Validate an external URL in the SEO tool

With the SEO tool, you can attach an external page to a topic or subtopic,, and it'll automatically validate the URL to track internal and inbound links. You can also manually scan external pages to validate them.

Validate an external URL using topics

1. In your HubSpot account, navigate to Content > SEO.
2. Click the Topic Clusters tab.
3. In the Topics table, click the name of a topic.
4. On the Topical Coverage tab, click Attach to content URL for a topic or subtopic.
5. In the right panel, click Add external URL. This process should finish within 20 seconds. Learn more about attaching content to a topic or subtopic.

Validate an external URL using an SEO scan

1. In your HubSpot account, navigate to Content > SEO.
2. On the SEO Recommendations tab, click Scan new URL on the top right. If you haven't scanned any pages, click Scan new URL in the middle of the page.
3. In the dialog box, enter the external URL in the URL field and then click Scan URL. The scanning process takes an average of three hours, but can take up to six hours for large sites. Learn more about viewing SEO recommendations.

Troubleshoot external URL validation status

If your external URL doesn't return a validation status within the expected time frames (e.g., 20 seconds or six hours), you may need to take additional action based on the validation status message. 

You may receive one of these error responses when validating an external URL in the SEO tool:

• Unverified: there's a temporary issue crawling your external page. Check back again in five minutes to see if this error has been resolved.
• Bad HTTP Status: your external URL returned an error response, usually a 404 error. To resolve the issue, check the DNS provider and content management system (CMS) where your external page is hosted.
• Validation error: the tool is unable to crawl your external URL. Removing, and re-adding this external page URL to your topic usually resolves this error. If you continue to see this error, contact HubSpot Support.
• SSL error: there's an issue with the SSL certificate for your website. To resolve this issue, check with your SSL certificate provider.
• Blocked by 403: additional security or authentication is preventing the SEO tool from crawling your external page. 
• Non-Canonical URL: your external URL doesn't match the canonical URL for that page. To resolve this error, click Replace with canonical URL.