How to Conduct a SEO Audit for Website

Every businessperson knows that an audit is necessary once in a while to ensure that the business is working properly, there are no regulatory breaches and the client base is thriving. A SEO audit for website works in the same manner: it ensures that Google indexes your site and that you meet all the ranking criteria of the search engine.

We understand that, the more you learn about SEO, the more complex and time consuming it appears. However, there is no better alternative to SEO, either financially or in terms of efficiency. Unless you afford to hire a digital marketing agency to set up and run your promotion strategy, you have to do SEO for your website. Otherwise, you will not get quality traffic to your site or new clients, and your business will stagnate.

What Exactly Is Supposed to Achieve SEO Audit for Website?

As we explained in other articles, SEO is an ongoing work. Even though you optimized your website at one point, you cannot just leave it unattended. First of all, the ranking criteria set by Google do not stay the same.

Several times each year, the search engine changes its ranking algorithm and requires websites to meet new conditions. Also, the internet is always changing. The article you linked back to half a year ago may have disappeared or migrated to another URL. Thus, you need to check for this issue, among others.

The Main Steps for Performing SEO Audit for Website

There are two types of SEO audits for your website:
•    Technical SEO audit – which should be performed by an IT specialist
•    General SEO audit – which you can perform on your own.

In this article, we will guide you through the steps of general SEO audit for website.

1. Check that Google Crawled Your Website Completely

The first thing you want to know is that Google has already crawled your entire website. This is the first step Google takes before indexing a website. If the crawl is incomplete or inaccurate, some pages of your website may not be found at all in Google searches.

To perform this verification, use the free URL Inspection Tool made available by Google in the Search Console. It can perform several functions:
•    See the current status of a URL (indexed or not indexed)
•    Inspect a live URL (test if a page can be indexed by Google)
•    Request indexing for a URL
•    Troubleshoot a missing web page from indexing by Google.

2. Check that Your Site Is Mobile Friendly

Mobile internet traffic has exceeded computer internet traffic in quantity for several years already. Moreover, Google is right now rolling over a mobile-first indexing system. This means that from now on, Google will index the mobile version of websites, not the desktop version.

Thus, if your website is not mobile friendly, you are not going to see any significant results from your SEO strategy. Thus, as part of the SEO audit for website, go to this free Google tool and check if your website is optimized for mobile browsing.

3. Check Page Loading Speed

The most recent update to the Google ranking algorithm puts Page Experience among the top ranking factors. We will not go into the technical elements of Page Experience, but tell you that it has to do with the speed with which a website loads and responds to inputs (clicks) from users.

The Google PageSpeed Insights tool will let you check how fast your website loads. Apart from giving you the overall Page Experience score for your website, the tool also offers:
•    Tips to improve the page speed by making changes to your website
•    Supplementary advice on optimizing the code and elements used in your site
•    Detailed reports for each specific ranking factor in the Page Experience update.

4. Check Your Web Pages for Missing SEO Elements

In order to rank for your relevant keywords, your website must be properly optimized for these words and phrases. The main keyword rich elements for each web page are:
•    Page title
•    SEO title
•    Meta description
•    H1, H2, H3 tags (titles and subtitles in your content)
•    Alt tag and description for images.

It will take some time, but you should check the backend of your website and make sure that all these elements are properly filled in and containing the relevant keywords.

5. Check for Broken Links

When you link to a web page that no longer exists or changed its URL structure, users will get the 404 Page Not Found error message. This makes your website look unprofessional, and may users will leave a page when this happens.

To ensure that there are no broken links on your website, use the free Check My Links Chrome extension for each page of your website. The tool will highlight all broken links within moments and you can start fixing them.

If you need help with any item on this SEO audit for website or want to perform technical SEO on your site, contact our team of experts!