How to Do an SEO Audit: The Complete Checklist

Your website isn't ranking. Traffic is flat. Maybe declining.

You've published content. You've done "SEO." But something's wrong.

Here's the problem: most websites are bleeding rankings because of issues nobody's looking for. Broken links. Slow pages. Duplicate content. Thin pages that should've been consolidated years ago. Backlinks that disappeared when a referring site died.

An SEO audit finds these problems. It's the difference between guessing why you're not ranking and actually knowing.

This isn't a surface-level checklist. This is what you actually need to check if you want your site to rank in 2025.

Why You Need to Audit Your Site (Regularly)

Search engines are constantly updating how they evaluate websites. Google's algorithm changes thousands of times per year. What worked last quarter might be hurting you now.

A proper SEO audit does three things:

Finds technical issues that prevent Google from crawling and indexing your pages
Identifies content gaps where you're missing opportunities or creating thin content
Evaluates your backlink profile to spot toxic links and find link-building opportunities

Sites that run regular audits see up to 61% more organic traffic compared to sites that don't. That's not a small edge.

How often should you audit? Every 3-6 months. Or after any major algorithm update. Or whenever your traffic drops significantly.

Let's break this down section by section.

Part 1: Technical SEO Audit

Technical SEO is the foundation. If your site can't be crawled and indexed properly, nothing else matters.

Crawlability & Indexing

Check your robots.txt file. It lives at yoursite.com/robots.txt. This file tells search engines what to crawl and what to ignore.

Common mistakes:

Blocking important pages accidentally
Blocking CSS and JavaScript files (Google needs these to render your pages)
Forgetting to include your sitemap URL

Your robots.txt should link to your XML sitemap. Speaking of which...

Audit your XML sitemap. Your sitemap at yoursite.com/sitemap.xml should only include:

Canonical URLs (not duplicates)
Pages returning 200 status codes
Pages you actually want indexed

Remove anything with a noindex tag, redirects, or error pages. A clean sitemap helps Google find your important pages faster.

Find orphan pages. These are pages with no internal links pointing to them. Google struggles to find them, and even if indexed, they won't rank well. Run a crawl with Screaming Frog to identify them, then either add internal links or delete them.

Status Codes & Redirects

Run a full site crawl and look for:

404 errors - Broken pages. Either restore them, redirect them with 301s, or remove internal links pointing to them
Redirect chains - Page A redirects to B redirects to C. Each hop loses link equity. Fix these by pointing directly to the final destination
Redirect loops - Page A redirects to B which redirects back to A. These break completely. Fix immediately
Soft 404s - Pages returning 200 OK but showing "Page not found" content. These waste crawl budget

E-commerce sites are notorious for 404 problems. Out-of-stock products, discontinued categories, old seasonal pages. Clean these up quarterly.

Core Web Vitals

Google measures three metrics:

Largest Contentful Paint (LCP) - How fast your main content loads. Target: under 2.5 seconds.

Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS) - How much your page jumps around during load. Target: under 0.1.

Interaction to Next Paint (INP) - How responsive your page is to clicks. Target: under 200ms.

INP replaced First Input Delay in 2024. If your site has heavy JavaScript or long-running tasks, your INP is probably bad.

Check your Core Web Vitals in Google Search Console under the Experience section. Fix your worst pages first - usually your homepage and high-traffic landing pages.

Quick wins:

Compress images and use WebP format
Lazy-load images below the fold
Set width and height on all images to prevent layout shift
Break up long JavaScript tasks
Use a CDN for static assets

Mobile Optimization

Google uses mobile-first indexing. It crawls and ranks based on your mobile version, not desktop.

Test your key pages with Google's Mobile-Friendly Test. Then check:

Tap targets are large enough (at least 48x48 pixels)
Text is readable without zooming
Content isn't wider than the screen
Your mobile and desktop versions have the same content

If your mobile site is missing content that exists on desktop, you're invisible to Google.

HTTPS & Security

HTTPS is a ranking factor. Every page should be served over HTTPS.

Checklist:

All URLs redirect HTTP to HTTPS (301 redirects)
No mixed content warnings (HTTP resources on HTTPS pages)
SSL certificate is valid and not expiring soon
HSTS header is set

Check your security headers at SecurityHeaders.com.

Part 2: On-Page SEO Audit

Once the technical foundation is solid, audit your on-page elements.

Title Tags & Meta Descriptions

Pull all your title tags and meta descriptions into a spreadsheet. Look for:

Title tag issues:

Too long (over 60 characters)
Too short (under 30 characters)
Missing entirely
Duplicate across multiple pages
Missing target keyword

Meta description issues:

Too long (over 160 characters)
Missing (Google will generate one, but it's rarely good)
Duplicates
Not compelling (no reason to click)

Every page should have a unique, keyword-optimized title tag. Period.

Header Structure

Each page should have:

One H1 tag containing the primary keyword
Logical H2s and H3s breaking up content
No skipped levels (H1 to H3 with no H2)

Headers aren't just for SEO. They help users scan content. If your headers don't tell a story, rewrite them.

Content Quality

For each page, ask:

Does this answer the searcher's question?
Is it more helpful than what's currently ranking?
Does it demonstrate expertise?
Is it comprehensive or thin?

Check for thin content. Pages with under 300 words rarely rank for anything competitive. Either expand them or consolidate with other pages.

Check for duplicate content. Use Screaming Frog's "Near Duplicates" feature to find pages with similar content. Consolidate them and 301 redirect the duplicates.

