Mohit Maheshwari presented on conducting SEO audits. He discussed the importance of SEO audits to discover issues, create an action plan, and set priorities. He recommended tools for conducting technical, link profile, content, and competitor audits. Mohit outlined the SEO audit process including checking indexability, accessibility, site performance, search engine penalties, on-page and off-page ranking factors. He provided tips on audit reporting and creating an implementation schedule based on priorities.

1. by Mohit Maheshwari

2. Speaker
• About Mohit Maheshwari (MD - NEW MEDIA GURU)
• 13+ years in the Internet and Technology Industry
• Worked with clients in more than 25+ countries
• Clients range from large established brands to agencies
and start ups globally
• Member of TiE , SEMPO , IAMAI
• Member NASSCOM NPC Marketing team
• Active speaker , consultant and digital enthusiast
• About NEW MEDIA GURU www.newmediaguru.co.uk
• Full service Digital marketing agency which offers Web Solutions ( CMS ,
Ecommerce , Custom Application Development) , Mobile app development ,
Search Engine and Social Media Marketing services.
• Team of 85+ digital professionals
• Established in 2007 in London with primarily UK clients to begin with
• Presence in US , UK , Australia and clients in over 30+ countries
• Selected in NASSCOM Orbitshift program
• Member of IAMAI ,Microsoft partner network (MPN ) , Amazon Consulting
Partner (APN) , Google Certified Adwords Partner , SEMPO member, TiE

3. Agenda
1. SEO Audit Process
2. SEO Audits Tools
3. SEO Audit Reporting
4. Actionable steps from SEO audit

4. Some pointers for Webinar
• Webinar is being recorded and will be available on Digital Vidya
website and NEW MEDIA GURU’s website Newmediaguru.co.uk
Recording will be available in 2-3 days
• Slide deck will be uploaded on Slideshare.net/mohitinhere
• It is impossible to include all tactics, factors, scenarios we usually
include in our SEO audits in a 30 minute presentation.
• SEO audits usually take 1-2 hours for a basic level audit to even 4-5
days for Mid level audits.
• Advanced SEO audits are not part of scope of this webinar.
• So use your own knowledge and do indepth R and D before coming to
a conclusion for your website or specific scenario.
• SEO is a dynamic field , so keep yourself updated with latest news
• Follow up on this presentation via twitter @mohitinhere

5. The Iceberg
Image credits: Flicker

7. Surface
SEO
OR
ON Page
Amplified
SEO
OR
Deep SEO
S
E
O
S
T
R
A
T
E
G
Y
Technical
Content
Social
Links
• Keyword
Research
• Site structure
• Site speed
• Browser and
Device
• Analytics
• Attribution
Tracking
• Trends Report
• Content Themes
• Audience
Survey
• Blogging
• Survey
• Reports
• Ebooks
• Interviews
• Whitepapers
• Distribution
• Amplification
• Virality
• Influencer
• Outreach
• Contest
• Channels- G+
• Earned and NOT
Built
• Brand
keywords/ancho
r text
• Campaign driven

8. SEO above
the surface:
On Page SEO
• Site structure
• Content
• Title , Meta etc
• Site speed
• Code cleaning
• Internal linking
• Authorship
• Schemas
• Sitemaps
• Site errors
• Server errors
• URL structure
SEO below
the surface:
Off Page SEO
• Link building
• Anchor text
• Keyword density
• Website
neighbourhood
• Guest posting
• Article
• Directory submissions
• Local submissions
• Press Releases
Oversimplification
of Modern SEO

9. The Cute people

10. Are NOT So Cute if YOU SPAM !!

11. SEO AUDIT
Philosophy , Framework, Tools , Process ,
Project management

12. Why do you need SEO Audit ?
• SEO audit is a health check of your
website
• It allows you to discover critical
issues you might be ignoring or not
aware off
• It helps in managing potential risks
and threats
• It helps in creating an action plan
for SEO , Risk Mitigation and tweaks
in strategy
• Helps in setting priority
• Creates roadmap for Web
development teams , SEO , Content
team , Social team

