You don’t need a fancy agency or a five-figure budget to improve your SEO. What you do need is a smart, simple checklist that shows you where your site stands and how to fix what’s broken.
Whether you’re running a WordPress site, Shopify store, or something in between, this DIY audit will help you spot the issues that are quietly killing your rankings.
Let’s get into it. 💻📈
Why Every Small Business Needs an SEO Audit
Search engines don’t rank websites – they rank pages. And if those pages are slow, confusing, or invisible to crawlers, your traffic’s going nowhere.
An SEO audit is your chance to clean up technical issues, optimize what’s working, and unlock free traffic over time.
How to Use This Checklist
You can run through all 12 steps manually, or download the free audit sheet at the end of this post to track your results. Each step includes a quick fix or tool recommendation. No fluff, no wasted time.
✅ Your 12-Point SEO Audit Checklist
1. Crawlability & Indexation
- Use Google Search Console to see what’s indexed.
- Check for blocked pages in your robots.txt or via meta noindex.
🛠️ Quick Win: Run a crawl using Screaming Frog (free for up to 500 URLs).
2. HTTPS & Site Security
- Is your site running on HTTPS? If not, Google’s dinging you.
- Install SSL and force redirect from HTTP to HTTPS.
🛠️ Tip: Use Why No Padlock to check for mixed content.
3. Mobile-Friendliness
- Your site must work perfectly on phones. Period.
- Run Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test to see if you’re in the clear.
🛠️ Fix common layout issues with responsive design or themes.
4. Page Speed & Core Web Vitals
- Slow site = low rankings.
- Use PageSpeed Insights to check load time, CLS, FCP, and more.
🛠️ Fix common layout issues with responsive design or themes.
5. Broken Links & 404 Errors
- Nothing screams “we forgot about this site” like broken links.
- Run a broken link checker and clean it up.
🛠️ Try: Broken Link Checker by Ahrefs
6. Title Tags & Meta Descriptions
- Every page should have a unique title tag (≤ 60 chars) and a clear, compelling meta description (≤ 155 chars).
- Include target keywords naturally.
🛠️ Use a plugin like Yoast SEO (WordPress) or edit manually in Shopify.
7. H1, H2, H3 Structure
- One H1 per page.
- Use H2s for main sections, H3s for sub-points.
🛠️ Think of it like an outline – Google loves organized content.
8. Keyword Usage
- Are your main keywords placed naturally in your headings, opening paragraph, and sprinkled throughout?
- Don’t stuff – just be clear.
🛠️ Pro tip: Check what you already rank for using GSC > Performance > Queries.
9. Image SEO
- Add descriptive file names and alt text to every image.
- Compress images to improve load speed.
🛠️ Use tools like TinyPNG for compression.
10. Internal Linking
- Link between blog posts, services, and related pages.
- Helps users explore your site and distributes SEO juice.
🛠️ Example: Link your homepage to top-performing blogs with target anchor text.
11. Local SEO Basics
- Add your business to Google Business Profile.
- Include name, address, phone (NAP) in your footer.
🛠️ Embed a Google Map and request reviews.
12. Schema Markup
- Helps search engines understand your content.
- Add structured data for articles, local business, products, etc.
🛠️ Use Google’s Rich Results Tool to check your site.
🧠 Free Download: SEO Audit Checklist (Printable PDF)
Want to track everything in one spot?
No email required (but we’d love to chat if you want help!).
What to Do After Your Audit
- Fix what’s urgent (speed, mobile, crawl issues).
- Prioritize pages with high impressions but low clicks.
- Start a content plan based on missing keyword opportunities.
Not sure where to start? We can do a full pro audit + custom SEO plan for your site. Just book a strategy call – we’ll walk you through it.
Final Thoughts
SEO isn’t magic. It’s maintenance.
You don’t need to master everything – but if you run this audit every 3 – 6 months, you’ll stay ahead of 90% of your competitors.
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