How to conduct a website audit in 6 steps

Advertising campaigns do not always guarantee steady traffic growth. Website traffic may plateau, while search rankings gradually decline. According to SEO experts, these setbacks are often caused by hidden technical issues, outdated content, or shortcomings in user experience (UX) optimization.

A website requires ongoing technical maintenance and monitoring. Over time, broken links, unoptimized images, toxic backlinks, and low-engagement pages that have lost their relevance to users and search engines can accumulate. Without regular audits and a systematic approach to fixing these issues, website performance can deteriorate, leading to a loss of competitive advantage.

In this comprehensive guide, we’ll walk you through a six-step website audit process:

1. Website Architecture and Navigation — how to build a logical site structure and effective internal linking.
2. Technical Foundation — how to check indexing and improve Core Web Vitals.
3. Backlink Profile — how to identify and address toxic spam links.
4. Content and Meta Tags — how to optimize pages to improve CTR.
5. User Experience (UX) — how to make your website mobile-friendly and increase conversions.
6. Analytics and Action Plan — how to turn identified issues into clear, prioritized tasks.

Best of all, you won’t have to tackle everything at once. At the end of the article, you’ll find a ready-to-use practical checklist to help you organize the process and achieve initial results quickly.

Step #1: Audit Your Website Architecture and Navigation

A clear website structure and intuitive navigation help both users and search engines find the information they need quickly. This directly affects your search rankings and business profitability. After all, if visitors cannot find your products or services, they will not be able to purchase them.

Here is how to audit your website architecture.

Analyze Your Website Navigation

Evaluate how easily users can navigate between pages. Your menu structure should be intuitive, and your overall website architecture should be logical.

Ask the following questions when reviewing your website’s key navigation elements:

• Main menu: Is it easy to find, and do the menu labels clearly describe the content of the corresponding pages?
• Site search: Does the search function return accurate and relevant results?
• Internal linking: Do you use links to related content to help users naturally explore your website?

Example of effective implementation: The Terra Outdoor furniture store meets all these criteria.

What did they do right? The website features a streamlined dropdown menu that organizes products logically by category, material, and collection. This structure allows shoppers to find exactly what they need without unnecessary effort.

Helpful resource: Use a menu design checklist to make your website navigation even more user-friendly.

Plan and Organize Your Page Structure

The content on each page needs a clear structure so that both readers and search engines can understand it easily.

Start by reviewing your heading hierarchy:

• H1 is the main heading of the page. It should be unique and accurately reflect the content of that specific page.
• H2 and H3 headings should logically divide the content into sections and subsections.

Further reading: Website Architecture: How to Build a Structure That Ranks High in Search Results.

Review Your Internal Links

Internal links help visitors navigate your website and signal relationships between different pieces of content to search engines. A well-planned internal linking strategy can also strengthen your website’s topical authority.

Make sure you link to:

• Important product or service pages
• Topically related blog articles
• Pages with high conversion rates

What to look for: Do you use descriptive anchor text (the clickable text of a link) that naturally incorporates relevant keywords? This helps readers understand where a link will take them and gives Google additional context about the content of the destination page.

Step #2: Check Your Website’s Technical Foundation

A technical SEO audit helps you determine how easily search engines can access, crawl, and index your pages. You may have the best content in your niche, but technical issues can still hold back your search rankings.

Here’s how to conduct a technical SEO audit.

Check Website Indexability

First, make sure search engines can discover and recognize your pages.

To check this, open Google Search Console and see whether Google is indexing your important pages. You can find this data under Indexing > Pages.

How to fix it: If your audit reveals indexing issues, follow a step-by-step guide to configuring website indexing in Google.

Identify Crawlability Issues

Next, make sure search engine crawlers can navigate your website without obstacles and discover your content. Look for broken links, missing pages, and overly complex or confusing structures.

Use Semrush Site Audit to identify crawled pages and uncover errors that prevent search engines from accessing your content efficiently.

How to do it:

1. Open the Site Audit section and select your project to get an overview of your website’s overall health.
2. Look at the Crawled Pages section, where pages are grouped into the following categories:
   • Healthy pages: Pages that work correctly without any issues.
   • Broken pages: Pages that return errors.
   • Have issues: Pages that require attention but are still accessible.
   • Redirects: Pages that redirect users to other URLs.
   • Blocked pages: Pages that are blocked from crawling.
3. Next, open the Crawled Pages tab to view the complete list of pages on your website.
4. Click the number in the Issues column next to the relevant URL to see what needs to be fixed.
5. If you are unsure what a particular error, warning, or notice means, click Why and how to fix it for detailed guidance.

