how to audit a website for SEO
How to audit a website for SEO
To audit a website for SEO, work from the foundation up: confirm the pages are indexed, check that every page has a unique title and description, review headings and internal links, measure mobile speed, validate structured data, check that images have alt text, look for broken links and redirect chains, review the content against actual search intent, and finish by confirming a visitor can call or contact you within one tap. Fix indexation problems first, because every other fix is worthless on a page Google cannot reach.
The nine steps, in priority order
Order matters more than completeness. An unindexed page with perfect schema still earns nothing.
- 1Check indexation. In Google Search Console, open Pages and compare indexed against discovered. Search site:yourdomain.com for a rough count. Anything important that is missing is your first problem, and it usually traces to robots.txt, a noindex tag or a broken canonical.
- 2Review titles and meta descriptions. Every page needs a unique title under about 60 characters with the term someone would actually type, and a description under about 160 characters that earns the click. Duplicates across pages are one of the most common local-site failures.
- 3Check heading structure. One H1 per page that states the subject, then H2s that map to the questions a buyer asks. Headings styled with CSS instead of real heading tags do nothing for search.
- 4Measure mobile speed. Run PageSpeed Insights on mobile, not desktop. Watch Largest Contentful Paint and Cumulative Layout Shift. Oversized hero images and unused scripts cause most local-site failures here.
- 5Validate structured data. Use the Rich Results Test. A local business should have LocalBusiness or a specific subtype, Service, Offer and FAQPage where relevant. Missing schema is the single biggest gap on most small business sites.
- 6Audit images. Descriptive alt text on every meaningful image, modern formats, and dimensions that match how the image is displayed rather than a 4000px photo scaled down in the browser.
- 7Find broken links and redirect chains. Crawl the site and fix 404s and multi-hop redirects. Each hop leaks a little authority and adds latency.
- 8Compare content against search intent. Search your target term and look at what actually ranks. If the results are comparison pages and yours is a brochure, the format is the problem, not the word count.
- 9Test the conversion path. On a phone, count the taps from landing to calling you. If it is more than one, fix that before writing another blog post.
Tools that cover most of this for free
You do not need a paid stack to run a first audit.
- Google Search Console for indexation, queries and Core Web Vitals
- PageSpeed Insights for mobile performance
- The Rich Results Test for structured data
- Google Business Profile insights for local visibility
- Any free crawler for broken links and duplicate titles
What a manual audit will not tell you
A checklist tells you what is broken. It does not tell you which fix is worth the most money, and that is where most owners stall. Ranking the findings by revenue impact is the difference between a to-do list and a plan.
Frequently asked questions
How long does an SEO audit take?
A focused manual audit of a small business site takes about one to two hours. A full technical audit with a crawler and competitive analysis takes a day or more.
How often should I audit my site?
A quick indexation and speed check monthly, and a full audit twice a year or after any redesign, migration or platform change.
What is the most common problem you find?
Missing or wrong structured data, followed closely by duplicate titles and a mobile page that takes more than four seconds to become usable.
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