling: Then vs. Now
In the old days, the web was a much simpler place. Websites were a bunch of interconnected HTML pages, and Googlebot — basically Google’s automated reader — would just breeze through these pages, scanning everything in its path. Fast forward to today, and websites are almost living, breathing entities, powered by complex JavaScript, CSS, and multimedia. These layers make pages interactive and visually rich, but they also add complications when it comes to crawling.
When Googlebot visits your web page, it’s kind of like a tourist who wants to understand everything about a new city. It…