Further reading: Learn about the most common website crawling issues and how to resolve them.

Check Your XML Sitemap

Make sure search engines can easily understand and navigate your website’s structure.

1. First, check your XML sitemap in Google Search Console to confirm that it has been submitted correctly.
2. Then, review the sitemap manually for errors, such as missing or duplicate URLs.

Further reading: XML Sitemaps: What They Are and Why They Matter for SEO.

Analyze Page Load Speed

A page speed audit helps you pinpoint exactly what is slowing down your website and how to fix it. Improving site speed can directly affect conversion rates and help increase sales.

A fast-loading website creates a better user experience. When pages load quickly, visitors can explore content, interact with the site, and complete desired actions more easily — such as clicking the “Buy” button.

Here’s how to check whether your website is performing at its best.

Measure Page Performance

Use Google’s free PageSpeed Insights tool. It provides detailed performance data and actionable recommendations for improvement.

Pay particular attention to Core Web Vitals — a set of metrics that Google uses as part of its page experience signals to evaluate the user experience.

Here’s why they matter and how to improve them:

• Largest Contentful Paint (LCP) measures how quickly the main content of a page loads. A good LCP score (2.5 seconds or less) indicates that the main content loads quickly.
  • How to improve it: Compress resource-intensive elements, such as banners, large images, and animations.
• Interaction to Next Paint (INP) measures how quickly a website responds to user interactions, such as clicks and taps.
  • How to improve it: Keep INP at 200 milliseconds or less by reducing JavaScript execution time and removing unnecessary third-party scripts that slow down the website’s response.
• Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS) measures a page’s visual stability as it loads. Unexpected shifts in page elements can disrupt the user experience and negatively affect your CLS score.
  • How to improve it: Aim for a CLS score below 0.1. Set explicit dimensions for images, reserve space for ads, and use stable fonts.

Prioritize the Most Important Fixes

During your page speed audit, focus on changes that deliver the greatest impact:

• Compress and properly resize all images.
• Minify CSS and JavaScript files.
• Remove unnecessary code and unused plugins.

If you’re unsure where to start, use the prioritized list of issues and recommendations generated by PageSpeed Insights to guide your next steps.

Step #3: Analyze Your Backlink Profile

A backlink audit helps you understand the current state of your link profile and identify new opportunities for improvement. High-quality links from authoritative websites can improve your search rankings, while low-quality links — or a lack of backlinks — can hold your website back.

Here’s how to evaluate your backlink profile effectively.

Review Your Overall Backlink Profile

Start by getting an overview of your link profile using Semrush Backlink Analytics.

Pay attention to the total number of backlinks, referring domains, and your overall toxicity score.

Watch out for any unusual spikes in low-quality backlinks. These could indicate a spam attack that may harm your SEO performance.

Free tool: Use a free backlink checker to quickly analyze your website’s backlinks or those of your competitors.

Analyze Backlink Quality

Use Backlink Audit to get a clearer picture of your backlink profile’s health.

Review the detailed metrics and link categories:

• Red: Toxic backlinks
• Orange: Potentially toxic backlinks
• Green: Safe or high-quality backlinks (non-toxic)

This breakdown provides two key opportunities:

1. Analyze your high-quality backlinks and identify similar websites for future link-building opportunities.
2. Identify toxic backlinks and request their removal or disavow them when appropriate.

A small number of toxic backlinks is not necessarily a reason to panic — they can occur naturally as your website grows. What matters most is the overall balance between high-quality and toxic links, with the vast majority coming from trustworthy, reputable websites.

Further reading: Modern link building is about building partnerships, not simple transactions.

Monitor Your Backlink Profile Regularly

Monitor your backlink profile consistently to keep it in good health. Schedule monthly audits to identify potentially harmful links early, before they affect your search rankings.

Recommended tool: Use Semrush Link Building Tool to manage and track your link-building efforts.

Step #4: Evaluate Your Content

A content audit helps you identify pages that need updating to increase traffic.

It gives you a clear understanding of three things:

• Which pages deliver the most value to your business
• Which pages need improvement or further optimization
• Which pages should be removed or consolidated with others

Here’s how to conduct a content audit.

