Describe an SEO audit.

An SEO audit determines how effectively your website is optimized for search engines. It identifies problems that can harm the site's rankings and offers solutions. This problem can prevent the site from growing since Google uses mobile friendliness as a ranking factor and because mobile searches are more common than desktop searches.

Here are some more advantages of finishing an SEO audit:

  • enables you to maintain an edge over your rivals 
  • enhances the website experience for your visitors
  • can spot profitable SEO possibilities to increase return on investment
  • helps you to improve your SEO tactics
  • allows you to explain the value of SEO to your company's stakeholders

What equipment is required for an SEO audit?

You may perform an SEO audit using a variety of tools, but the most straightforward place to start is with two free tools that cover all the essentials:

  • Webmaster Tools for Ahrefs (AWT)
  • (GSC) Google Search Console
  • How to do an SEO audit

Although every SEO audit is different, here are the 11 stages you may follow to develop your SEO audit:

1. Use AWT to crawl your website

The software checks your website during a "crawl" to look for SEO problems. You must do one utilizing AWT to serve as the foundation for your SEO audit. Click Import from Google Search Console after that. (To accomplish this, you'll need a Google Search Console account.) The audit will begin when you have authorized with Google, choose your site, and click Import. Once your audit is set up, you have to wait. But after your audit is over, Ahrefs will email you. The audit's ability to find over 100 faults may be intimidating for beginners. Therefore, I suggest concentrating on the following procedures rather than attempting to address each problem individually if you are new to auditing. 

2. Determine any declines in organic traffic and determine their reason.

Google often modifies its search algorithms. Numerous upgrades target specific issues, such as link spam or article quality. If a decline follows substantial upgrades in traffic, this might help you determine which areas most likely require your attention. This is how to check. Drops can occur for a variety of causes, but there are two basic ones:

Updated Google algorithms 

Manual procedures

Plugging your URL into Ahrefs' Site Explorer and observing any traffic dips that correspond with updates is the quickest approach to determine whether you have been affected by an update. For instance, the decrease in traffic to this site corresponds with a Google Spam Update, as shown below. Additionally, you may double-check Google Search Console's performance for organic search. Given Ahrefs' estimates of organic traffic, this is crucial to accomplish. 

How to do it:

  • Click on the Search Results Report page. 
  • The date should be set to the last 12 months.
  • Search for any noticeable decreases.
  • Check drops to determine if dots and Google's Search Status dashboard correspond.

If your traffic has stopped altogether, it might be necessary to look for manual action. Here is when a human Google reviewer determines that your site does not adhere to the Google search requirements. It implies that either all or part of your website won't appear in the search results on Google. Manual action will likely occur if you've done something very wrong. However, ensuring you're not already out of time before you begin is crucial. Visit the Manual actions report in Google Search Console for any manual activities.

3. Look for any unauthorized copies of your website.

Only one of these URLs should be used to access your website by visitors: https://domain.com

https://www.domain.com. You need help if it can be accessed from either of its non-secure equivalents (http://domain.com and http://www.domain.com) or both. The variants above must lead users to your website's main page. This is crucial as Google interprets these URLs as different site versions. Multiple accessible ones can interfere with crawling and indexing. It may dilute link equity in some circumstances, which might harm rankings. Install the Ahrefs SEO Toolbar, enter each URL version into your browser, and then verify the HTTP headers to make sure they all redirect to the same "master" version to make sure everything is working as it should.

For instance, if we go to http://ahrefs.com, it takes us to https://ahrefs.com, which is the secure version.

4. Identify and address indexability problems

Search results are found in Google's index, a database containing hundreds of billions of websites. To have any chance of ranking, your pages must be included in this index. Although indexing problems can get rather complex, you can quickly check for fundamental issues. First, look for "Noindex page" alerts in the Indexability report in Site Audit. It is essential to ensure they are not pages you want to be indexed since Google cannot index pages with warnings. Remove or modify the meta robots tag if they are.

5. Check that your website is mobile-friendly.

Checking whether your website is mobile-friendly makes sense because it is now one of Google's ranking factors. Go to Google Search Console's Mobile Usability report to accomplish this. It will let you know if any URLs have issues that make them unusable on mobile devices.

6. Benchmark the results of Core Web Vitals.

Google measures user experience using Core Web Vitals data. They gauge how quickly a website loads, how interactive it is, and how stable the material is while it does so. John Mueller acknowledged in 2022 that Google solely utilizes Core Web Vitals instead of "old page speed signals."

7. Regain control by restoring faulty links

Broken pages on your website are never a good thing. If there are backlinks to these pages, they are useless since they point to nothing. In Site Explorer, you can also look for broken URLs with backlinks. To add a "404 not found" filter, enter your website, go to the Best by Links report, and do so. The information should then be ordered by referring domains, high to low.

8. Make sure your sitemap is error-free.

The pages you want search engines to index are listed in a sitemap. Redirects, non-canonicals, and defunct pages should not be recorded since they provide Google with conflicting signals. It's crucial to check that your sitemap contains the most significant pages you want to be indexed. You can monitor your sitemap difficulties by visiting Google Search Console and selecting Sitemaps.

9. Check that on-page components follow SEO-recommended practices.

Your website's indexable pages must include an H1 tag, a meta description, and a title tag. These fundamental on-page components aid Google in comprehending your material and enable you to increase clickthroughs from your ranks. Go to the "Issues" tab in the Content report for problems.

10. Look for dwindling content to regain ranks

Rankings are not permanent. Search traffic to out-of-date material frequently starts to decline. But simply refreshing and republishing the article, you can typically restore ranks. As an illustration, in 2021, the number of top Google searches drastically decreased.

11. Discover phrases your rivals are ranking for, but you aren't

Content gaps may develop when your competitors' websites gain visibility for terms you don't. It takes time to find these keywords manually. Here is a quick method for utilizing Ahrefs' Content Gap tool to discover content gaps at a domain level:

  • Entering Site Explorer, type in your domain.
  • Please see the Content Gap study.
  • Paste the parts of your rivals.