13. Some Recommended tools for Site Audit
Purpose Tool
Site crawling Screaming Frog SEO Spider ( Free and paid)
Xenu’s Link Sleuth ( Free -Only good for broken links reporting)
Webmaster ,
Keywords and
Analytics
Google Analytics , Google Websmaster , Bing webmaster
Google Adwords Keyword planner
Local SEO Audits Getlisted / Moz Local ( Citations)
Whitespark ( Citations)
Brightlocal ( Citations)
Site Performance
check
Pingdom , Gtmetrix , Yslow , New Relic
SEO On page Audits Raven Tools , Moz
Link profile Audits Moz , Majestic SEO , Raventools
Competitor Audits Moz , Majestic SEO , Raventools
Checklist template Anne Cushings Site Audit Check list ( make your own custom version on
case basis)
Tools for Reporting Excel , Word , Powerpoint
Screenshots - Jing – Free , SnagIt( Paid)

14. Audit Philosophy
• Importance of check lists in
our work
• How to create check lists (
one pager for each theme)
• How to ensure check list
cross link and co relate to
the broader objective
• Process to creating checklist
• For improving what you
learn
• For teaching team members,
educating clients , other
partners

15. Checklist in action via PM Tools

16. Anee Cushing’s - Biggest Site Audit Checklist

17. Create your own version – based on case by case needs
http://goo.gl/5HCxJK

18. SEO Audit Reports
• SEO Audit report preparation Tips
• Use Screenshots tools - Jing ( Free) , Snagit( paid) , Videos recording if
explaining complicated material to developer sitting outside your office
or remotely with agency
• Audit items should be grouped thematically for easy understanding
• Technical
• Link Analysis
• Content and Social Analysis
• Competitor Analysis
• Ensure you add table of content
• Interlink the document and cross refer with the excel sheets to be precise
• Don’t leave things open to interpretation. Give specific examples to the
developer where need be
• Add Excel docs as Supporting document with the main report
• Based on your audit outcome ,Create a Todo list sorted by priority A , B ,
C for the developer and Digital Marketing team ( SEO , Content , Link
building , Citation etc)

19. SEO Audit report resources
Template Website Audit
Books Danny Dovers SEO book – SEO secrets http://goo.gl/m6e3LK
Checklist
template
1. Anne Cushings Site Audit Check list ( make your own custom
version on case by case basis) http://goo.gl/ULIq3b
2. Technical Site Audit checklist http://goo.gl/sE8ywV
3. Danny Dovers 15 minutes Audit check list
http://goo.gl/DhZ0zv
4. 60 minute SEO checklist http://goo.gl/O2Dt0b
SEO audit Case
study
AJ Kohns case study http://goo.gl/08NfMu
Main document
template
Neil Patel’s Quicksprout version http://goo.gl/jBV8sd

20. NMG Audit report templates
SEO Audit Report : Master Document

21. NMG Audit report templates
SEO Implementation schedule : Prioritized

22. NMG Audit report templates
Analysis Sheet : Supporting documents

23. SEO AUDIT
Executing the Audit

24. Technical Audit
Accessibility, Indexability,
On page Factors , Penalty check
Link Profile Audit
Off page Factors
Content + Social
Audit
Competitor Audit
SEO AUDIT

25. Technical Audit

26. Technical Audit Checkpoints
Areas Website Audit
Technical Audit • Accessibility
• Site Performance
• Index ability
• Search Engine Penalty
Semantic Audit • Content Analysis
• Link Analysis
Competitor
Audit
• Link Graph
• Type and No. of links
• Link Authority
• Nature of links (Built or Earned)

27. Ensuring Site Accessibility
• Robots.txt
• Check if it’s there ?
• Is it optimized ?
For more info:
robotstxt .org
Google Robots.txt Guide
What is Robots.txt?

28. Ensuring Site Accessibility
• Robots Meta tags
• Check if it’s there ?
• Is it placed properly ?

29. Ensuring Site Accessibility
• Http Status Code
Always inventory site’s redirection techniques.
Use 301 ONLY - NO 302 HTTP Redirects
5 Common HTTP ERRORS
• HTTP ERROR 500 (Internal Server Error)
• HTTP ERROR 403 (Forbidden)
• HTTP ERROR 404 ( Not Found)
• HTTP ERROR 400 (Bad Request)
• HTTP ERROR 401 (Unauthorized)
Tools: Google Webmaster, Screaming frog, Xenu

