Knowing the health status of your website is essential. Performing regular SEO audits of your website will help you stay on top of any adjustments that need to be made.
Do you know how your SEO (search engine optimization) efforts are going? Are they producing the results you expected? Do you appear in searches? Do you know why your efforts may not be effective or how to make things better?
If you can't answer these questions, it's probably time for an SEO audit.
When to carry out an SEO audit?
Performing these audits several times a year will help you have specific data and insights into things like your page performance, traffic, and more. You can also see how your chosen keywords perform and how your site ranks compared to your competition.
You know that SEO is a long-term commitment . You also know that trying to check for changes every day can be frustrating and make it seem like you're not gaining ground.
I recommend doing SEO audits two to four times a year.
If you have an SME and a small website, performing the SEO audit twice a year is enough. For larger businesses or larger websites with a lot of new content every month, try to review your site every quarter.
Regardless of how often you conduct an SEO audit, creating a clear strategy and checklist will help you save time and effort.
Here are some more things we've learned about SEO audits to help you with your own planning and website success.
SEO technical analysis
With technical analysis, you ensure that your site performs as it should. This means that the links go to the correct pages and the images load quickly. Evaluate all technical aspects of your site's operation.
On-page SEO review
Your website must be properly structured and include content that makes sense for your brand, products and services.
It's also a good time to evaluate the keywords you're targeting.
Look for problems by reviewing content categories and making sure everything aligns with your business goals and purpose.
If you have a sparse and disorganized approach to content, you will hurt your site's chances of ranking well. Also make sure there is no duplicate content.
Off-page SEO analysis
Off-page SEO is challenging because not every aspect of it is something you can control. It is important to understand this very well.
You need to make sure that Google sees your site as an authority that people can trust. This includes making sure you have online reviews and inbound links and very importantly, that you are not using shady SEO practices.
You can see the SEO audit as a type of verification that lets you know if your efforts are still effective or if you need to make changes.
Benefits of an SEO audit
Optimizing the performance of your website
Website audits typically assess a site not only for its content but also for its technical performance.
As a result, an audit will give you the opportunity to inspect the soundness of your website's technical framework and infrastructure. It also allows you to assess how search engine friendly your website is and determine how easy it is for users to intuitively navigate and find content on your website.
Search engine optimization
By performing a website SEO audit , you will be able to identify any missed SEO opportunities and remedy any misguided or poorly executed SEO errors. For example, keyword stuffing, exact match anchor text links, etc. in all the content of your website.
It will also allow you to better focus your SEO efforts on users first and search engines second.
This will protect you from constantly searching for changes in Google's ranking algorithms. This means that you won't be applying bad practices just to appear at the top of search engine results pages (SERPs).
Conversion Rate Optimization
Website SEO audits also allow you to reassess the effectiveness of your website in terms of lead generation and conversion .
As a result, you'll be able to spot any previously overlooked opportunities to convert visitors into leads so you can add relevant calls-to-action . You can also identify deficiencies in your landing pages so you can optimize them to increase conversions.
How to perform an SEO audit of your website
Analyze your site through an SEO audit
Analyze your website URL through a site audit tool. If you don't have one you can get a free audit from Do It Marketing .
When you use SEO audit software for your site, you can get specific recommendations and test the performance of your pages.
Find technical errors
Once you've run your site through an audit tool, you'll want to look for technical errors. These could be related to performance, SEO, mobile, security, and more. The technical structure of the site and the configuration of your site play an important role in the performance of your website for customers.
Identify SEO issues
Once your entire site has been analyzed by an SEO audit program, you'll want to see any SEO-related issues so you can improve your search engine ranking.
This could mean looking at meta descriptions, reviewing image alt texts, and more.
Analyze design and UX
One of the things I like to look for when doing a website audit is the user experience.
How does your site design work for your clients? Some programs have heatmaps that tell you which parts of your design draw the most attention and what users read.
This type of analysis will let you know how the overall design and user experience is impacting your visitors.
Evaluate the content of your website
A website audit will help you assess the content of your website, including blogs, website pages, your landing pages, etc.
You'll want to know how your current pages are performing.
Ask yourself: is my content ranking well in search engines ? and “Is my on-page SEO and performance aligned with my traffic numbers?”
Generate a list of your site's issues
Generate a checklist of all site issues and recommended solutions
Lastly, when you do an SEO audit of a website, it's important to have a place to put a summary of all your findings.
It lists site issues and recommended solutions, so you can send that information to the appropriate teams.
Create a plan to solve the problems found as soon as possible.
Conclusion of an SEO audit
Thanks to all the tools available today, you will find that performing these SEO audits is easier than you think. What you must be clear about is that SEO is a process that takes time and you must continually review and adjust before all the initiatives that your competition implements to fight for the top positions.
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