Nowadays, if you want to succeed as a website owner, your site must align with modern SEO standards. The challenge? There are millions—if not billions—of websites competing for that coveted top spot. You could launch the perfect website today, only for Google’s algorithm changes to shake things up a few months later.
That’s why regular SEO audits are essential—they reveal what’s holding your site back. These audits help optimize your content, identify technical issues, and ultimately enhance user experience. Given the complexity of this process, this article will walk you through how to perform a technical SEO audit (and more) to help drive traffic to your website.
Types of SEO Audits
To effectively run diagnostics on your website’s performance, you’ll need to understand the main types of SEO audits:
1. Technical SEO Audits
These audits focus on the backend of your site—looking at mobile-friendliness, site speed, HTTPS security, and crawlability. The goal is to ensure that search engines can properly index your website. Just as importantly, these audits aim to reduce bounce rates—since 40% of users abandon sites that take more than 3 seconds to load.
2. On-Page SEO Audits
These audits review everything on the page itself, including internal linking, meta tags, content quality, keyword usage, and structure. The goal is to make your website attractive and informative to both users and search engines.
3. Off-Page SEO Audits
This type focuses on your site’s reputation across the web—evaluating backlinks, brand mentions, and social signals. A strong off-page SEO profile helps search engines view your site as trustworthy and authoritative.
SEO Audit Checklist for Agencies
Websites are complex, and optimizing them takes multiple steps. Whether you’re using Ahrefs, Semrush, Sitebulb, or another SEO tool, here’s what your audit should cover:
✅ Ensure the Site Is Indexed
First, make sure your website is being indexed by Google. You can check this by searching site:yourdomainname.com in Google. If few or no results appear, there may be indexing issues. Head to Google Search Console and visit the Pages section to identify what’s preventing your content from being indexed.
✅ Check for Duplicate Versions
Having multiple versions of your website (e.g., with and without “www,” HTTP vs. HTTPS) can dilute your authority. Only one version should be accessible. Redirect all traffic to the HTTPS version, and set your preferred domain in Google Search Console.
✅ Test Mobile-Friendliness
Around 45% of North American traffic comes from mobile devices—and globally, that number jumps to 62%. Use mobile-friendly testing tools to ensure text readability, media playback, and page speed work well across devices. Most modern WordPress themes already come optimized for mobile.
✅ Evaluate Site Speed
Page speed is critical. A slow-loading website increases bounce rates and damages SEO. Use Google PageSpeed Insights to analyze performance and find opportunities to boost speed. A score in the 80s is generally strong—perfection isn’t necessary, but consistency is key.
✅ Review Content Quality
Your content must offer real value—Google’s algorithms prioritize thorough, accurate, and user-friendly content. Avoid keyword stuffing and instead aim to answer searcher intent clearly. Update outdated posts and remove irrelevant or thin content to maintain quality.
✅ Identify Missed Keyword Opportunities
You may be overlooking valuable keyword opportunities your competitors are already using. Tools like Semrush’s Keyword Gap can show you what terms you’re missing so you can create content to close those gaps.
✅ Check for Broken Links
Broken links hurt user experience and SEO. Studies show that 23% of web pages contain at least one broken link, and over 66% of links decay within 9 years. Use tools like Ahrefs or Broken Link Checker to identify and fix dead links regularly.
Final Thoughts
A well-designed website is just the beginning—what really matters is how well it performs. With regular SEO audits, you can catch issues before they snowball, stay compliant with Google’s evolving standards, and maintain a competitive edge.
Use this guide as a foundation and make auditing a recurring part of your SEO strategy. Doing so every few weeks or months can make a significant difference in your long-term traffic and rankings.