What does it mean to get indexed by Google?

Getting indexed means Google has found your page, read it, and added it to the huge list of pages it can show in search results. Until a page is indexed, it can't appear when someone searches — so indexing is the very first step to getting any traffic at all.

Here's a way to picture it: think of Google's index as an enormous library catalog. A book that isn't in the catalog can't be found, even if it's sitting right there on a shelf. Indexing is your page getting its catalog card.

What indexing is

There are two steps behind the scenes. First Google crawls your page — a little program visits and reads it. Then, if it's worth keeping, Google indexes it — files it away so it can be shown in search. A page has to clear both before it can rank for anything.

How long indexing takes

For a new page, indexing usually happens within a week or two, sometimes faster. This is a big part of why a brand-new store can look quiet at first — the pages are there and being read, but they're waiting to be filed before they can show up. That quiet stretch is normal and temporary.

Helping your pages get indexed

The good news is I handle most of what helps here: publishing your pages cleanly, linking them together so Google can travel between them, and keeping your sitemap tidy so Google knows where to look. Your part is to keep your content installed and live, and give it those first couple of weeks to land.