Word count
Internal link count
And more
However, if you’re a rental equipment service where the look and feel of your company matters a lot, then you’ll want to consider image-based metrics such as:
Alt text
Image size
Page load speed (since images can weigh down your website’s speed)
Number of images per page
And more
2. Consider the tools you’ll use
In addition to planning out your goals, you’ll also want to consider the tools and software you’ll use for your audit. Every website analysis tool is slightly different, so gathering as much information from as many different sources as possible is important.
There are tons of great software and tools out there to help you with your analysis, like:
Moz
Semrush
Ahrefs
Screaming Frog
Google Analytics
And more
You can use as many as possible to help supplement your audit process!
3. Discuss your audit goals with stakeholders
The next step in how to conduct an SEO website audit is to directly discuss your audit goals and hypothesis with your stakeholders!
This is a really important step because it can help you build buy-in for the findings you come up with while also allowing you to do them a favor if there’s something they would also like to look into.
Maybe the product manager wants to take a quick look at the philippines mobile number effectiveness of a new page template, or maybe the IT team wants to get a quick snapshot of the website’s Core Web Vitals. You can not only help your co-workers out but also build momentum for any recommendations that you come up with!
4. Conduct the audit
It can be incredibly easy to lose sight of your goals or hypothesis as you conduct your audit, but try to keep your ultimate goals in mind!
Scope creep can kill the focus of your audit, muddle the findings you analyze, and either burn you out or confuse you as to why you’re undertaking the project at all. It’s essential to refer back to your planning documentation and processes to ensure you’re targeting your hypothesis and goals.
While conducting your audit, you’ll also want to revisit the list of tools and resources you created during the planning phase. It’s important for you to use as many different resources as possible to ensure you can view your website in multiple different ways and perspectives.
For example, Screaming Frog is one of the best tools for understanding technical SEO data, but Semrush and Google Analytics are great for auditing your content and search appearances. Utilizing multiple sources can help you create well-rounded findings that address your hypothesis or topic.
A common question among beginning website auditors is how much data to use. While there is no right or wrong answer since it can depend greatly on your goals and hypothesis, a general rule of thumb is to use at least six months of data.
Since SEO is a long-term marketing strategy, you need to include a large enough time frame to reflect how slowly search engine crawlers truly take to understand how your website fits into the overall web. As Google has recently hinted, it can take months for search engine crawlers to accomplish this, so including a large enough data timeframe is essential for an accurate assessment and analysis.
5. Report the audit findings