Check for keyword cannibalization. If multiple pages target the same keyword, they compete against each other. Pick one page to be the canonical version, and either redirect or differentiate the others.

Internal Linking

Internal links pass authority and help Google understand your site structure.

Audit your internal links by checking:

Do your most important pages have the most internal links?
Are orphan pages getting linked?
Is anchor text descriptive (not "click here")?
Do you have pages with too many outbound internal links (over 100)?

Build topic clusters. Link related content together. Your pillar pages should get links from all supporting content.

Image Optimization

Images affect both page speed and rankings.

Check:

All images have descriptive alt text
Images are compressed (use tools like Squoosh)
Images use modern formats (WebP or AVIF)
File names are descriptive (not "IMG_3847.jpg")

Structured Data

Schema markup doesn't directly improve rankings, but it makes your listings stand out with rich results.

Priority schema types:

Organization - on your homepage
Article - on blog posts
FAQ - if you have FAQ sections
Product - on product pages
BreadcrumbList - for navigation

Validate your markup with Google's Rich Results Test.

Part 3: Off-Page SEO Audit

Your backlink profile is arguably the most important ranking factor. Sites ranking #1 have 3.8x more backlinks than positions 2-10.

Backlink Profile Analysis

Use Ahrefs, Semrush, or Moz to pull your backlink data.

Key metrics to check:

Referring domains - The number of unique sites linking to you. More is better (quality permitting)
Domain Rating/Authority - How authoritative are the sites linking to you?
Anchor text distribution - A natural profile has mostly branded anchors (70%+) with some keyword anchors
Dofollow vs. nofollow ratio - A natural mix is healthy. 100% dofollow looks suspicious

Toxic Link Identification

Not all backlinks help you. Some hurt.

Look for links from:

Spammy link directories
Unrelated foreign language sites
Sites with thin or scraped content
Known link schemes or PBNs (private blog networks)
Sites with "guest post" or "sponsored" in every article

If you find genuinely toxic links, use Google's Disavow Tool. But be careful - disavowing legitimate links hurts you. Only disavow if you're certain the links are harmful.

Lost & Broken Backlinks

Links disappear. Sites go offline. Pages get deleted.

Run a "lost backlinks" report to see what you've lost recently. Sometimes you can reclaim them:

If a page moved, reach out and request the updated URL
If a site died, that link is gone (unless someone like Revised acquires the domain)

Also check for broken backlinks - links pointing to 404 pages on your site. Set up 301 redirects to capture that link equity.

Competitor Backlink Analysis

Your competitors' backlinks are your opportunity list.

Pull their backlink profiles and look for:

High-authority sites linking to them but not you
Types of content earning links (resources, tools, research)
Link-building patterns (guest posts, PR, partnerships)

The "link intersect" feature in most SEO tools shows sites linking to multiple competitors but not you. These are your lowest-hanging fruit.

Brand Mentions

Unlinked brand mentions are free link opportunities.

Set up Google Alerts for your brand name and key products. When you find mentions without links, reach out and ask. Most site owners will add the link if you ask politely.

Part 4: Content Audit

Content decays. What ranked two years ago might be outdated and losing traffic.

Traffic Trend Analysis

Pull your pages by organic traffic over the past 12-24 months. Categorize them:

Growing - These are working. Keep doing what you're doing
Stable - Monitor these. They might need refreshes soon
Declining - Prioritize these for updates
Zero traffic - Decide: update, consolidate, or delete

Content Freshness

For each declining page:

Is the information still accurate?
Are statistics and examples current?
Have search intent or competition changed?
Could this be consolidated with similar content?

Update declining pages with fresh data, better examples, and more depth. Add "Updated for 2025" to titles when relevant.

E-E-A-T Assessment

Google evaluates Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness.

Audit for:

Author bylines - Who wrote this? Are they credible?
Author bios - Do they demonstrate expertise?
Citations - Are claims backed by sources?
Contact information - Can users reach you?
Privacy policy and terms - Do you have these?

For YMYL (Your Money or Your Life) topics like health, finance, or legal content, E-E-A-T is even more critical.

Part 5: The Authority Problem

Here's where most audits stop. Technical: fixed. On-page: optimized. Content: refreshed.

And rankings still don't move.

Because authority is the hardest part. You can have perfect technical SEO, great content, and still not rank - because you don't have the backlinks that signal trust to Google.

Real authority comes from links on sites Google already trusts. Wikipedia. Reddit. Hacker News. Major publications. These aren't links you can just ask for. They're earned over years. Or they happen by luck.

Or you find another way.

Revised takes a different approach. We find contextual backlinks from trusted sources by acquiring domains that already have them. When authoritative sites link to dead pages, we acquire those domains and redirect that link equity to relevant content.

It's not link building. It's link reclamation at scale.

If your audit reveals a backlink gap - competitors outranking you with more authority - that's the problem Revised solves. See how it works.

The Complete SEO Audit Checklist

Copy this and run through it quarterly:

Technical:

On-Page:

Off-Page:

Content:

Declining pages identified and updated
Outdated content refreshed
E-E-A-T signals in place
Author bios and expertise visible

Next Steps

An audit is useless if you don't act on it.

Prioritize fixes by impact:

Technical issues blocking indexing - Fix immediately
Core Web Vitals on high-traffic pages - Fix within 2 weeks
Declining content - Update within 1 month
Backlink gaps - Ongoing priority

Run this audit every quarter. Compare to previous audits. Track progress.

And if your backlink profile is the bottleneck - if competitors are outranking you with more authority from trusted sources - Revised can help. We automate the hardest part of SEO so you can focus on everything else.