How to Audit a Website? A Complete Checklist of Auditing a Report
A website SEO audit is a comprehensive process of analyzing website performance and optimization in terms of search engine visibility and ranking. The major goal of an SEO audit is to identify errors, opportunities, strengths, and weaknesses that can help you gain more visibility.
An SEO ( search engine optimization ) audit usually covers various components like
- Site build-up
- Loading speed
- User experience
- Indexing and crawlability
- Competitor analyzing
- Keyword research
- Backlinking
- On-page SEO
Various SEO Audit Tools
Here’s a brief explanation of various SEO audit tools:
Google Analytics
It is used to monitor website traffic, audience insights, and conversions, guiding data-driven decisions for website optimization.
Google Search Console
It is a set of dashboards that provides comprehensive insights about website performance in Google search, including mobile usability, indexing status, and detailed performance analytics.
Semrush
It is considered an all-in-one SEO audit tool that helps improve website performance in all the crucial SEO areas and includes features like backlink analysis, keyword research, site audit, and rank tracking.
Ahrefs
It is primarily known for backlink analysis but also provides various other features such as rank tracking, keyword research, site audits, etc.
Screaming Frog
It primarily assists in site audit and crawling, analyzing metadata, recognizing broken links, and is a crucial tool for enhancing on-site elements.
How to do an SEO Audit Check
Check Indexing
For pages that are not indexed in Google search data, Google can’t rank them. If you want to check whether your website pages are indexed or not, check them in the Google search console.
For this, under the left menu of the Google search console, just click on the “index” option and then on the “pages” section. Under this, various reasons will be listed as to why your pages are not indexed yet. Inspect the reasons thoroughly.
There will be multiple pages that are not indexed yet and you even don’t want all of them to be indexed. You have to choose the pages that you want to show in Google search results.
Here are some examples of pages that don’t need to be indexed in your slide.
- Admin pages
- Feed pages
- Pages with redirects
- Feed pages
For the page that you want to be indexed on Google, click on the “Request Indexing” link.
Check Duplicity
It is important to verify that Google is indexing only one version of the site. If your site runs on more than one URL version of www, http, or https. It can cause various issues related to ranking, crawling, and indexing, and then Google will consider them duplicates.
Additionally, the presence of multiple versions of the site can impact page rank, which can have an adverse impact on the ranking of the page.
It can be checked easily: You can use SEO audit tools like Semrush, Screaming Frog, Moz, and Sitebulb to highlight duplicate URLs.
Increase the Speed of launching a Site
Even Google has confirmed that the speed of launching a site is a critical factor in website ranking. Here are a few tips to increase website loading speed:
- Use modern formats and compressors to optimize images.
- Combine files to minimize HTTP requests.
- Set up a browser caching header.
- Prioritize loading important content first.
- Optimize server performance by reducing server response time.
- Optimize font styles and weights.
- Avoid unnecessary redirects to pages.
Remove Zombie Pages
Zombie pages, also known as orphaned pages or dead-end pages, are web pages that lack internal or external links, making them isolated and hard to find. Removing zombie pages from your website is crucial, as they can negatively impact the overall user experience.
Here’s how to find zombie pages in an SEO audit.
- Make use of SEO crawling tools to identify pages with no internal or external links.
- Use website analytics to review pages with no or very minimal engagement.
- Access the relevance of the content on the pages and remove them if they are outdated or irrelevant.
- Use 301 redirects to redirect the URL of removed pages to active pages to increase the user experience.
Check Organic Traffic Regularly
It’s important to regularly check how much organic traffic you’re getting on your site. To do that make use of Google Analytics.
To check this, click on all traffic under the acquisition menu and then clock on channels under it. After that, click on organic search and you will get to know how many people have visited your site in the past few months. It will also give you insights about the position of the curve.
Check the Mobile-friendliness of your Website
Never neglect the power of mobile SEO.
According to research, over 60% of people perform Google searches through mobile devices. Even Google has prioritized the mobile-first algorithm.
Here are some pro tips:
- Design the vertical scrolling of the website to make it similar to user behavior.
- Minimize unnecessary ads or pop-ups as they obstruct content.
- Optimize the structure of the content and its length so that it’s more visible, scannable, and concise.
- Regularly check your website on various models of smartphones to check its performance.
- To check mobile compatibility, make use of Google’s mobile-friendly test.
- Show important information at the top of the page to grab the user’s attention immediately.
Check Keyword Ranking
Use keyword tracking tools like Ahrefs and Semrush to check keyword ranking. Semrush works best when it comes to checking keyword rankings. What’s more beneficial about using Semrush is that it doesn’t just check the ranking of your particular keyword; it will also give you suggestions about other keywords.
Isn’t it beneficial for you?
Conclusion
If you want to dive deeper into the technicalities of SEO, check out our website or directly contact us. We will guide you every step of the way and help you rank your website, driving more visibility and, hence, more revenue.