30. Ensuring Site Accessibility
• Sitemap
• Is the Sitemap a well-formed XML document? Does it follow the
Sitemap protocol?
• Has the Sitemap been submitted to your webmaster tools accounts?
• Did you find pages in the site crawl that do not appear in the
Sitemap?
• Are there pages listed in the Sitemap that do not appear in the site
crawl?
More Info: What is Sitemap
Sitemap Tools:
Xenu, Screaming frog, www.xml-sitemaps.com

31. Ensuring Site Accessibility
• Website Architecture
• Is it user friendly?
• No. of clicks to reach important pages ?
• Are Navigational links are easily accessible to user ?
• Is site navigation built using flash or Javascript ?
More Info: Importance of link architecture
Tools:
*GA: Behavior > Site Content > Content Drilldown
**BWT: Reports & Data > Index Explorer
*Google Analytics, ** Bing Webmaster Tool

32. Ensuring Site Accessibility
• Site Performance
• Google Page Speed
• Pingdom
• Gtmetrix
• Advanced Tool:
• New Relic

33. Checking Indexability
• Site:command
• Index Sanity check
• Page Searches
• Brand Searches
• Search Engine Penalty

34. Checking Indexability
• Site:Command ( 1000 ft view)
• It is a rough estimate
• Estimated index count can help identify one of three scenarios:
• The index and actual counts are roughly equivalent
• The index count is significantly smaller than the actual count
• The index count is significantly larger than the actual count
• If you suspect a duplicate content issue, append "&start=990" to the end of the URL in your
browser and then, look for Google's duplicate content warning at the bottom of the page. The
warning message will look similar to this:
.

35. Checking Indexability
• Index Sanity check (100 Ft view)
• We need to make sure the search engines are indexing the site's most
important pages.
• Page searches
• search for a specific page's URL to check if it is indexed:
• If you don't find the page, double check its accessibility. If the page
is accessible, you should check if the page has been penalized.
• Brand Searches

36. Check and Resolve Search Engine Penalty (if any)
• Check for search engine penalties
• On Page Ranking Factors
• Off Page Ranking Factors

37. Check for Penalty
If your site is penalized don’t be scared

38. Check for Penalty
Fix the Site's Penalized Behavior

39. Check for Search Engine Penalty
1. Make Sure You've Actually Been
Penalized
2. Identify the Reason(s) for the
Penalty
3. Fix the Site's Penalized Behavior
4. Request Reconsideration

40. Check for Penalty
• Make Sure You've Actually Been Penalized
• Google Analytics:
• Google Webmaster: If you see something likewise this, there is some
issue.
• Also check webmaster message as well.

41. Check for Penalty
• Identify the Reason(s) for the Penalty
Helpful Tool : Panguin Tool 2.0 by Barracuda Digital
http://goo.gl/10BL1i

42. Check for Penalty
• Take a deep dive on what type of penalty is
applied on your website
(Check On page + Offpage factor)
• Few Usual Suspects
• Unnatural Links – Penguin
• Panda
• User Generated Content spam
• Paid links in advertorials and perhaps elsewhere
• Paid links in the form of discount offers
• Selling links to other websites
• Cloaking
• Doorway pages

43. Check for Penalty
• Request Reconsideration
“Google wants to see you have made genuine efforts to lift penalty!”
Google doc tracking all efforts and
giving report to Google at
Reconsideration stage
Submit your case with proper
explanation: (Example email)

44. On Page Ranking Factors
• URLs
• URL based duplicate content
• Content ( plus check for)
• Information Architecture
• Keyword Cannibalism
• Duplicate Content
• HTML Markup
• Titles
• Meta Descriptions
• Other <head> Tags
• Images – should contain descriptive name along with Alt and title
tag.
• Outlinks – No. of outbond links to other website
• Other <body> Tags – like Heading tag

45. On Page Ranking Factors
• Tools to check and resolve on page issues
Name Website
MOZ Moz.com
Screaming Frog www.screamingfrog.co.uk/seo-spider/
Google Webmaster tool https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/
Site Liner siteliner.com
Google Page Speed https://developers.google.com/speed/pages
peed/insights
Majestic SEO majesticseo.com
Google Analytics http://www.google.com/analytics/
Schema Validator Schema Validator
Raven tools raventools.com

46. On Page Ranking Factors
• Resolving issues and tracking : MOZ , GWT ,Raven

47. Other Pro Tips ( General)
• Check domain expiry and if it’s <1 year, we recommend it to
book for next 10 years
• Check what sort of plugins are there, if some important
plugins are missing recommend those to developer
• Check what backup plan is there in case of virus attack or
hacking attempt, in case it’s not available recommend it to
developer
• Check website hosting and recommend some better hosting
solutions like AWS or some other cloud hosting provider
• In Ecommerce recommend a cart abandonment email
solution.

