How to run an SEO audit

An SEO audit is a structured review of how well a website is set up for search engines and the people using them. It finds problems that hold a site back, from pages that cannot be indexed to slow load times and thin content. A good audit ends with a prioritised list of fixes, not just a long report.

What you need

• Google Search Console, which shows indexing, search queries and errors for your site.
• An analytics tool to see which pages bring in visitors and what they do next.
• A crawler, such as one of the free desktop SEO crawlers, to list every URL with its status code, title and description.
• PageSpeed Insights for performance and Core Web Vitals.

Step 1: Check indexing

Compare the number of pages you expect to be indexed with what Search Console reports. Look for important pages excluded by noindex tags, blocked in robots.txt or treated as duplicates. Make sure your XML sitemap lists only pages you want indexed.

Step 2: Crawl the site

Run a crawler and look for broken links (404 errors), redirect chains, pages with missing or duplicate titles and descriptions, and pages that are hard to reach from the menu. Fix broken internal links and point old URLs to their best new equivalent.

Step 3: Review site speed and mobile use

Test key templates, such as the home page, a product or service page and a blog post. Large images, unused scripts and render-blocking resources are the usual problems. Check the site on a real phone too.

Step 4: Review on-page elements

For each important page, check that the title tag, main heading and opening text clearly describe the topic and that the URL is readable. Make sure images have descriptive alt text.

Step 5: Assess content quality

Look for thin pages, near-duplicates and outdated information. Decide for each one whether to improve, merge or remove it. Note topics your customers ask about that the site does not yet cover.

Step 6: Look at internal linking

Important pages should be linked from several relevant places. Orphan pages, which nothing links to, are easy to miss and rarely rank.

Step 7: Review backlinks

Use a backlink tool or the Links report in Search Console to see which sites link to you and which of your pages attract links. Make sure pages with links still work; if a linked URL has changed, redirect it.

Step 8: Check local signals

For local businesses, review your Google Business Profile, the consistency of your name, address and phone number across directories, and your reviews.

Step 9: Prioritise

Rank the issues by impact and effort. Indexing problems and broken pages usually come first, then speed and key pages, then content improvements. Repeat a lighter audit every few months.

For the techniques behind the fixes, see SEO techniques that still work.