Share a preview of your website before it goes live. Coming to Striive.

You want a second opinion. Not an audience.

Before launch, your business partner should read it through, or a customer should sign it off. Publish it to get feedback, and it’s public. A half-finished site can land in Google before you’re ready.

Why keep a website under construction out of Google?

Search engines index what they can find. If a half-finished site is public, Google may show unfinished pages, placeholder text or the wrong prices in its results, and it can take a while before the right version replaces them.

It matters most when you’re replacing an old site. Two versions of the same text on two addresses compete with each other, and neither ranks as well as one would.

What is noindex?

Noindex is an instruction in a page’s code that tells search engines not to show the page in their results. It’s the usual way to keep a preview or a test site out of Google.

It isn’t the same as robots.txt. Robots.txt asks search engines not to read a page, but a page that’s blocked there can still show up in results if other sites link to it. Noindex keeps it out, as long as the search engine is allowed to read the page and see the instruction.

How preview links will work in Striive

The plan is a private link you can send to anyone, plus a switch for each site:

1. Create a private preview link for your site.
2. Send it to whoever should see it. They don’t need an account.
3. They see the site exactly as it will look once published.
4. The link stays out of search engines.

A hide-from-search switch

Each site will also get a “hide from search engines” switch. A site in progress, or one you only share with a few people, stays out of Google until you turn it off.

What you can do today

There’s no preview link yet, but you can get feedback before launch without going public:

• Drafts are private. Nothing on your site is public until you publish it.
• Invite the person as a colleague. They get their own login and can look through the site in the editor, where it appears exactly as it will be published. Remove their access when you’re done.
• Your current website on your domain stays untouched until you connect the domain to Striive.
• Once your own domain is connected, your Striive address sends visitors on to it, so search engines see one version of your site, not two.

Good to know before you publish

Until the switch arrives, a published page is public and can be found by search engines. Striive lists it in your sitemap automatically. So keep pages as drafts until they’re ready, and publish when you’re happy with them.