48. Off Page Ranking Factors
• Popularity
• Trustworthiness
• Backlink Profile
• Authority
• Social Engagement
• Citation – Local SEO

49. Off Page Ranking Factors
• Analyze Links : MOZ , GWT , Ahrefs , Raven Tools

50. Off Page Ranking Factors
• Anchor text distribution : Tool Ahrefs
• Keep Dollar keyword % age less and brand keyword significantly higher in
Anchor text. Use Co Citation
• Ensure the link profile has no follow links and not just do follow

51. Competitive Analysis
• Compare your link profile with Competitors Link Profile
Complete details on this method on this post : Link Profile Tool

52. Competitor link analysis : OSE

53. Citation Building and Tracking

54. Citation Building and Tracking

55. CONTENT AUDIT

56. Why Do You Need Content Audit?
A content audit will help
you collect information
you need to:
• Review current
information architecture
(site structure, navigation
systems)
• Website Information
architecture for new
design
• Develop your content
matrix
Image courtesy : Distilled

57. How to Perform a Content Audit
Step 1 - Get list of your webpages
Extract a report from your CMS ( if feature available).
You may be able to collect extra information about each page,
like the metadata (page title, keywords), Heading tags, Image alt
tag, canonical url etc.
If CMS does not support , you
could use one of these free
tools to crawl your site (
limitations apply) :
Screaming Frog ( Paid)
Xenu Link Sleuth (Windows)

58. How to Perform a Content Audit
Step – 2 Create a spreadsheet with all of your data.
A few good things to add to your spreadsheet include:
• Date of the audit
• Title of the content
• Category
• Keywords and audience
• Timely or evergreen
• Needs changing
• Traffic
• Social popularity
• URL
• Author

59. How to Perform a Content Audit
Step 3: Collect Traffic and Conversion Data
Add a few extra columns at the end to accommodate the following ( from GWT) :
1. Impressions
2. Clicks
3. Click-Through Rate
4. If available, Average rank.
Bonus Metrics ( from GWT and GA) :
• Top 3 referring (non branded) keywords for each page
• Bounce Rate, Exit Rate, or Time on Page.
• Unique Page Views – With this, you’ll identify pages
which visitors are actively consuming, regardless
of source.
Tools used – Google Analytics, Google Webmaster

60. How to Perform a Content Audit
Step 4 – Detect Duplicate content (internal)
Tool Name Website
SEOmoz Crawl Test Moz.com
Screaming Frog: Hash
(Apply conditional
formatting to column to
catch duplicates)
www.screamingfrog.co.uk/seo-spider/
GWT For HTML improvement – Duplicate
titles , Long titles etc
DMCA , Copyscape DMCA, Copyscape - Content protection (
external)
Siteliner Detects internal duplicate content

61. How to Perform a Content Audit
Step 5 - Study Competitors
Take a deep dive into your competitors' content assets to
do a side-by-side comparison.
• Where are the content gaps?
• Which content assets are they targeting the same
audience with?
• How is their content better ?
Tools used - MajesticSEO, Ahrefs, or Open Site Explorer

62. Ways to Get More From Your Top Content
• Repurpose top content -
– Ebook to Blog , Blog to ebook
– Blog to Info graphic
– Whitepaper to Videos
– Videos to blogpost
• Update top content
– Make it latest , fresh , integrate social interaction / chatter
• SEO optimize top content
• Conversion optimize
– Call to action , forms , Phone no. , email newsletter
subscription

63. +
The Iceberg
Check out
Slides http://goo.gl/yXrjsh
Video - http://goo.gl/7xmgkR

64. Thank You
Mohit Maheshwari
mohit@newmediaguru.co.uk
www.facebook.com/newmediaguru
@new_media_guru
@mohitinhere
http://in.linkedin.com/in/mohitinhere
www.newmediaguru.co.uk