(Entry was posted by Josh Sheldo on this post in the Dumb SEO Questions community on Facebook, 08/05/2021).

I am having trouble getting a specific page indexed by Google

Hi everyone, I`m hoping to get some advice.I am having trouble getting a specific page indexed by Google.The page in question was previously getting blocked by robots.txt for some reason which was rectified. I then requested indexing in GSC (this was approx 2 weeks ago) Google has crawled the site multiple times since then, most recently today, but isn`t crawling the page that`s missing from the index with the last crawl occurring on the 30th of May 2021.The page is in the site map, the main navigation menu and is linked to directly from the home page. It seems to me like Google is purposefully avoiding crawling this page or even attempting to?Is there something I`m missing or does anyone have any strategies to get around this? Any help is much appreciatedThanksJosh
this is the urlhttps://anchorsafe.com.au/roof-safety-services/

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YOUR ANSWERS

Selected answers from the Dumb SEO Questions Facebook & G+ community.

James Slattery: Include in socials, youtube description... add some content to bottom of page & get a few links that get real traffic. No page will stay non-indexed after that
Josh Sheldon: Thanks James Slattery I will try this
Michael Martinez: Try using the URL submission tool in Google Search Console. But before you click on "Submit to Index", click on "Test Live URL". See if you get an error. If not, verify that it did in fact just fetch the page. If you`re satisfied with that, then submit it to the index.
Josh Sheldon: Thanks Michael Martinez. I had followed this process on the first index request. I have checked again now to be sure and it`s all green ticks when testing the live URL. For background, the live test has always given this page the tick for availability even before the issue with the robots.txt was rectified. Any thoughts on this?
Michael Martinez: Josh Sheldon It`s always been an iffy process for me. Sometimes I`ve had to submit URLs to PageSpeed Insights and Mobile-friendly Test tools along with the Test Live URL before I could confirm that Googlebot was actually fetching anything. And sometimes you just have to wait for them to get their heads sorted out.
Josh Sheldon: Michael Martinez I will keep working at it, appreciate your time!
Richard Hearne: If it`s popping in and out after using this tool you most likely have quality issues. Google doesn`t like the page.
Josh Sheldon: Richard Hearne Googles reasoning is "blocked by robots.txt" which has been rectified approx 2 weeks ago and tested as available in the live test. I would understand if google crawled the page and chose not to index it because it saw it as low quality but it`s just refusing to crawl it at all with the last crawl back in May. Please let me know if my reasoning is twisted
Michael Martinez: Josh Sheldon For what it`s worth, the Google Search Console URL inspection tool appears to do a quality check when you submit a page for indexing. I`ve found that improving pages can help get past some of these submission issues.

But every site is different. All we can do is suggest things to try.
Josh Sheldon: Michael Martinez great insight thankyou! I will work at improving the page and see if that helps
Perry Bernard: What Michael said.
Josh Sheldon: Thanks Perry Bernard! please see my response to Michael and chip in with any recommendation you might have moving forward
Jade N Sherry: More of a chance of us helping if you provide a url...
Josh Sheldon: Hi Jade N Sherry URL is https://anchorsafe.com.au/roof-safety-services/
Jaroslaw Pidburskyj: From the URL provided, I could see the page has a little more of black hat installed, this might be the reason why Google isnâ€™t indexing.
Josh Sheldon: Jaroslaw Pidburskyj thats interesting. Can you tell me what you`re noticing that`s black hat? There was a previous agency working on this site so it`s certainly possible.
Jaroslaw Pidburskyj: Keyword stuffing, some the keywords used are over 1-2% or some say 1-3%. Ideally you should be within these tolerances. As there are 2 limits as mentioned itâ€™s best to stay with the primary of 1-2% to be safe.
Josh Sheldon: Jaroslaw Pidburskyj Appreciate the feedback and after reviewing the page I agree with you that it was a little overdone.
Jade N Sherry: In the nav menu, the link says height safety instead of roof safety, which is confusing. In the sitemap page, on mobile, I can`t figure out which link is to that page. If you want that page found, you`re not making it easy. I also confirm that its not indexed by Google, as I don`t see it when I google site:https://anchorsafe.com.au/. Are all your other pages showing up when you do that Google search? I see that it was recently added on the 22nd to your website sitemap (sitemap.xml). Does it show in your GSC sitemaps > index coverage > valid > submitted and indexed? If so, do a screenshot after clicking on that url under "examples"

ANCHORSAFE.COM.AUAnchor Safe | Height Safety Services and SystemsAnchor Safe | Height Safety Services and Systems
Josh Sheldon: Jade N Sherry thanks for pointing out the issue with the URL, I`ll get that rectified. As far as GSC index coverage the page is in the excluded tab under Submitted URL marked â€˜noindexâ€™. The robots txt blocking test shows that all bots are "allowed" so if the tool is to be trusted there shouldn`t be any reason for it to be in this section, unless I`m missing something.
Juan Dalisay Jr.: Maybe there is a tag in that page with nofollow or something