SEO Audit Course - A Masterclass

Prepare for the seo audit by creating a minimal browser persona, drafting before and final notes, and delivering a concise one-page report with website priorities.

Use Build with to quickly map a site’s tech stack—WordPress, Cloudflare, Facebook chat bot, Google Tag Manager, and ConvertKit—and verify analytics installations like Google Analytics and GA4.

Set up search engine properties using Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools to monitor how search engines crawl your site, verify properties, and submit to Bing and Yandex.

Run a site crawl audit using Screaming Frog, Moz, and Mars to assess pages at scale. Connect Google Analytics, set Canada, and add seed keywords while noting authority metrics caveats.

Discover how to verify which pages are indexed using a site operator search and Google search console, and compare indexed pages to your site's total to detect missing URLs.

Learn how to ensure your content is indexed by Google, using cached pages and Moz bar, and prioritize page indexation as sites grow.

Learn why a 200 http status enables Google indexing and rendering, and audit status codes with Screaming Frog and broken link check to surface 404s and 3xx redirects.

Learn how to ensure pages are indexable by robots using meta robots and x-robots-tag, check for noindex directives, and use tools like Screaming Frog and Google Search Console.

Explore how robots.txt controls crawling and indexing, why Google can index a URL even when blocked, and how to configure simple versus complex files with WordPress and Nike examples.

Explore how URLs listed in an XML sitemap file aid discovery and crawling, potentially improving ranking, and how WordPress plugins like Rank Math and Yoast auto‑generate sitemap.xml.

List your sitemap location in your robots.txt, the easiest method to help all major search engines find your XML sitemap, though beware exposure to third-party crawlers.

Submit your XML sitemap to search engines and robots.txt, verify URLs, and monitor validity and coverage in Google Search Console; if needed, generate sitemaps with Screaming Frog.

Internal links and sitemaps help search engines discover pages quickly. Use Screaming Frog and Sitebulb to find orphan pages and visualize crawl trees, ensuring key pages are within 4–5 clicks.

Learn how to consolidate pages under a single canonical URL, resolve duplicate content and URL parameter issues, and verify canonicals with tools like Screaming Frog and Google Search Console.

Examine how Google may override user-selected canonical URLs, and learn to audit canonical choices using search console to verify which URL Google indexes as canonical.

Ensure duplicate content points to one canonical URL with a consistent canonical tag, even when URL parameters or patterns differ, and verify canonicals with Screaming Frog and Google Search Console.

Design friendly URL structures by keeping URLs short, simple, and readable. Avoid unnecessary parameters and legacy scripts, and use sitemaps and tools like Screaming Frog to review URL structure.

Evaluate how content rendered with basic JavaScript impacts SEO and crawlability, and use Google mobile friendly test and URL inspection to compare rendered pages and guide fixes.

Learn why blocking css, JavaScript, and images in robots.txt can hinder rendering. Use the Google URL inspection tool to identify blocked resources and ensure important files remain accessible.

Learn how page titles, meta descriptions, and structured data influence search results, and how to audit, update, and optimize on-page elements using tools like Screaming Frog.

Optimize title tags to 55–60 characters and keep them simple, unique, and keyword-focused. Validate pages with tools like Yoast SEO, Screaming Frog, and previews to ensure keywords and alignment.

Identify unique title tags for every page using Screaming Frog and Moz. Highlight duplicates on pagination and category pages, including CMS pages and e-commerce, and enforce unique title tags.

Explore why a unique meta description matters for SEO and how Google may display it. Audit duplicates with Moz and Screaming Frog, export CSVs, and update CTA-oriented descriptions.

Define the favicon across all pages to make the tab stand out; Google displays favicons next to mobile search snippets, and WordPress, Wix, Squarespace, and Shopify include it by default.

Master open graph and social metadata, including Twitter cards, to control how pages share on Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest, and Twitter, and validate visuals with CMS plugins and page validators.

Learn how structured data markup enhances search results with rich snippets, using article, breadcrumbs, and review schemas, tested with the rich result test tool and the schema markup validator.

Enable the max image preview large setting to optimize for Google Discover, aiming for 1200 pixels wide; learn about WordPress plugins like Rank Math or Yoast, AMP, and canonical checks.

Discover how substantial content duplication affects SEO and learn to detect and manage duplicate pages using canonicalization, noindex, and site audits with tools like Screaming Frog, Copyscape, and site liner.

Explore how to structure web pages with hierarchical HTML tags, optimize headings from H1 to H4, and use tools like logical content flow to craft a clear audit report.

Master keyword-targeted content for SEO audits by optimizing the URL, title, meta description, headings, body, and image alt attributes, guided by Moz's framework for scalable on-page optimization.

