Why Regular SEO Audits Matter More Than You Think
If you’re beginning to take SEO seriously, you’re likely searching for how often you should audit your website for SEO, right? We’re here to help you determine the next best steps when it comes to successfully auditing your website for SEO purposes with our team of SEO experts here at DASH-SEO. An SEO audit, when done correctly, will help you identify problem areas which may be affecting your search engine rankings, organic traffic, and overall user experience. SEO audits should certainly be a part of your overall digital marketing strategy, especially from an SEO perspective. The question still remains, how often should you actually audit your site for SEO purposes?
The answer is, it’s not a one size fits all approach, rather, it should be best determined based on a few different factors. These factors consist of everything from your website’s size, to your industry’s competitiveness, to the frequency of content changes being made on your website.
In this full-scale guide, we’ll break down the following into clear action items which you can utilize going forward:
•What an SEO audit includes
•How often you should conduct SEO audits (based on your site’s needs)
•The different types of SEO audits
•A step-by-step guide to auditing your website
•Common SEO issues and how to fix them
After reading through this full-scale guide, you’ll have a much better understanding of how to keep your website optimized throughout the year and have your best performing site yet. Feel free to contact us if you have any immediate questions and we’ll be happy to help in any way we can.
What Is an SEO Audit? (And Why You Need One Regularly)
An SEO audit is essentially a health check for your website. It helps you properly identify the following:
Technical issues: Technical issues will likely hurt rankings over time with everything from broken links, to slow-loading pages, to duplicate content issues
On-page SEO problems: On-page SEO issues consist of missing title tags, missing meta descriptions, and improper header structuring
Content gaps: Content gaps will often consist of content which has missing keywords, thinly produced content, or outdated pages which are no longer relevant
Backlink profile health: Toxic links may end up causing some issues to arise if they’re deemed too spammy by search engine algorithms, yet nowadays, search engines such as Google usually evaluate toxic links from a neutral standpoint where it’s neither good nor bad.
User experience (UX) issues: UX issues will likely impact engagement levels and overall conversion when you begin to generate additional organic traffic
Search engines are always evolving with their algorithms, so it’s a good idea to try and stay up to date on the latest developments with algorithm updates, as your competitors are likely staying up to date as well. Let’s explore how often you should audit your site based on a few different factors.
How Often Should You Audit Your Website for SEO?
Monthly SEO Audits (For Highly Competitive Industries & Large Sites)
Who needs SEO audits?
•Large E-Commerce Sites
•News/Media Sites with Daily, Frequent Updates
•Businesses in Highly Competitive Industries (finance, healthcare, SaaS, legal, etc…)
•Sites which publish content daily or weekly
If your site changes frequently, whether that’s adding new products, publishing a large amount of blog posts, or continually optimizing landing pages, you’ll likely need monthly audits or at least quarterly audits to catch any issues prior to the issues becoming a larger problem which may end up hurting your rankings.
What to check in a monthly SEO audit:
Technical SEO health: Crawl Errors, Broken Links, Site Speed Issues, etc…
Indexing & crawling issues: These issues may end up presenting themselves within Google Search Console
Keyword rankings & traffic fluctuations: Ahrefs is a great tool for monitoring these fluctuations on a monthly basis
Competitor analysis: Again, ahrefs is a great tool for keeping a close eye on competitors within your niche to see if they’re outperforming you on a monthly basis
New backlinks & toxic link removals: Be sure to monitor your site’s backlink performance to ensure you’re receiving as many follow links as possible, and disavow any toxic links which may arise from time to time
Pro Tip: Choosing to set up automated reporting for your store speed fluctuations throughout the month, as well as technical SEO health, and overall organic rankings will help you better understand the performance and progress associated with your website’s SEO
Quarterly SEO Audits (For Most Businesses & Medium-Sized Websites)
Who needs Quarterly SEO Audits?
SMBs: Small-to-Medium-Sized businesses with ambitious goals to improve their website’s organic traffic performance
Service-based businesses: Any form of a service-based business such as law firms, medical providers, financial services providers, etc…
Active Blogs: Blogs which publish content on a weekly or monthly basis
Local businesses: Any local business which relies on GoogleBusiness to help their business reach the right customers in their locale
A quarterly SEO audit will help to keep the anticipated goals on track while at the same time being aligned with any and all algorithm updates, seasonal search trends, and competitor changes within your niche.
