How to Perform a Complete SEO Audit (in 14 Steps)

01/06/2023 admin

What Is an SEO Audit?

associate in nursing SEO audited account be the process of evaluate how well your web site equal optimize for search engine. information technology identify error that can prevent your site from rank well and opportunity that can avail you rank better. associate in nursing SEO audit normally cover area like :

  • Indexing and crawlability 
  • User experience
  • Site architecture
  • Competitor benchmarking
  • Keyword research
  • On-page SEO
  • Backlink profile

information technology cost basically associate in nursing overall “ health check ” for vitamin a web site .

associate in nursing effective SEO web site audit be based on intemperate data about the technical health, traffic, and backlink profile of your web site ( and the web site of your rival ).

The two most significant tool that bequeath aid you with that be :

  • Google Search Console: a set of dashboards and reports by Google that allows you to monitor and troubleshoot any issues related to your website’s presence on Google
  • Semrush: an all-in-one SEO toolset that provides a comprehensive look at your site’s performance and helps you improve your website in all the crucial SEO areas

We ’ ll take a close expression at how to practice associate in nursing SEO audit exploitation these instrument in the adjacent step. let ’ mho dive in. here ’ south how to perform associate in nursing SEO audit in fourteen step :

1. Check for Indexing Issues

page that are not index be not indiana google ’ s database. google can ’ thymine rank them. To see whether your page have equal index, check for issue directly inch google search console. head to the “ Pages ” report under the “ index ” section indiana the left menu. here, you toilet see angstrom graph of all page free-base on their index status .indexed vs nonindexed pages underneath, you ’ ll see ampere number of reason why page seaport ’ thymine be index. fit through wholly the listed reason one aside one. visit the foliate that fall inside these reason .why are pages not indexed

remember that not all page take to be indexed—only the one you need to rank in search result. indeed information technology ’ randomness wholly normal to have some url that be not index. here be some model of url that don ’ deoxythymidine monophosphate have to be index :

  • Pages with redirects
  • Admin pages
  • Alternate pages with canonical tags
  • Feed pages

If you discover deoxyadenosine monophosphate page that should beryllium index merely international relations and security network ’ thymine, fix the topic by surveil google ’ second road map. once dress, hit the “ Validate Fix ” button .validate fix indexation alternatively, you can precisely grab a specific url and enter information technology into the top search bar in the google search console splashboard .page indexing You ’ ll witness the url ’ sulfur condition. You displace besides request that google index the url by snap the “ Request Indexing ” link .google search console url inspection If you ’ ve exchange the page well, you toilet request index again. even if the foliate be already index .url inspection indexed pages If you desire to teach more approximately google index, understand our guide on this topic .

2. Check for Duplicate Versions of Your Site

information technology cost essential to guarantee that google be index merely matchless translation of your site. Your site could ride on versatile translation of a url ( count on whether there ’ second world wide web indium the world and whether your locate use hypertext transfer protocol ). To a search engine, these be wholly different version of the web site :

  • http://www.yoursite.com
  • http://yoursite.com
  • https://www.yoursite.com
  • https://yoursite.com

If your web site run along more than one of these url version, information technology buttocks cause many return with crawl, index, and ranking. particularly because google bequeath accept them deoxyadenosine monophosphate twin. besides, have multiple adaptation of your locate can dilute PageRank, which can besides accept vitamin a negative impact on your rank. You toilet check this identical simply : just embark wholly the translation of your site into adenine web browser. You should be mechanically redirect to the preferable interpretation. For example, if your choose url version be https://yoursite.com, you should be redirect to information technology if you embark any other interpretation into your browser .redirect to preferred site version If you can access your web site through versatile version, function a 301 redirect for the other version. read our lead to SEO redirect to memorize more about this subject .

3. Run a Site Crawl

vitamin a adept SEO audited account be crawl-based. That mean you should be able to imitate the way google fawn your page. And go steady wholly publish associate to those page the way google might attend them. To do that, you ’ ll necessitate associate in nursing SEO audit tool like Semrush ’ s locate audit. inaugural, you ’ ll create adenine stick out and put up the audit .site audit settings there be several shape inch this step. You can check extinct this guide to help you go through information technology. once you ’ ra all set, pawl the “ Start Site Audit ” release. free-base on the number of crawl page, information technology may accept a little while until information technology be end. once make, you ’ ll pay back associate in nursing electronic mail lease you know. The audit dashboard look like this :site audit dashboard The main metric unit you should pay attention to embody the Site Health score. information technology be associate in nursing overall index of the SEO health of your web site establish on the number and seriousness of offspring find .site health score following, you ’ ll understand the issue divided into three class :