Evaluate Content Quality

High-quality content keeps readers engaged and signals to search engines that your page provides value and deserves to rank higher in search results.

But how exactly do you assess content quality?

High-quality content is generally well-researched, contains up-to-date information, and offers unique expert insights.

Key elements of high-quality content include:

• Clear, straightforward language
• A reader-friendly format
• Short paragraphs
• Relevant images, charts, and videos

Further reading: Content Pruning: How to Improve SEO by Removing Underperforming Pages.

Review Meta Elements

Title tags and meta descriptions are your first opportunity to capture users’ attention in search results. They can influence whether someone clicks through to your website or scrolls past it.

What should you look for when auditing titles and descriptions?

Effective title tags should:

• Include the target keyword near the beginning.
• Stay within approximately 60 characters (or 600 pixels — tools such as Mangools can help you check this).
• Use compelling wording that encourages clicks.
• Follow a consistent format across your website.

Effective meta descriptions should:

• Naturally incorporate relevant keywords.
• Accurately describe the page content.
• Stay within 155 characters or 960 pixels (or approximately 120 characters or 680 pixels on mobile devices).
• Include a clear call to action (CTA).

Use Google Search Console to identify the pages receiving the most clicks from search results and analyze their meta elements to understand what works best.

Pay particular attention to pages with a high number of impressions but few clicks. These pages have a low click-through rate (CTR), and optimizing them can help generate additional traffic.

Step #5: Evaluate the User Experience (UX)

The goal of a user experience (UX) audit is to identify friction points and optimize them so visitors can find the information they need effortlessly.

A great UX keeps your audience engaged and encourages them to take action, such as making a purchase. An intuitive interface also helps demonstrate that your website provides value to users, while page experience is an important factor in Google’s ranking systems.

Here’s how to conduct a UX audit.

Check the Mobile Experience

More than 60% of web traffic comes from mobile devices. Test your website on different screen sizes to ensure a smooth experience for every user.

Pay attention to the following:

• Are buttons and links large enough to tap comfortably without zooming in?
• Do images scale correctly across different screen sizes?
• Is the text easy to read without zooming in?
• Does the navigation menu work smoothly and correctly on smartphones?

Further reading: Mobile SEO: What It Is and How to Benefit from Mobile Optimization.

Evaluate Visual Hierarchy and Readability

Your design should guide users’ attention to key elements and make your content easy to understand.

Ask yourself the following questions:

• Is the heading hierarchy (H1 > H2 > H3) structured correctly, with key points highlighted for users who scan the page?
• Is there sufficient contrast between the text and the background?
• Do you use enough white space to separate content blocks?

Helpful resource: Use Nielsen Norman Group’s guidelines to improve your content’s readability.

Test Your Calls to Action (CTAs)

Calls to action are key conversion points. They should be noticeable, persuasive, and easy to click.

Make sure your CTAs:

• Stand out visually on the page.
• Use clear, action-oriented wording.
• Appear at logical points along the user journey.
• Work correctly across all devices.

Tip: Use heatmap tools such as Hotjar to see how visitors interact with your CTAs. These tools reveal where users click most often, how far they scroll, and whether they notice your calls to action.

Further reading: Conversion Rate: How to Calculate, Optimize, and Avoid Common Mistakes.

Step #6: Analyze Analytics and Conversion Data

Auditing the content already published on your website is only part of the process. To determine the right next steps, you need to rely on actual data.

Analyze Search Performance

Open Google Search Console to review your content metrics and identify:

• Pages with zero traffic
• Content with a low click-through rate (CTR)
• Pages ranking on the second or third page of Google search results

As Brian Dean notes:

“Start by identifying content that generates no traffic or sales. When you have published a lot of content, analyzing everything at once is simply impossible. Get rid of the ‘junk’ first, and you can focus your efforts on pages that are actually worth improving.”

Further reading: A Google Search Console Guide to Monitoring and Analyzing Organic Traffic.

Track Traffic Trends

After removing uninformative pages from your website, evaluate the performance of the remaining content. The main metric to focus on is traffic trends, which show whether your content continues to attract an audience.

Look for content with a consistent downward trend in views:

1. Open the Performance section in the left-hand menu of Google Search Console.
2. Scroll below the chart and open the Pages tab.
3. Select a period of 12 months or longer to identify long-term trends.
4. Click a specific page to view its individual performance graph.

Watch for these warning signs:

• A steady decline in traffic over several months
• Sudden drops in performance that never recover
• Pages that previously performed well but have since lost momentum

These are your key opportunities for growth. Updating these pages can help recover lost traffic.

