How to Perform a Technical SEO Audit

Slides from my talk at the Optimisey SEO Meetup in March 2019 where I spoke about my approach to technical SEO audits.

Transcript

1. @badams
   @badams
   How to perform a
   Technical SEO Audit
   Barry Adams
   Polemic Digital
   

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2. @badams
   

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   “This guy is a dick.”
   - A client’s lead dev
   

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   @badams
   My SEO Audit Model
   

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   Web Search Engines
   Crawler Indexer Ranker
   

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   The Three Pillars of SEO
   Technology
   Relevancy
   Authority
   

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   Relation to Web Search
   Technology Crawler
   Relevancy Indexer
   Authority Query Engine
   

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   Relation to Web Search
   Technology Crawler
   Relevancy Indexer
   Authority Query Engine
   

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    1. Technology
    Technical SEO is about;
    • Crawl optimisation
    • Load speed
    • Mobile SEO
    • JavaScript
    • International SEO
    

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    2. Relevancy
    On-page SEO is about;
    • Keyword/topical focus
    • Information Architecture
    • Page structure
    • Content quality
    • Structured Data
    • Accessibility
    

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    3. Authority
    Authority & Ranking is about;
    • Link building
    • Internal linking
    • Social signals
    • Spamming the shit out of Google
    

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    ‘Technical’ SEO Audit
    Technology Crawler
    Relevancy Indexer
    Authority Query Engine
    

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    @badams
    What is an SEO Audit?
    

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    Start of an Improvement Process
    Analysis of a website using applied SEO theory to initiate a
    process towards improved organic search visibility.
    SEO Audit
    

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    https://jamesclear.com/marginal-gains
    

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    Before The Audit…
    

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    Google Search Console
    

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    Access
    Must-have:
    • Google Search Console
    Nice to have:
    • Web Analytics
    • Server Log Files
    

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    @badams
    Audit Tools
    

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    Initial Scan
    

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25. @badams DeepCrawl
    

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26. @badams Screaming Frog
    

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27. @badams Google Search Console
    

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28. @badams Google Search Console
    

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29. @badams GTmetrix
    

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30. @badams SEOInfo
    

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    Wappalyzer
    

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32. @badams Link Redirect Trace
    

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    The Actual Audit
    

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    Checklist
    

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    The Key to a Good Audit
    

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    The Key to a Good Audit
    Pattern Recognition
    

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    Identify Templates
    1. Homepage
    2. Category page
    3. Product/Service page
    4. Blog/News overview page
    5. Post/Article page
    6. Static Content page
    7. … ?
    

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    Writing The Report
    

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    It will be shared
    

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    Make it Actionable
    

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    Only Include What Needs
    The checklist should be provided as an attachment
    

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    Omit The Trivial Stuff
    .
    

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    Prioritise Backwards
    1. Ranking Issues;
    ➢ If a page is indexed, what prevents it from ranking?
    2. Indexing Issues;
    ➢ If a page is being crawled, why isn’t it indexed properly?
    3. Crawling issues;
    ➢ Why is a page not being crawled?
    

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    Concise and Light on Jargon
    If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it yourself
    

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    Three Main Audiences
    1. C-Suite 2. Marketers 3. Tech
    

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    C-Suite
    • Summary of key points;
    ➢ No jargon
    • Don’t Apportion Blame;
    ➢ You need to keep marketing & tech on side
    • Show Them The Money;
    ➢ Estimate the positive impact of your recommendations
    

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    Marketing
    • Your Job = Make Marketing Look Good
    • SEO is a process;
    ➢ Not a one-off activity
    • Competitors aren’t doing everything right either;
    ➢ Don’t imitate, innovate
    • Give them the tools;
    ➢ Teach a man how to fish…
    

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    Tech
    • Speak Their Language;
    ➢ Understand their paradigm
    • Basic Concepts You Need To Get Across:
    ➢ How search engines work
    ➢ URLs are sacred
    ➢ SEO benefits Tech
    • Don’t Tell Them How, Tell Them Why;
    ➢ Outcome focused – they can find their own path
    

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55. @badams
    “This guy is a dick.”
    - A client’s lead dev
    

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56. @badams
    Barry Adams
    ➢ Doing SEO since 1998
    ➢ Specialist in Technical SEO & News SEO
    ➢ Co-Chief Editor at StateofDigital.com
    ➢ Columnist for SearchEngineLand.com
    

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    Questions?
    barry@polemicdigital.com
    www.polemicdigital.com
    @polemicdigital
    @badams
    

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