Initiating A Website Audit Procedure – What Should You Know About?

By Admin | October 14, 2022
Website Audit Procedure

So, tell me, when did you give your website a check-up the last time? Was it today or a week before? Or, is this the first time you’re hearing about “taking care” of your website?

Well, whether you believe it or not, a website works like a human body. If you keep it healthy and well, it’ll operate as smoothly as you do when you exercise regularly.

But, if you show a “don’t care” attitude to it, the complete infrastructure will come crashing down on your head. For example, the website will –

  • Start working slowly.
  • Won’t have the ability to maintain the coming web traffic.
  • Will show the “error” message when someone opens it.

So, if you want to avoid such a tragic circumstance, it’s best to audit your site at least once or twice a month. But, I’m not going to say anything else here. If you want to know more about website audit or how it works, then keep scrolling till the end.

Introducing… Website Audit Procedure!

Now, before I delve into the deep waters, let me start with the basics first. 

So, what’s a website audit, really? Well, in essence, it’s an examination or assessment, which you’ll need to make to understand your webpage performance. 

Auditing your website can help you determine if your website is well-optimized to achieve a higher ranking or not. It’ll also tell you how you can improve it and increase the web traffic.

The Benefits Of Website Audit

Performing a website audit can help you out quite massively in almost every facet of building your website. Keep reading to know what I’m talking about.

Advantage – 1: Search Engine Optimization

By making an audit, it’ll be easier for you to identify if you’ve missed out on an SEO-related opportunity or not. You can also refocus your SEO efforts on your site’s visitors more than a search engine. Additionally, you’ll find some pitfalls, like keyword stuffing, with it as well.

Advantage – 2: Competitive Analysis

By auditing your website, you’ll know where it stands in terms of performance. Thus, it’ll be easier to see how well you’re doing against your competitors and work in accordance with it. Just use a tool like a website grader by HubSpot, and you’ll be fine.

Advantage – 3: Website Performance

Finally, making a website audit once in a while can also improve your site’s performance by a mile. Like, with it, you can take care of the technical infrastructure and framework. Thus, the speed of your website will increase even more.

How To Do A Website Audit?

The procedure of doing a website audit is pretty easy, especially if you’re doing the same in a step-by-step manner. Let’s keep reading to find out more about it.

Step – 1: Establish Your Criteria.

Contrary to what you were thinking, doing a site audit can be helpful in more than one aspect. For example, if you’re using it to achieve your marketing goal, you’ll need to focus on –

On the other hand, in case you want to boost the effectiveness of your page, you need to start working on –

  • The purpose of each of your pages.
  • The core reason for your landing webpage.
  • Usage of strategic email marketing, etc.

So, before you take a single step in this regard, don’t forget to establish the criteria you want to work upon. Work with a professional if you can, but don’t mess up this stage at all.

Step – 2: Analyze Your Website Speed.

No matter what your purpose is, the speed of your website will matter in almost every aspect. Hence, that should be the next thing you should focus on.

For example, check if your website is opening within a time limit of two seconds or less. And, while you’re at it, don’t forget to see if it’s crashing frequently or not.

Dallas SEO Ryan Howard sees speed as a significant ranking factor; “When we overhaul a site, get it passing core web vitals, and get mobile speed scores in the 90s, we typically see a lift in rankings across the board.”

Step – 3: What About The Indexed URLs?

Depending on your website’s stature, it will have both an indexed and a non-indexed page. The latter are the pages that are yet to be available on Google.

So, once you find such information on your website, look for a way to index them again. For example, writing the content or using a new image or two can be helpful here. 

Step – 4: HTTPS Confirmation.

Your website needs to have an HTTPS certification to work or be accepted by Google. If it doesn’t have the same, Google will consider your site to insecure. And, this, in turn, can prompt an “error message” whenever someone tries to open your site.

There’s no easy way out here, though. 

If you want an HTTPS certification for your website, you will need to buy it from an official authority. It may cost you a little at first. However, the expense is well worth it.

So, That’s All?

Honestly, no. A website audit procedure is much more elaborate and extensive than you can ever imagine. But, it’s not possible to cram everything else in a single article and talk about them in an elaborate manner. So, I’ll list the other ones here for you –

  • Check if there’s any manual action issue available or not.
  • Analyze the indexation issues and resolve all of them accordingly.
  • Keep an eye on the duplicate version of your website in Google’s index.
  • See if your website is mobile-friendly or not. 
  • Learn more about website traffic and see what’s stopping them from coming to you.
  • Fix all of your issues with the orphan pages. 
  • Find out all the thin content-based web pages and fix them.

Finally, I’ll also ask you to run a backlink audit as soon as possible. It’ll help you know about the authoritativeness of your website and ensure that you’re increasing the same. 

Also, check if there’s any duplicate content available on your site or not. It usually doesn’t bode too well for your relationship with Google.

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