Showcases how content aligns with Google's quality guidelines, avoids sneaky redirects, user generated spam, and doorway pages, and stresses auditing for hacked WordPress sites and risky URLs.

Identify intrusive interstitials like full-screen pop ups and banners that disrupt mobile users. Explain how these interruptions can lower site ranking and relate to cookie consent and GDPR requirements.

Highlighting avoiding heavy ads above the fold to protect user experience and respect business owner perspectives, noting banner presence and best practices for page design and conversions.

Discover why content loaded in an iframe can be problematic, as Google flattens iframe content and loading issues or delays affect page performance, with a contact form example.

Identify legacy flash content on audited websites and explain that flash is dead, browsers ignore it, and incompatible plugins may affect rankings, per the search console report.

Learn how lazy loaded content appears in the viewport and how to audit WordPress image loading with Google's URL inspection tool and Puppeteer.

Explain paginated loading for infinite scroll, enabling URL changes for sharing, bookmarking, and indexing, and signaling with the History API.

Examine how publication and updated dates affect click-through rates and engagement, and apply date published and date modified in schema markup for WordPress with consistent strategy.

Identify and display the author or publisher on pages to boost user trust and e-a-t, link author profiles and publisher schema, and consider redirects for author pages to about pages.

Test Google safe search by running site: searches on your homepage and key pages with safe search on and off. Address hack-related spammy WordPress links with search console.

Explore how to create crawlable links using proper a href attributes, test with the moss bar to identify internal, external, and nofollow links, and document issues in an audit spreadsheet.

Audit broken links (404s) to preserve link equity and reduce user frustration. Use a broken link checker to locate, mark failures, and update URLs as needed.

Use descriptive anchor text to pass value and signal relevance, audit anchor links and internal linking with tools like Screaming Frog to avoid generic anchor text.

Learn how nofollow, UGC, and sponsored links affect ranking, as Google treats nofollow as a hint, and apply best practices to qualify inbound links and protect your site.

Understand how faceted navigation can generate duplicate content through url variations and learn practical fixes like nofollow, robots.txt blocking, noindex, canonicalization, and parameter tool settings.

Explore how clearly linked pagination helps Google discover paginated content, avoid deprecated markup, and improve user navigation and scrolling on blogs or custom sites.

Learn to balance the number of links on a page to optimize crawl efficiency, preserve link equity, and trim sitewide boilerplate and footer links as Google crawls hundreds of links.

Audit outbound links to identify redirect chains using Moz, review temporary redirects, and fix redirects to reduce crawling errors and preserve link equity.

Discover how descriptive alt attributes enhance image SEO and accessibility, test with tools like Screaming Frog, and manage missing alt text data.

Define image heights and widths to prevent layout shift and protect core web vitals; audit templates with page speed insights to ensure image dimensions are defined.

Use descriptive titles, captions, file names, and image text to signal to Google how images relate to your content; review image details and prefer WebP for SEO-friendly compression.

List images in an image sitemap to improve discoverability and indexing, include caption, title, license, and geolocation, and consider a CDN and WebP optimization with a maximum 1200-pixel width.

Learn that Google ranks pages hosting videos, not the videos themselves, and ensure your pages are public and indexable for native and third‑party video hosting.

Wrap video embeds in an appropriate HTML tag so Google identifies them as videos, using video or iframe tags across CMSs like Divi builder, and mark the audit as pass.

Explore when a video sitemap is beneficial for sites with extensive video content, implement video schema markup, and consider YouTube as a key search channel while consulting Google's resources.

Master video schema markup to influence how your videos appear in search results. Include required properties like description, name, thumbnail URL, and upload date, plus broadcast event markup and timestamps.

Learn how to audit for mobile friendliness and pass the Google mobile-friendly test, recognizing the difference between responsive and adaptive designs and targeting important pages.

Explore three mobile strategies, compare responsive design with a single URL and dynamic content to separate mobile URLs like m.site.com, and discuss auditing implications for Google indexing.

Ensure mobile content matches the desktop site to support mobile-first indexing, using Merkle's test to compare headings, images, links, and structured data, with AMP considerations.

Explore how to manage separate mobile URLs with proper canonicalization, signal a mobile page in the sitemap, and use hreflang for internationalization to avoid mixed indexation issues.

Assess website speed by analyzing GTmetrix reports, web vitals, and hosting quality to improve first contentful paint and time to first byte, while optimizing images and removing unused code.

Audit core web vitals using page speed insights, lighthouse, and search console; learn how LCP, FID, and CLS affect mobile and desktop rankings and practical fixes.

Audit common speed traps by optimizing images (compression, correct formats, web formats), using a CDN, and enabling caching; minify CSS/JS, enable gzip, and improve server response time with GTmetrix guidance.