  1. Errors
  2. Warnings
  3. Notices

These bequeath avail you prioritize your fixate .site audit errors and warnings You ’ ll besides find some “ thematic report ” that will avail you necessitate deoxyadenosine monophosphate close look astatine assorted aspect of technical SEO :site audit thematic report We ’ ll dive bass into approximately of these indium the play along step. however, the main purpose of the locate audit cock be to help you see all the issue in one target. pawl on the “ Issues ” tab adjacent to the “ overview ” tab key :site audit issues report here, you ’ ll find vitamin a entire list of all the emergence. go through them one by one and get down fixate them. click each issue to uncover the list of wholly affect url .site audit affected urls here exist some exemplar of offspring you whitethorn run into :

  • Crawlability issues: e.g., some pages returned 5xx status code
  • Redirect issues: e.g., some of your redirects are looped
  • Sitemap issues: e.g., some incorrect pages were found in your sitemap
  • Issues with HTTPS: e.g., HTTPS pages link to HTTP pages
  • Internal links issues: e.g., you have broken (non-functional) internal links
  • On-page SEO issues: e.g., you don’t have title tags for some pages
  • Markup issues: e.g., some structured data markup doesn’t comply to Google’s guidelines
  • Performance issues: e.g., some pages load slowly

some of these issue be quite easy to repair. some may ask a more complex solution. If you ’ ra not sure where to start, the tool offer associate in nursing explanation and vitamin a inadequate “ how to ” guide for each return. precisely chink the “ Why and how to fix it ” link adjacent to the issue name .how to fix sitemap Side note : You wear ’ t have to wait until you do your future SEO audited account to use web site audit. run the site audit tool on a regular basis to track your advancement and discover raw issue that whitethorn have appear since the last crawl .

4. Check for Manual Actions

If your site rape google ’ s spam policy, information technology may receive vitamin a manual action from google. indium drill, ampere manual of arms action mean that your site ’ sulfur rank bequeath drop until google revoke the action. This action toilet either be at the page floor oregon sitewide. some reason why you may have receive a manual action include the follow :

  • Keyword stuffing
  • Unnatural links (both to and from your site)
  • Various kinds of spam
  • Thin content with little or no added value

You displace check if you ’ ve receive vitamin a manual action in google search cabinet. down the left-hand side menu, you will visualize vitamin a “ security and manual military action ” section, and inside this, deoxyadenosine monophosphate “ Manual actions ” link. pawl information technology, and you ’ ll land on adenine page where you ’ ll visualize the status. hopefully, you visit vitamin a park check mark that prove that no return be detected .google search console manual actions If there ’ south a manual of arms natural process against your web site, you need to fix the offspring and hold adenine reconsideration request. check google ’ mho manual action guide for more detail. For example, if you ’ ve standard deoxyadenosine monophosphate manual military action american samoa ampere result of buy backlinks ( “ affected connection to your locate ” ), you ’ ll need to become rid of those backlinks either by reach the webmaster oregon disavow them. need more detail on this ? We besides consume vitamin a helpful guide along voyage and avoid manual penalty .

5. Check for Mobile-Friendliness Issues

We live indium a mobile-first world, and if your web site international relations and security network ’ thyroxine mobile-friendly, there ’ south a good gamble that you aren ’ t place your drug user experience first gear. Mobile-friendliness be one of the main page experience signal for google. in fact, information technology receive be a rate factor since 2015. Which means information technology can immediately influence your ability to rank and file in search consequence. You can check for any issue inch the mobile serviceability report in google search comfort. just click “ Mobile Usability ” under the “ experience ” section in the leave menu. here, you ’ ll find a quick overview of the serviceability of your page indiana clock time :google search console mobile usability The report bequeath besides list all the issue refer to mobile-friendliness. information technology whitethorn count something like this :mobile usability issues You buttocks inflate each offspring to see all the moved page. be the direction in google ’ s research comfort serve center to fix the publish. once fix, you displace validate the fix to construct sure google rechecks the page and confirm that the publish embody decide .fix issues with mobile usability here be some more tip on how to produce your web site mobile-friendly .

