What is an SEO Audit and What’s Included?
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is an important, baseline component of every digital marketing measure. After all, a website can only be successful and receive a large volume of qualified traffic if it’s visible on Google and other search engines and listed high in the rankings. To ensure that your website meets all requirements for high visibility on search engine results pages (SERPs), an SEO audit is indispensable. Auditing your website provides the necessary optimization measures to achieve sustainable success on SERPs and increase your website traffic.
What Is an SEO Audit?
An SEO audit is a detailed analysis of the factors that influence how your website performs in organic search results. It provides a data-driven roadmap to improve visibility, ranking, and user experience. A well-structured SEO process typically focuses on three primary areas:
- Technical SEO: This aspect of SEO is focused on how well search engine spiders can crawl your website and index your content.
- On-Page SEO: This aspect of SEO is concerned with the content on the website and how well it is optimized for relevant keywords, as well as providing a good user experience for visitors
- Off-Page SEO: This aspect of SEO focuses on inbound links from other websites to your website. Natural links from authoritative and relevant websites act as an independent ‘vote of confidence’, which helps search engines trust your website more.
Technical SEO Audit
The goal of a Technical SEO Audit is to evaluate how search engines find, crawl, interpret, and index your website. This step focuses on your site’s infrastructure rather than its content. A technically sound website ensures that your SEO efforts can deliver their full potential.
- Identify possible site indexing issues
- Review the loading speed of your website
- Find 301 redirects and 404 errors
- Review mobile accessibility
- Review your SSL settings and ensure all URLs are HTTPS
- Review your robots.txt file
- Check WordPress visibility settings
- Review content indexing settings
- Review XML sitemap settings
- Check for sitemap errors
- Review structured data markup data
On-Page SEO Audit
On-Page SEO focuses on the quality, relevance, and structure of your website’s visible content. Search engines analyze your pages to determine if they match the intent behind user searches — and whether they deliver a good experience once users arrive.
- Review URL, permalink structure, and make sure URLs are SEO-friendly
- Page titles and meta descriptions
- Headline structure (H1, H2, and supporting tags)
- Internal and external linking
- Canonical tag settings
- Image alt tags
- Image sizing and optimization
- Page request efficiency
- Keyword review
Off-Page SEO Audit
Technical SEO and On-Page SEO will help you create an SEO-friendly website, but to rank higher in Google Search Results, you need more than that. This is where Off-Page SEO comes in. Off-page SEO is about website promotion techniques and how to convince search engine algorithms that your website deserves a higher ranking in the search results than other websites. Listed below are some of the key factors:
- Incoming Links: Assess the quality and relevance of backlinks pointing to your site. High-quality links from trusted domains act as “votes of confidence” that strengthen your authority in search results.
- Review Domain Authority: Domain Authority is calculated by evaluating multiple factors, including linking root domains and the number of total links, into a single DA score. This score can then be used when comparing websites or tracking the “ranking strength” of a website over time.
- Review Local SEO: Local SEO is the process of optimizing your website so that it appears in the first position of Google Search Results for searches that are related to your area, city or country.
- Social Media Engagement Review: Social signals influence visibility and brand credibility. Review your current social platforms to see where you stack up vs your competition.
An SEO audit provides the clarity and direction needed to improve performance in a measurable way. It helps uncover hidden technical barriers, optimize on-page content, and enhance your site’s reputation through link-building and engagement.
At RYCO Design, our SEO audits go beyond surface-level checks. We take a strategic, data-driven approach to identify what’s holding your site back — and provide actionable insights to help you reach your long-term goals. Whether you’re just starting out or refining an established digital strategy, a comprehensive SEO audit ensures your website stays visible, competitive, and built for sustainable growth.