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<\/a><\/p>\nRecently tasked with performing a technical SEO audit? Or maybe you\u2019ve just heard about how important it is without any real idea as to why. This blog post not only goes into the <\/span>point<\/span><\/i> of a technical SEO audit, but exactly how to complete one.<\/span><\/p>\n Performing a technical SEO audit is important to anyone who is concerned with website optimization, increasing website visitors, and increasing page rank. In short, performing a technical SEO audit is something that should matter to every business on the web. <\/span><\/p>\n It\u2019s necessary to perform an audit if<\/span><\/p>\n Done correctly, there can be huge gains after you successfully complete a technical audit. And it\u2019s not all about optimizing specific pages for keywords. It\u2019s also about finding 404 errors and fixing them with 301 redirects. <\/span><\/p>\n Websites are ever-changing. And while we like to think we\u2019re always on top of the redirects, sometimes things fall through the cracks. If you change the location of a page without setting up a redirect, that means all of that original SERP can\u2019t be passed on to the new page. Instead, you lose it completely. Your new page, then, is essentially starting from scratch to achieve rankings. Finding and fixing these errors allows you maintain your current rankings. Adding keywords and updating your title tags allows you to <\/span>increase<\/span><\/i> your current rankings.<\/span><\/p>\n Now that you know <\/span>why<\/span><\/i> you should perform an audit, let\u2019s talk about the <\/span>how<\/span><\/i>. There\u2019s more than one way to optimize a page. It\u2019s true. But let\u2019s keep it simple. Here are the basics (in order) for performing a technical SEO audit.<\/span><\/p>\n A 404 error occurs when a person attempts to navigate to a page that no longer exists. Sometimes this is intentional, a page is either removed completely or is now housed in a different location. Sometimes this occurs accidentally; someone might change the destination of a URL but forget to alter any hyperlinks pointing to the old address. Sometimes they simply occur when a user attempts to enter a URL directly and includes a typo. Every website (especially larger websites with a complex architecture) will experience 404 errors in some way. That\u2019s why it\u2019s always a great idea to have a unique 404 landing page.<\/span><\/p>\n To begin your SEO audit, you need to scrape your site to check for 404 errors. Use tools like <\/span>Moz<\/a> or <\/span>Screaming Frog\u2019s SEO Spider<\/a>. While you\u2019ll need a subscription for Moz, the SEO Spider is free to use for up to 500 URLs. For larger websites or agency use, you\u2019ll need to purchase a license.<\/span><\/p>\n Before you go any further, determine which pages are registering as 404-ing properly (pages that have been deleted from your site completely) and which are not. Set up a 301 redirect for pages that have been permanently moved. The 301 redirect will send your website visitor to the right location (and pass along the original page\u2019s ranking, unlike a 302 redirect). You can even set up multiple redirects all pointing to a single page if necessary.<\/span><\/p>\n Don\u2019t just assume that Google is indexing your pages. You need to turn site indexing on. This will often happen after companies launch a new site. When developers are working in the testing and developing environment, they don\u2019t want Google to index those pages. But when everything is pushed live, no one flips the switch so Google can index.<\/span><\/p>\n If Google isn\u2019t indexing your pages, then you have no SEO to maintain. Use <\/span>Google Search Console<\/a> to determine whether or not your pages are indexed. Additionally, you can type \u201csite:example.com\u201d into Google\u2019s search engine to see how many results generate. Your homepage should be the first result (outside of Google Search Console). If your homepage is <\/span>not<\/span><\/i> the first result, this could point to issues such as a penalty. These penalties are invoked by things like <\/span>duplicate content<\/a>, an abundance of 404 errors, a poor mobile site, buying links, or excessive use of H1 tags. Moz and the SEO Spider\u00a0<\/span>will help you find the errors that can result in a penalty.<\/span><\/p>\n However, there may be instances where a specific landing page is <\/span>so<\/span><\/i> popular it outranks your homepage. That\u2019s fine (and it\u2019s also kind of awesome). Just be aware of this possibility when you check your results. If your homepage ranks suspiciously low, then there may be cause for concern. Check your site for those errors I mentioned and implement fixes to get back on Google\u2019s good side.<\/span><\/p>\n Now that you\u2019ve scraped your website, you should have a good idea of where the holes are in your SEO plan. <\/span><\/p>\n Meta descriptions and SEO titles are important for search engines (and those doing the searching) since it acts as a preview of the associated page\u2019s content. This is the text people see when they\u2019re looking at search engine results. This text also generates automatically when links are shared on social media pages. Make sure your meta description matches the content of the page it\u2019s describing and includes any relevant keywords. For help creating a meta description, <\/span>check out this blog post<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n This will be the first place to start, but there are still a few other things to consider first.<\/span><\/p>\n You\u2019ll also want to find what pages are lacking <\/span>content<\/span><\/i> on the page. This is a huge factor in ranking as Google prioritizes pages with at least 300 words on the page. You should also consider it a negative if your page has a significant amount of <\/span>code<\/span><\/i> (HTML or CSS) compared to content (text).<\/span><\/p>\nThe Point<\/strong><\/h2>\n
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The Benefits<\/strong><\/h2>\n
The How-To<\/strong><\/h2>\n
Checking for 404s<\/strong><\/h3>\n
<\/a><\/p>\nAre your pages indexed?<\/strong><\/h3>\n
Find missing titles, meta descriptions, and meta keywords<\/strong><\/h3>\n
Find missing content<\/strong><\/h3>\n
Create a spreadsheet<\/strong><\/h3>\n