It is a well-known fact that without proper search engine optimization (SEO); your website will not be able to rank in the top search engine results. However, before beginning the SEO campaign it is recommended to perform a SEO audit of the site you are working on. Though the audit process it is easier to locate the problematic areas in the website and rectify them accordingly. Not only this, with proper audit the website remains updated with latest search marketing developments that are taking place.
Need and expectations from SEO audit
The SEO industry is extremely dynamic in nature. Without regular audits, the website might lose on important updates and developments. Once the audit is done, you can expect many things. You will have a complete list of actions, which are completely based on SEO audit checklist with detailed explanation of each item. You will have complete status on the position of the website in various areas. You will also get a comprehensive report mentioning great internet marketing strategies so that your website can do better in the web.
Checklist of SEO audit
There are many items which make up the checklist for SEO audit. Some of the most important ones are as follows:
Look to improve onsite authority factors
Google will check whether the website in question is authoritative or non-authoritative. Here are some ways of checking the same:
- Each URL should be short, easily readable and include relevant keywords
- Site navigation should be smooth with smooth linking, categories and sub categories
- Avoid bad redirects like 307 or 302. Better use 301 redirects
- Site speed matters – faster it loads, better it is
- Ensure there are no internal broken links and all point to proper pages in the site
- Get a ranking boost with a secured site. Upgrade to SSL encryption
- Set up Google Analytics for getting information on each page of the site
- Compatibility with multiple browsers and mobile optimized sites are must
Look into search index presence and accessibility factors
Ensure that the website pages can be accessed by users as well as located by search engine crawlers. Check these:
- Remove JavaScript and Flash features as search engines find them hard to index and read
- Ensure that the XML sitemap works fine as it is a map for the search engine bots
- Found in source code, the robot.txt file needs proper configuration. Otherwise the search engine bots will not crawl the site properly
- Do ensure there are no broken links or 404 errors
Looking into content matters
Content plays a major role in every website. It should be used properly for best results. Check these out:
- There should be no compromise with the quality of the content. Check there are no grammatical and spelling errors
- Every page in the site should have some content – quantity does not matter
- Work on meta tags and title tags so that they are unique and contain relevant keywords
- Minutely review multimedia content as well as images in the site with proper meta information and alt tags
This comprehensive SEO audit checklist will help in starting or re-boosting SEO campaign for your site bringing in highly favorable results.
