Gainsty
How we diagnosed a hidden robots.txt issue blocking Google from rendering a JS-generated canonical tag, corrected inconsistent canonical URLs across page templates, and cleaned up the backlink profile for an AI-powered Instagram growth platform.
Visit WebsiteChallenges Faced
Gainsty's Next.js marketing site was struggling to get indexed on Google and Bing, with pages that had once ranked slowly disappearing from search — and no obvious error in Google Search Console pointing to why.
Pages Deindexing With No Clear Error
Only the homepage was reliably indexed on Google, none of the site's URLs were indexed on Bing, and pages that had previously been crawled were quietly slipping into "Crawled – currently not indexed" over time — with the brand name itself failing to surface in search.
Blocked Assets Hiding the Real Canonical Tag
The canonical tag was generated by JavaScript, but the robots.txt file was blocking JS and CSS files from being crawled — so Googlebot couldn't render the page and never detected the canonical tag at all, on a site where content itself relied heavily on JavaScript to display.
Inconsistent Canonical URLs Across Templates
Canonical tags were correct on blog and idea pages but incorrect on core page templates, with several pages pointing to the homepage as their canonical URL instead of themselves — and fixes were rolling out inconsistently across the site as the developer worked through them.
An Unaudited Backlink Profile
The site's backlink profile had never been systematically audited, leaving potentially toxic domains unidentified and undisavowed in Google Search Console.
Our Strategy
A methodical diagnosis-first approach — find the actual root cause behind the indexing failure, fix it at the source, push Google and Bing to recrawl, and clean up the backlink profile alongside it.
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Ran Ahrefs, Semrush, and Google Search Console audits in parallel to build a complete technical picture of the site
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Diagnosed that JS and CSS files blocked in robots.txt were preventing Googlebot from rendering the page and detecting its JavaScript-generated canonical tag — confirmed by simulating the same JS-blocking in browser testing
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Identified that the same blocked assets were causing Google to see broken, incomplete pages on the JS-heavy Next.js site, reducing crawl interest over time
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Tracked incorrect canonical URLs across page templates, flagging that core pages were pointing to the homepage while blog and idea pages were already correct
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Recommended unblocking JS/CSS assets and removing overly broad Disallow rules from robots.txt so Google could properly render and index the site
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Ran repeated follow-up audits to verify developer implementation, catching partial fixes template-by-template and escalating until changes were fully applied
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Submitted indexing requests for extracted URLs across both Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools
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Resubmitted XML sitemaps and used the URL Inspection Tool to prompt recrawling after each round of fixes
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Escalated unresolved indexing questions through the Google Search Central Community, Stack Overflow, and Reddit to pressure-test the diagnosis and surface additional guidance
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Ran a full backlink audit to identify toxic domains in the link profile
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Disavowed toxic domains through Semrush and prepared documentation for submission through the GSC Disavow Tool
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Delivered before-and-after backlink reports confirming a cleaner, more trustworthy link profile
Where Things Stand
A root cause identified and fixed at the source, a backlink profile cleaned up, and continuous pressure applied until Google and Bing recrawled the site.
Audit Platforms Used
Search Engines Targeted for Reindexing
Community Channels Escalated To
Full Backlink Audit & Disavow Completed
Before & After
Backlink audit results before and after toxic domain disavow.
Gainsty
Gainsty is an AI-powered Instagram growth platform that helps creators and brands gain real, organic followers without bots or fake engagement. Running on a JavaScript-heavy Next.js site, the company needed a technical SEO partner who could dig past surface-level crawl reports to find why pages that showed no obvious errors still weren't getting indexed.
Gainsty
Instagram Growth & Social Media SaaS
Small Issues, Big Losses —
We Solve Both
When Google won't index your site and there's no obvious error, the answer is usually hiding in your rendering setup. Let our technical SEO specialists find the actual root cause instead of chasing symptoms.