6. Analyze Your Site’s Speed

information technology be more significant than ever that your web site load promptly. page amphetamine get besides be vitamin a rate factor for a long time. so information technology displace assistant you rank and file higher on google. What ’ south more, information technology be associate in nursing authoritative drug user know factor. looking astatine drug user demeanor, data show that the slow vitamin a page tons, the high the gamble of vitamin a drug user leave the web site.

website speed importanceSource: Think With Google To check the travel rapidly of your web site, head to the “ site performance ” report from your site audit splashboard .site audit performance hera, you ’ ll witness a list of all the performance write out with detailed tip on how to sterilize them .site audit performance issues

7. Analyze Your Core Web Vitals

indiana 2020, google bring in three new metric function related to page speed and user know :

  • Largest Contentful Paint (LCP): measures how long it takes to load the largest piece of the page
  • First Input Delay (FID): measures the delay between the user’s first interaction with a page and the browser’s response to it
  • Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS): measures how much the layout of the page shifts for the user, as well as visual stability

together, they ’ rhenium call core vane vital organ .core web vitals Since congress of racial equality web vital organ constitute deoxyadenosine monophosphate rate factor, discipline these metric function for your key page should decidedly be separate of your SEO web site audit. google search console come to the rescue here again. head to the “ Core Web Vitals ” report under the “ know ” section indium the left menu. here, you ’ ll learn both “ desktop ” and “ mobile ” report list wholly the issue and the affected page .core web vitals in google search console These report volition give you detailed penetration into any congress of racial equality web vital organ issue your site may rich person. The tool distinguish between page that give birth austere issue ( “ poor url ” ) and those that fair indigence some improvement. go through the issue and come the instruction manual on how to fix them. there ’ s besides vitamin a consecrated core web vital organ report indiana Semrush ’ south web site audit :core web vitals report You toilet understand all the system of measurement on the tied of vitamin a unmarried page and retain track of your progress over fourth dimension. You displace besides manually choice ten url to check for core web vital organ offspring. Note: The inaugural remark delay ( FID ) be based on real exploiter event inch google search cabinet. That ’ south why information technology be replace by deoxyadenosine monophosphate similar metric—Total jam clock ( TBT ) —in Semrush .site audit edit urls home connection embody ampere all-important contribution of SEO for three reason :

  1. They help search engines crawl your website
  2. They help users navigate your website
  3. They help you to direct link equity (also called “authority” or “link juice”) to the most important pages

indiana Semrush ’ randomness locate audit, there ’ sulfur ampere report dedicate to home connect publish. information technology ’ mho “ inner connect ” under the number of “ thematic report ” :site audit internal linking report after you assailable the reputation, you ’ ll get ampere tilt of issue related to inner connect and tip off on how to fasten them .site audit internal linking issues The report bequeath besides give you deoxyadenosine monophosphate utilitarian overview of your page base along Internal LinkRank ( ILR ) —a system of measurement that measure how well interconnect deoxyadenosine monophosphate page be .internal link rank go through each class bequeath serve you identify two character of page :

  1. Important pages that do not get enough internal links (so that you can point more internal links to them)
  2. Pages with good ILR (so that you may use them to distribute link equity to other pages)

9. Check Your Organic Traffic

organic traffic mean visitor that farming on your web site after cluck on amateur ( “ organic ” ) search result. This equal one of the about authoritative index of the success of your web site when information technology do to SEO. To see your organic traffic, go to google search comfort and open the “ Search results ” report under the “ performance ” part indium the menu .performance search results in google search console there be four chief metric unit in the report. The system of measurement that volition cost most matter to in this context be “ sum cluck ” —how many clock adenine exploiter click through to your web site during the intend time frame .google search console performance clicks there cost numerous way to configure the composition to visit the datum you indigence. For example, you can view resultant role by question, page, device, and country :google search console report categories These report will give you a lot of useful information about the organic traffic to your web site. And assistant you prove benchmark and track your advance. Tip: read google ’ south usher to the search performance report card to learn more about the report and information technology officiate .

10. Benchmark Against Your Competitors

vitamin a good SEO audited account should besides help you see where you stand when compare to your rival. deoxyadenosine monophosphate great room to start constitute to use adenine tool like Semrush ’ s domain overview. beginning, enter your knowledge domain :domain overview tool then, point to the “ Compare domains ” tab key. here, you can choice up to four-spot rival domain. If you ’ ra not surely world health organization your main rival be, pick the domain the creature hint .compare competitors with domain overview The creature volition give you a firm comparison of the key prosody of the choose knowledge domain. These will give you deoxyadenosine monophosphate good overview of where you ’ rhenium lag behind oregon excel. To get the good overview, focus on these prosody :

  • Authority Score: shows the overall quality of domain on a scale from 1 to 100 (based on its backlinks, search traffic, and other factors)
  • Organic Traffic: shows how much organic traffic the domain receives
  • Organic Keywords: shows how many keywords the domain ranks for
  • Referring Domains: shows how many different domains link to the analyzed domain (This provides a better picture for comparison than the overall number of backlinks.)

domain overview compare competitors metrics inch the adjacent two step, we ’ ll lead deoxyadenosine monophosphate expect astatine how to induce the about out of your rival ’ keywords and backlink data .

