If you have found yourself at a digital brick wall, unsure what you can do to help improve your online presence, it may be time to consider an SEO site audit.
If you find yourself questioning why your website isn’t working the way you want it to or why you’re not getting the sales you expect, then the first stop should be organising yourself a website audit with a reputable SEO professional.
What is an seo audit?
Having an SEO site audit is like performing a service on a car. You are looking beyond the body of the car which we can see with the naked eye and gaining a deeper understanding of the more technical components that bring everything together and ensure it works on a day to day basis.
A technical site audit will provide you with the details you need to discover why your site is not generating the traffic that you’re expecting or aiming for. It can also look at why you’re not converting on sales.
Perhaps visitors are getting to certain point on your site and then not committing to the next step? An audit could provide you with the answers you’re looking for.
The processes involved are vast and can range from looking for duplicate content to looking for red flags in the underbelly of your website or finding completely missing elements that are effecting your rankings.
It will also involve working with several pieces of website audit software and online tools to bring together all the data required to gain a full picture.
When is the best time to have an SEO Audit?
Any SEO expert will tell you that site audits are the foundation to a healthy website. Frequent audits will ensure your website keeps up-to-date and on top of any changes/errors as they crop up.
Leaving problems running in the background of your website for too long can have devastating effects on your rankings and although the damage may be irreversible, it can take a long time to undo the damage. The best way to avoid this is by having regular SEO audits every quarter, six months or annually.
Just because something you do now is deemed innovative, excellent and a great demonstration of web expertise, it does not mean that this will still be the case in 6 months’ time, let alone 5 or even 10 years.
There is no excuse for websites to be left without audits, care and updates for long periods of time.
The world of the web is always going to see advancements and changes that will need you to stay on top of the industry and unless you’re going to take on this onerous task on top of the running of your business, you need to find someone who can help you do this.
The longer we have access to this growing digital environment behind our computer screens, the more complex things will become, the more factors we will need to consider and the smarter search engines will get in determining rankings.
This year alone has seen the introduction of multiple new initiatives and factors online, for example Google is now looking at mobile version of websites first, before desktop. On top of this, technical code and site speed have been top factors considered this year. Do you know what to expect next year?
It isn’t just about knowing the trends that effect your online ranking, it’s about knowing your own website too.
Do you know if the mobile version of your website is search engine friendly? Do you know how many backlinks you have, their quality and topical relevancy? What about broken inbound, outbound or internal links? These are a tiny portion of the things you need to know in order to rank and an audit can help you find the answers you need.
What should you expect from a professional SEO technical audit?
And what are the signs of a low quality SEO audit?
If you’ve never had a website audit, then you won’t know what to expect. But here are a couple of red flags to look out for, to ensure you don’t end up disappointed or with unreliable information.
- A good SEO site audit is not a quick process, so if this is something you have received within a few hours or a day, or even immediately then this will raise alarm bells.
- Easy read? Not necessarily. Whilst the aim of an SEO audit is never to confuse you, it is important to provide a real insight into the website. There’s no point receiving a quick and easy read as a result of an audit, otherwise how will you know which individual elements you need to work on to move forward.
How I perform SEO audits
My SEO audits are intense and designed to reveal all information about your SEO campaign. Here’s what is involved:
Keywords Audit & Strategy
I analyse your current set of keywords, find new, better keywords to target, prioritise your keyword set, and then categorise your keywords based on search intent.
Competitors Analysis
I analyse your competitors to help you prioritise what keywords you should be targeting. Then, I analyse your competition on a deeper level to extract KW ideas, content perspectives and backlink opportunities.
Technical SEO Analysis
Having a strong technically-optimised website is critical to the long-term success of your SEO campaign. I use a variety of tools to identify technical issues that may be holding your website back or hurting User Experience (UX).
Site Architecture
A well-designed site architecture improves crawlability and indexing and helps grow your site’s overall authority. I audit your existing architecture and will map out a more effective one if deemed necessary.
SEO Content Audit
SEO content refers to any keyword-targeted page on your website. I analyse every single one of your keyword targeted pages to help you make them even better.
Backlink Audit
Backlinks are a fundamental piece of the SEO equation. I first analyse your existing backlink profile and then I create a list with the links that have to be changed/improved or disavowed
Detailed Roadmap
Information is useless without direction. That’s why I also supply you with a detailed action list. This list is prioritised based on what actions will have the highest impact on your SEO performance.
SEO Audit Prices
All website audits include:
- Keyword research & strategy
- Competitors analysis
- Technical SEO analysis
- Site architecture audit
- SEO content audit
- Link audit (inbound & outbound)
- Actionable advice – roadmap (delivery time: 1 week for SMALL, 2 weeks for MEDIUM, 3 weeks for LARGE)
- Meta title & descriptions rewrite (for the 25 most visited URLs according to Google Search Console for SMALL, 50 URLs for MEDIUM and 100 URLs for LARGE)