How to Turn Audit Findings into Action

After completing your audit, you will likely have a long list of tasks. To avoid feeling overwhelmed and maximize the impact of your efforts, prioritize your resources.

Prioritize Fixes

Start with issues that have the greatest impact on SEO and user experience:

• Critical technical errors affecting crawling and indexing
• Missing meta tags on key pages
• Slow page load times
• Confusing navigation and mobile usability issues
• A significant number of potentially harmful backlinks

Create a Step-by-Step Action Plan

Break your list of tasks into manageable stages based on the time and resources required.

Quick wins — minimal effort, up to one hour

• Add missing meta descriptions.
• Fix broken internal links.
• Compress large images.

Medium-term tasks — require planning

• Improve website architecture.
• Rewrite underperforming articles and pages.
• Resolve Core Web Vitals issues.

Long-term projects — involve major changes

• Redesign the website to improve UX.
• Migrate to faster hosting or a new platform.

Tip: Set up regular automated monitoring with SEO tools such as Semrush Site Audit to detect new issues promptly.

Make Auditing a Regular Habit

An audit only delivers results when you put its findings into practice. Do not try to fix everything at once — start with the issues that are currently causing the most harm to your website.

• If rankings are declining, start with technical and on-page SEO.
• If visitors leave your website quickly, focus on UX.

Websites are constantly changing, and new issues inevitably arise between audits. Regular checks help you resolve them before they start costing you traffic and conversions.

Helpful Resources for Further Reading

• 14 Challenging Technical SEO Issues: Solutions for improving AI crawling, resolving Schema markup issues, managing infinite URLs, and preventing test websites from being indexed.
• 10 Ecommerce SEO Tips: How to strengthen product and category pages through review analysis, internal search optimization, selective filter indexing, and proper handling of out-of-stock products.

Comprehensive Website Audit Checklist

Step 1: Website Architecture and Navigation

• Main menu: Logical and simple, with labels that clearly describe the content of each page.
• Site search: Works correctly and returns accurate, relevant results.
• Internal linking: Links connect related content, popular products, and high-converting pages.
• Anchor text: Descriptive, includes relevant keywords, and fits naturally into the content.
• Heading hierarchy: Each page has one unique H1, with content logically organized using H2–H3 headings.

Step 2: Technical Foundation and Page Speed

• Indexing: Important pages are indexed in Google Search Console.
• Crawlability: No broken links (404s), server errors (5xx), or incorrectly configured redirects.
• XML sitemap: Submitted to Search Console, regularly updated, and free of duplicate or blocked URLs.
• Page speed (Core Web Vitals):
  • LCP (loading performance of the main content) ≤ 2.5 seconds.
  • INP (interaction responsiveness) ≤ 200 ms.
  • CLS (layout stability) ≤ 0.1.
• Resource optimization: Images are compressed, CSS/JS code is minified, and unnecessary scripts are removed.

Step 3: Backlink Profile

• The number of backlinks and referring domains has been checked, and unusual spikes in spam links have been investigated.
• Toxic backlinks have been identified and assessed for removal or disavowal where appropriate.
• Regular monthly backlink profile audits are scheduled.

Step 4: Content and Meta Tags

• Content is up to date, unique, organized into short paragraphs, and enhanced with images or graphics.
• Up to 60 characters, with the target keyword near the beginning and compelling, relevant wording.
• Up to 155 characters (approximately 120 for mobile), incorporating relevant keywords and a clear call to action (CTA).
• Pages with high impressions but low CTR have been identified, and their meta tags have been updated.

Step 5: User Experience (UX)

• Buttons and links are easy to tap, text is readable without zooming, and navigation works smoothly.
• Text contrasts clearly with the background, and there is sufficient white space between content blocks.
• Visible, positioned at logical points in the user journey, and functional across all devices.

Step 6: Analytics and Action Plan

• Traffic analysis: Pages with zero or declining traffic have been identified in Search Console using data from the past 12 months.
• Content cleanup and updates: Low-value pages have been removed or consolidated, while outdated and potentially high-performing pages have been updated.
• Task prioritization:
  • Quick wins: Fix broken links, add missing meta descriptions, and compress images.
  • Medium-term tasks: Update content and improve Core Web Vitals.
  • Long-term projects: Redesign the website, migrate to new hosting, or restructure the site.

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