What to check in a quarterly SEO audit:
Site speed & mobile usability: Site speed and mobile-friendliness are both very important aspects of a quarterly SEO audit
Keyword performance updates: Monitoring keyword progression is another important aspect of any quarterly SEO audit
Backlink analysis: Having an overview of any new links, lost links, or extremely toxic links can help you gain a better understanding of where your link profile is today and where it could be a few months from now
Content audits: Trimming up any outdated pages which are no longer ranking (or never ranked in the first place) can be very helpful to your overall SEO performance, as well as monitoring your keyword performance for any missing keywords or duplicate content issues which may have been published by mistake
Local SEO performance: Local SEO performance can be one of the key metrics you should monitor if you serve a specific locale and you’ve found a large majority of your customer base has discovered your from your GoogleBusiness profile
Pro Tip: If your business relies on GoogleBusiness, ensure your NAP (Name, Address, Phone Number) maintains consistency and monitor and respond to reviews on a regular basis
Biannual or Annual SEO Audits (For Low-Maintenance Websites)
Who needs them?
Websites with little content change: Any website which has little to no content changes and is primarily used as a placeholder site to inform visitors of the service or product they offer and little to nothing else noteworthy (i.e.: A parent organization’s website which has a portfolio of the companies they own and operate)
Informational websites which are not focused on ranking: An informational website which has maintained the same content on their site for many years is unlikely to require any major SEO audit as they’ll likely have already addressed any and all issues several years ago
If your site doesn’t have many updates throughout the year(s), you’ll likely find an SEO audit unnecessary. At the same time, an SEO audit can help your site catch any major issues before they become larger issues.
What to check in an annual SEO audit:
•Overall site health & indexability
•Broken links & outdated content
•Keyword rankings & organic traffic changes
•Backlink profile & domain authority updates
•Competitor SEO landscape
Even if your site is deemed to be relatively low-maintenance, it’s still in your best interest to implement best SEO practices across your site as much as possible to give you the upper hand, even if your competition is low or nonexistent.
Types of SEO Audits (And Why You Need Each One)
SEO audits are not just one type of audit. There are multiple styles of SEO audits which will help to keep your site as SEO-friendly as possible:
Technical SEO Audit – Recommended Every 1-3 Months
A technical SEO audit will seek out any site speed issues, broken link issues, indexing errors, and mobile-friendliness issues
On-Page SEO Audit – Recommended Every 3-6 Months
An on-page SEO audit will identify any issues with title tags, meta descriptions, headers, keyword usage, and overall content quality
Backlink Audit – Recommended Every 3-6 Months
A backlink audit will help to properly analyze your backlink profile to look for broken backlink opportunities, spammy link cleanup opportunities, and even lost backlink opportunities
Local SEO Audit (For Businesses with Physical Locations) – Recommended Every 3 Months
A local SEO audit will verify your GoogleBusiness, local citations, and online reviews are all performing as they should
Content Audit – Recommended Every 6-12 Months
A proper content audit will identify any problem areas with the content on your website, as well as resolve any thin, outdated, or duplicate content issues which require updating or removing
Incorporate SEO Audits as a Routine Process, Not a One-Time Fix
SEO is never truly “complete”, as Google will update its algorithm a few times every year to stimulate growth and activity, while also giving lesser known sites a chance to rank with the best of the best competitors. With this being known, it’s best to implement ongoing SEO audits throughout the year on a regular basis to stay on top of your website’s performance and reap the benefits of a proper SEO strategy.
SEO Audit Interval Recap:
Monthly SEO audits → Large websites & competitive industries
Quarterly SEO audits → Most businesses & service providers
Biannual/Annual SEO audits → Low-maintenance websites
Through conducting proactive SEO audits of your website, you can have a stronger edge against the competition and find yourself with a much better level of overall organic performance. If you need any help with auditing your website from an SEO perspective, you’ll want to contact us using the form below and we’ll be happy to help. We look forward to hearing from you soon!