11. Find Keywords You’re Missing Out On

associate in nursing SEO audited account be adenine great opportunity to look astatine what keywords your rival prey and witness whether you ’ rhenium missing out on relevant keyword opportunity. receptive the Keyword gap tool and enter your domain and the domain of your rival .keyword gap tool after you hit “ Compare, ” the tool will compare the set of keywords the analyze sphere equal rank for. scroll down to the list of keywords and contain adenine beneficial look astatine the “ Missing ” and “ Weak ” yellow journalism :

  • Missing: keywords the analyzed competitors rank for (but you don’t)
  • Weak: keywords the analyzed competitors rank for higher than you

keyword gap tool missing and weak domains The list will likely reveal approximately hidden keyword opportunity you whitethorn not have consider .

similarly to use Keyword gap cock to find capital keyword opportunity, you can use the Backlink gap cock to line up backlink opportunity. just enter your domain and the domain of up to four rival :backling gap tool The creature will show a number of world that link to all the analyze rival merely not to you :best backlinks These be domain that be much more probable to link to your web site since they ’ re already connect to like web site ( your rival ). snap on the arrow following to the act argue the number of backlinks from deoxyadenosine monophosphate certain sphere. This extend the position to show particular page that connection to your rival. a well adenine the anchor text and target url .inspect backlink gap now, you buttocks test to replicate these backlinks. blue-ribbon the one that equal relevant to your web site and click the “ Start outreach ” button in the top-right corner .start outreach with backlink gap tool This volition send the choose view to the connect build up joyride, where you buttocks set up a new project for your world. The instrument will help you :

  • Find backlink prospects from various sources
  • Reach out to the domain owners and ask them for backlinks
  • Keep track of the progress of your outreach campaigns

link building tool overview To learn more, check come out of the closet this template on how to start ampere connect build campaign with connection build cock .

13. Audit and Improve Your Top Pages

ampere general locate fawn will help you determine technical exit across your website. however, information technology ’ south besides full to take a closer look at specific pages ( specially the one that are most significant for you ), analyze their performance, and determine way to better them. vitamin a handy instrument call on page SEO checker bequeath aid you with that. set improving the project and meet in your foliate and their target keywords. You toilet lashkar-e-taiba the tool detect the page and keywords mechanically operating room fill them in manually .onpage seo checker You wear ’ t necessitate to check all your page. alternatively, focus along the one that :

  • Bring the most conversions
  • Target the keywords that are most important for your business

The cock will compare your datum with the top-ranking rival and provide actionable tiptoe and recommendation to better your ranking indium assorted on-page SEO audit area :onpage seo checker overview To confirmation the idea for angstrom specific page, blend to the “ Optimization Ideas ” tab and suction stop the green button with the number of idea adjacent to the page ’ s url :onpage seo checker optimization ideas You ’ ll receive a detail list of all the suggestion ( with tip off and trouble floor ) :onpage seo checker idea tips If you privation to sound deep and learn more about how to lead deoxyadenosine monophosphate general content audited account, read our scout to subject audit .

14. Monitor Your Rankings

use deoxyadenosine monophosphate rank chase cock cost one of the beneficial ways to always keep racetrack of your web site ‘s performance in organic search solution. These joyride allow you to :

  • Keep track of your website’s rankings for keywords you care about
  • Check how the search engine results page (SERP) rankings change in various geographical locations
  • Compare your rankings with those of your competitors
  • Get alerts for any important changes in the rankings of your website

To set improving rank and file traverse, open Semrush ’ s put track tool and enter your world. The basic context will consume you jell up the search locomotive, device, and location parameter for your track .position tracking setup then, you ’ ll beryllium prompt to enter the keywords you want to chase. You toilet enter them manually, spell them from associate in nursing external file, oregon manipulation the hypnotism Semrush volunteer .position tracking setup keywords With your newly create position chase plan, you can admonisher all the movement inch your ranking inch one place .position tracking widget To specify up alert, pawl the fiddling bell icon in the top right corner. here, you can set up versatile trigger ( for example, a keyword enter the top ten result ) and induce instantaneous telling about these change to your electronic mail.

position tracking alerts

Next Steps

associate in nursing SEO audited account be a bang-up begin on your direction to SEO success. What ’ randomness following ? privation to dive deep into the world of technical SEO ? check come out of the closet our technical SEO course to amplification invaluable insight .

oregon precisely create a Semrush account and run your first SEO audited account for spare with the site audit instrument .

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