An SEO audit is an important procedure if you want to be certain your site is attracting as much traffic as possible, but it can take quite a while (particularly if you hire an expert with a vested interest in prolonging the process). It’s possible to do your own SEO audit, without expending too much of your valuable time. Here’s how to do a full SEO audit of your own site in as little as a day.
1. Check for Other Versions of Your Site
You can start by making sure there’s only one accessible version of your site. You want to make sure that every possible version of your URL is set up with a 301 redirect to the definitive version of your site—otherwise, there could be versions floating around that aren’t properly optimized, possibly damaging your rankings. Try typing every version of your site’s name, including with or without the www or http prefix, and make sure only one is accessible. Make a note of what you type to access the definitive version.
2. Make Sure You’re Indexed
If you’re not indexed by Google, you won’t rank for any keywords. Go to Google Search Console, click Google Index, and click Index Status. This will tell you how many pages (if any) Google has indexed by your site. If there aren’t any, you have a rogue x-robots-tag HTTP header that you’ll need to repair. It’s a simple process you can find here.
3. Get A Traffic Overview
Using the definitive URL, search for your root domain on SEMRush. This doesn’t require any payment or even an account. SEMRush will spit out a graph of your organic traffic and your your pay-per-click traffic, as well as a pie chart displaying what the main sources of your traffic are. Is there anything unexpected here? Are your PPC efforts making headway? Is your organic search in the gutter? This is a good place to spot major issues.
4. Check Out Your Keywords
SEMRush will also give you some information about the keywords that are generating your organic search traffic. These can greatly inform your SEO efforts—if you’re spending your time targeting keywords that aren’t generating any traffic, they won’t show up on this screen. Conversely, this can also show you unexpected pathways to your site that you can capitalize on in the future by creating more content to improve your ranking for these keywords.
5. Scope Out the Competition
Check out the Competition Graph that SEMRush gives you to see how your domain is doing in comparison with others that are in your same category. Are you doing as well as you’d like? If not, you can take some cues from your competitors. Look at their SEO strategy and imitate their most successful techniques.
6. Check Out Your On-Site Copy
The Moz SEO Toolbar can help you optimize the on-site content that is responsible for a large part of your ranking (or lack thereof). Make sure that your page headings and titles are optimized for style and keywords, so that they’ll be positioned to earn you the rank you want for your targeted keywords.
7. Make Sure Your Pathways Are Clear
One major SEO mishap is sloppy site mapping. Try selecting five pages form your site at random. How would a user reach them from your homepage? If your pathways aren’t clear, especially the ones involved in your sales funnel or the pages necessary for your desired conversion, you need to fix this. You should also make sure that each link contains unique keywords.
You don’t need to spend a week on an SEO audit. Follow the steps above and you’ll have a great picture of your site’s SEO, with some action steps to work on to improve it.
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