Carrying out a thorough Seo Audit necessitates looking into website content components that could significantly influence your site’s search engine rankings.

In this comprehensive guide on “Website Content Factors You Must Check During an SEO Audit,” we will delve into various aspects of optimizing your website for better visibility and user experience.

We’ll discuss content quality by exploring unique and relevant content creation, keyword research & placement, as well as readability and grammar. Next, we’ll cover site architecture, including internal linking structure, navigation & URL structure, and mobile optimization. Moving forward, you’ll learn about page speed & performance through image compression & optimization techniques, minimizing HTTP requests, and code bloat reduction methods. We will also touch upon leveraging browser caching and Gzip compression for improved loading times. Let’s start.

#1. Content Quality

Assessing the content quality of your website is essential when performing an SEO audit. Examining the content’s distinctiveness and pertinence to your target market, researching and situating keywords accurately, and confirming readability and grammar is paramount when conducting an SEO audit.

Unique & Relevant Content

To provide value for your visitors, you must create unique & relevant content. Ensure each page offers something different from other pages or competitors’ websites. Avoid duplicate content issues by using tools like Copyscape or Siteliner.  Identify high-volume keywords related to your business using tools such as Google Keyword Planner, Grammarly, or Yoast SEO Readability Analysis to check for grammar, spelling errors, and readability scores. Strive for clear and concise content that is easy to understand by your target audience.

Content excellence is a fundamental necessity for any flourishing SEO audit, and appropriate exploration and enhancement of content can produce noteworthy improvements in the general execution of your website. Moving on to site architecture, several elements need to be considered when auditing your website’s structure.

#2. Contact Us Page

The Contact Us page is an important part of any website. It provides customers with a way to get in touch with the business, and it also serves as a gateway for potential customers to learn more about the company’s services or products. A well-crafted Contact Us page can help build trust between your brand and its visitors, so you must ensure yours is up to par.

When designing your Contact Us page, there are several elements you should consider:

Site architecture, identifying under-optimized pages, content that provides value and unique insights into your company’s offerings, and contact information such as phone numbers or email addresses.

#3. Site Architecture

Site architecture plays an important role in how users interact with your website. If the navigation structure isn’t intuitively laid out, or it’s difficult for users to find what they’re looking for, they may be less likely to reach out via the Contact Us page. Please ensure all links within your site point directly back to this page so visitors can easily access it when needed.

How to Check

#4. Identify Pages That Are Under-Optimized

It’s also important to identify any pages on your website that could use some optimization before adding them onto the Contact Us page – things like broken links or outdated content will give off a negative impression of your brand if left unchecked! You can use tools like Google Analytics or SEO crawlers (such as Screaming Frog) to check these areas quickly and efficiently – just make sure everything looks good before linking them from here!

You should conduct a check on pages that exhibit the following deficiencies:

#5. Page Speed & Performance

Page speed and performance are essential for a successful SEO audit. Therefore, when conducting an audit, it is important to consider technical SEO factors such as indexation & crawling issues analysis, structured data markup implementation, and canonicalization of URLs. A slow-loading site can lead to higher bounce rates, lower conversions, and poor overall user satisfaction. By examining the elements affecting page speed and performance, this SEO audit will provide insight into optimizing your website for improved user experience and search engine rankings.

Image Compression & Optimization

Large image files can significantly slow down your website’s load time, negatively impacting the user experience and search engine rankings. To optimize images on your site, consider compressing them using tools like TinyPNG or Squoosh. Additionally, ensure you use the appropriate file format (JPEG for photographs or PNG for graphics with transparency) and utilize responsive images by specifying multiple sizes of each image in your HTML code.

Minimizing HTTP Requests and Code Bloat

The time taken for a webpage to load completely can be extended when the browser has to make numerous HTTP requests. To minimize these requests during an SEO audit:

Additionally, clean up any redundant or unused code within your HTML markup and CSS stylesheets.

Leveraging Browser Caching and Gzip Compression

Leveraging browser caching allows users’ browsers to store static assets such as images, stylesheets (CSS), and JavaScript files, reducing the number of HTTP requests needed to load your site. Implement browser caching by setting appropriate cache-control headers in your server configuration file or via a content delivery network (CDN).

Another technique for improving page speed is enabling Gzip compression on your web server. This can be accomplished by shrinking the dimensions of HTML, CSS, and JS files transmitted from a server to web browsers. Most modern web servers support Gzip compression; consult your hosting provider’s documentation for instructions on enabling it.

#6. Technical SEO Factors to Consider

When conducting an SEO audit, it is crucial to consider various technical aspects that can impact your website’s performance and search engine rankings.

 Indexation & Crawling Issues Analysis

To ensure that your website content is easily discoverable by search engines like Google or Bing, you must identify any potential indexation or crawling issues during the SEO audit process. You can utilize tools such as Google Search Console, which provides valuable insights into how well your site is being crawled and indexed by Googlebot. Additionally, a tool like Screaming Frog’s SEO Spider can help you quickly identify broken links or other crawling issues on your site.

Structured Data Markup Implementation

Structured data markup, also known as schema markup or rich snippets, helps search engines better understand the context of your website content by providing additional information about specific elements on a page (e.g., product reviews). Implementing structured data in relevant areas of your site can improve its visibility in SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages) and potentially increase click-through rates from organic search results.

Different structured data formats, including JSON-LD and Microdata, are available to mark up your website content. To test the implementation of structured data on your site, you can use Google’s Structured Data Testing Tool.

#7. Schema.org Markup Exists On-Site

In present times, it is widely regarded as a recommended practice to incorporate Schema.org markup on your website. At a minimum, most websites should implement fundamental Schema.org optimization, which can be identified by searching the code.

What Is Schema.org?

In search engine optimization (SEO), “Schema.org” refers to the Microdata markup on the Schema.org website. “Schema.org” refers to the terminology used on the website Schema.org. You may markup the data that is actually on the page with a variety of different vocabulary phrases. These terms can be used to describe the data. Schema.org may be difficult to understand, leading to a wide variety of fundamental problems that center on aspects like syntax and, more recently, Google’s adoption of spammy Schema.org penalties. As if that were not enough, you will also need to be familiar with and able to work with JSON-LD, an implementation of Schema.org markup based on JavaScript. Additionally, several categories are ambiguous, and their meanings change depending on the context in which Schema is used. Some of the others are candidates for deprecation.

Check for the Existence of Basic Schema.Org Markup

This is a relatively simple check. Simply use Screaming Frog to check for any instances of schema.org.

#8. Check on Visual Attractiveness

 The visual appeal of a website design holds significance. It’s not merely a matter of pixels moving across the screen to catch a visitor’s attention. Context and creativity are crucial factors that differentiate your site from others. During a website audit, even if no significant issues could result in a penalty (to the best of our knowledge), design plays an essential role in SEO, which translates to user experience. If bad design negatively affects user experience, it reflects poorly on you and your website.

What to Check

Perform the following visual checks on your client’s pages.

Conclusion

The website content factors you must check during an SEO audit are essential for the success of your local business. A thorough examination of these components is imperative to guarantee that your website complies with all the criteria for a successful online presence.

Content quality, site architecture, page speed and performance, technical SEO factors, and user experience (UX) should be carefully assessed to optimize your website for maximum visibility and improved ranking on search engine results pages. With this knowledge, you can ensure that all aspects related to website optimization are considered when optimizing your local business’s digital presence.

Let OptiLocal help you with your website content optimization and local SEO needs. Our experienced team will ensure that all factors are checked during an audit to maximize the success of your online presence.