Technical SEO Audit Service
What Is Technical SEO?
Achieving a high ranking on Google requires employing diverse Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) strategies, with Technical SEO being one of them.
Technical SEO is dedicated to the technical facets of a website, ensuring that it is easily accessible and comprehensible to search engines. This involves optimising site speed, generating XML sitemaps, and having a well-structured site architecture.
Our recommendation is for clients to start their SEO efforts by focusing on Technical SEO before progressing to On-Page SEO. It’s important to note that Technical SEO alone will not secure a high ranking, but it plays a vital role in the overall SEO strategy. Think of it as the foundational step in the larger matrix of optimising your website’s visibility on search engines. Amongst the other SEO strategies are:
- Keyword Research: Keyword research is the strategic process of identifying and selecting specific words or phrases that users are likely to type into search engines when looking for information, products, or services.
- On-Page SEO: On-Page SEO involves optimising individual web pages for better search engine rankings. It includes improving content, titles, meta descriptions, headings, and internal links to align with target keywords.
- Local SEO: Local SEO is crucial for businesses targeting local audiences. It involves optimising a website and online presence to appear prominently in local search results. Key elements include claiming and verifying Google Business Profiles, optimising for location-based keywords, and encouraging customer reviews.
- Off-Page SEO: Off-Page SEO encompasses external tactics to boost a website’s authority and visibility. This includes building quality backlinks, managing online reputation, and leveraging social media for enhanced credibility.
Why A Technical SEO Audit?
By conducting a Technical SEO audit, you can design a website that is not only search engine-friendly but also provides a better experience for users.
Regular audits are essential to keep up with changes in search engine algorithms and maintain optimal website performance.
We have started implementing Technical SEO from the start on the websites we design for clients.
Technical SEO Factors
Ensuring that search engines are able to access, crawl, and index all of the pages on a website. This includes implementing a clear site structure, creating an XML sitemap, and using robots.txt to control crawling.
Optimising the website's load time to improve the user experience and reduce bounce rates. This can include compressing images, minifying code, and using a content delivery network (CDN).
Ensuring that the website is mobile-friendly and responsive to different screen sizes. This includes using a mobile-friendly design, creating a mobile version of the site, or using a mobile-first design.
Using structured data (such as schema.org) to provide search engines with more information about the content on a website. This can help with rich snippets, knowledge graphs and entity understanding by the search engines.
Creating a clear and consistent URL structure that makes it easy for users and search engines to understand the hierarchy and organisation of a website's content.
Optimising the internal linking structure of a website to help search engines understand the relationship between different pages and to distribute link equity.
Regularly monitoring the website for technical issues and troubleshooting any errors or problems that arise.
Ensuring that the website is secure by using HTTPS and implementing security best practices.
What Is Included in Our Technical SEO Audit
We Will Check and Fix the Following:
- Checking if an SSL certificate is implemented. If not, then we will implement an SSL certificate provided cPanel is the hosting control panel.
- Checking for broken links. If there are broken links, then will direct them to the home page.
- Checking for consistent use of follow and nofollow links, if there are any.
- Checking if “Discourage Search Engines” in WordPress is disabled. If not, then we will disable it.
- Checking if “Post Name” option is used as the permalink structure. If not, then we will enable it.
- Checking if a search capture feature has been implemented on your website. If not, then we will implement it if the theme allows for it.
- Reviewing site on Google Safe Browsing Implementations.
- Checking for the presence of a security plugin. If not present, then we will install a security plugin.
- Checking for the presence of a backup plugin. If not present, then we will install a backup plugin.
- Signing up the website to Google Search Console, if the website has not been signed up.
- Submitting a sitemap to Google Search Console for crawling & indexing, if it has not been submitted.
- Signing up the website to Google Analytics, if the website has not been signed up.
- Checking if a robots.txt file is present. If not, then we will create it and add the Allow rule for Google to crawl the site.
We Will Report On the Following:
- Checking for social media integration
- Checking if redirects have been set up properly, if there are any.
- Checking for duplicate content on your website.
- Checking if images have been optimised.
- Checking if modern formats like .webp are used for images.
- Checking if the website is mobile-friendly.
- Checking the speed of the home page.
- Checking the URL structure.
- Checking if the domain or the IP address is blacklisted.
What Does a Technical SEO Audit Cost
We charge R1500.00 for a Technical SEO Audit per website of about 20 pages.
The turn-around time is 10 working days. For some items we will have to wait till Google Search Console has reported.