SEO Audit: Find Out What’s Holding Your Site Back
An SEO audit is a health check of your website on Google. We make sure Google can see your pages, that they answer what your customers are searching for, and that other sites trust them. You walk away with a list of actions ranked by importance, with an explanation for each one.
your-site.comExample · fictional site
Crawl complete
Pages not indexedBlocked by a noindex tagCritical
Duplicate titlesSame title on several pagesNeeds fixing
Mobile speedCore Web Vitals thresholds metPassed
Prioritized action plan
- 1Remove noindex from key pages
- 2Rewrite duplicate titles
- 3Track indexing every month
What is an SEO audit?
An SEO audit is a health check of your website on Google: we examine it, list what’s keeping it from attracting visits, and tell you what to fix first.
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1Your site
We examine it
Every page gets reviewed the way Google would see it: what it can read, what the pages say, who talks about you.
- Pages and technical setup
- Content
- Links from other sites
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2The diagnosis
We find what’s blocking it
Every issue is logged, explained in plain terms and ranked by severity.
- Pages invisible on Google
- Duplicate titles
- Slow site on mobile
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3Your action plan
We tell you where to start
You get the list of fixes, from most useful to least urgent, along with how to make them.
- Make pages visible
- Rewrite the titles
- Speed up mobile
Example · fictional site
Without an audit, you fix things at random: you rewrite pages Google has never seen, or chase links to a site too slow to benefit from them. With an audit, you know where to start, and why.
When should you get an SEO audit?
An audit is useful at specific moments. If any of these situations sounds familiar, now is the right time.
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Your traffic is dropping
Visits from Google are declining and you don’t know why: the audit looks for the cause.
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Your site has plateaued
It’s been live for months, yet it doesn’t show up for the searches that matter to your business.
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You’re planning a redesign
Before switching sites, we identify the pages that bring you visits, so you don’t lose them.
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You just launched a new site
After launch, we check that nothing got lost: forgotten pages, broken links, redirects.
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You’re targeting a new country
We make sure the site is ready to be found in another language.
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A year has gone by
With no warning signs, one audit a year is enough for most sites to stay up to date.
What our SEO audit covers
Four areas, like four questions. Expand them to see what we check in each one.
Audit dashboardExample · fictional site
- 62 %Pages visible on Google
- 73 %Titles and content
- 41 %Authority
- 58 %Mobile speed
Technical auditCan Google read your site?
First and foremost, Google has to be able to find your pages, index them and display them fast. A technical roadblock can make entire sections invisible.
- Pages blocked or missed by Google
- XML sitemap and robots.txt file
- 404 errors and redirects
- Speed and Core Web Vitals
- Mobile display
- Security (HTTPS) and structured data
Content auditDo your pages answer what people search for?
Each page should target a specific search and answer it better than the rest. We check the wording, the headings and the quality of the copy.
- Keywords targeted by each page
- Fit with what your customers are looking for
- Title tags and meta descriptions
- Page headings (H1, H2)
- Thin or duplicate content
- Pages competing with each other
- Links between your pages
Backlink auditDo other sites recommend you?
To Google, a link from another site is a recommendation. We measure how many you have, their quality and where they come from.
- Sites linking to yours
- Quality and topic of those sites
- Questionable links that could hurt you
- Pages receiving the links
- Unlinked mentions (press, directories)
- Google Business Profile, for a local business
Competitor auditWho’s ahead of you, and why?
We look at the sites holding the top spots for your searches, to understand what they do that you don’t.
- Your real competitors on Google
- Searches where they show up and you don’t
- Their content that performs
- Where their links come from
- Speed and technical gaps
How the audit works, step by step
An audit always follows the same order. The exact timeline is in the quote: it mostly comes down to the site’s size.
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01Week 1
A conversation about your business
What you sell, to whom, what the site needs to bring in and why you want an audit now.
Deliverable: Your goals and the competitors to track
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02Week 1
Your real numbers
Read-only access to Google Search Console and your analytics: the only sources of real data.
Deliverable: An initial snapshot
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03Weeks 1–2
Crawling the site
Software goes through every page, the way Google does, and picks up what the eye can’t see.
Deliverable: The page inventory
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04Weeks 2–3
The analysis
Technical, content, backlinks, competition: every issue is checked by hand and ranked.
Deliverable: Actions by priority
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05Week 4
The walkthrough
We present the report in a meeting and explain every recommendation.
Deliverable: The report and the roadmap
Timeline based on a site with a few hundred pages; a large online store takes longer.
What you get
Four documents, designed to be put into practice by you, your developers, your writers or your web agency.
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The executive summary
Two pages for leadership: the state of the site, the three main roadblocks and the decisions to make.
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The detailed report
Every issue, the pages affected, an explanation and how to fix it.
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The prioritized list
Every action sorted by its likely impact and the effort it takes, quick wins first.
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The roadmap
The schedule for the months ahead, ready to drop into a spreadsheet or your project management tool.
Sample previews · fictional site
A consultant or an automated tool?
Online tools can produce an “audit” in a few minutes. They’re useful and we use them too, but they don’t replace a human look at your site and your market.
What a consultant brings
- Sorts the alerts and sets aside the ones that don’t matter
- Ties each issue to your business goals
- Compares your site to your real competitors
- Reads your content and judges whether it answers searches
- Proposes a realistic order of work for your teams
The limits of a tool on its own
- An overall score that doesn’t tell you where to start
- Alerts with no hierarchy, all at the same level
- No reading of the actual quality of the content
- No knowledge of your market or your margins
- Flagged errors that aren’t errors on your CMS
What happens after the audit?
The action plan is yours. You can carry it out with your team, with your web agency, or hand us all or part of the work as part of ongoing SEO services. Either way, we stay available to answer questions from whoever is implementing the recommendations. If you also want to know whether assistants like ChatGPT cite your brand, we can measure your presence in AI answers.
Sites change, and so does Google: one audit a year is enough for most sites, with a quick check after every major change.
Your questions: SEO Audit
Can’t find your question? Ask us
What is an SEO audit?
It’s a health check of your website on Google: we make sure Google can see your pages, that they match what your customers type and that other sites trust them, then we rank the fixes by importance.
How long does an SEO audit take?
A few weeks for most sites, longer for a large online store or a multilingual site. The exact timeline is stated in the quote, along with the date of the walkthrough.
What do you get at the end of the audit?
An executive summary for leadership, a detailed report issue by issue, a list of actions ranked by impact and effort, and a roadmap. Everything is presented in a walkthrough meeting.
Isn’t a free audit tool enough?
It gives you a first idea, but it flags everything at the same level and knows nothing about your market or your goals. A consultant sorts the alerts, sets aside false errors and proposes a realistic order of work.
How often should you do an SEO audit?
Once a year works for most sites, and always before a redesign, a CMS migration or expansion into a new country. An unexplained drop in traffic also calls for an audit right away.
Do you need an audit before a website redesign?
Yes. It identifies the pages that bring in traffic, prepares the redirects and fixes the old site’s flaws instead of carrying them over to the new one.
Can you do an SEO audit yourself?
Partly. Google Search Console, which is free, already shows the pages Google ignores and the searches that bring you visits. What takes experience is sorting out what really matters and deciding where to start.