Technical SEO Audit: How to Check and Fix Your Website
If your website is not showing up on Google, the problem might not be your content. It could be something much more fundamental, such as a technical issue that is quietly preventing search engines from finding, reading, or ranking your pages.
This is where an SEO tech audit comes in.
An SEO tech audit is a structured review of the behind-the-scenes elements of your website. It looks at the factors that affect how search engines crawl and index your site, and it gives you a clear picture of what needs fixing. Whether you have a small business website or an online shop, running a regular SEO tech audit is one of the most effective things you can do to improve your visibility on Google.
This guide will walk you through everything you need to know, in plain and simple terms.
What Is a Technical SEO Audit?
A technical SEO audit is a thorough check of your website’s technical health. It is not about your content or keywords. Instead, it focuses on the structural and technical factors that affect how well search engines can access and understand your site.
Think of it as a health check for your website. Just as you would service a car to keep it running well, an SEO tech audit helps you spot and fix issues before they affect your rankings.
Common technical SEO issues that an audit will uncover include:
- Slow page loading speeds
- Broken links and error pages
- Missing or duplicate page titles and meta descriptions
- A website that does not work properly on mobile devices
- Missing SSL certificates (the padlock in your browser bar)
- Pages that search engines cannot crawl or index
Each of these issues can hold your website back in the search rankings, even if the rest of your site is excellent.
Why Does a Technical SEO Audit Matter for Small Businesses?
Many small business owners focus on writing blog posts or updating their product pages, but overlook the technical foundations of their site. The truth is, even the best content will struggle to rank if there are technical barriers stopping search engines from doing their job.
A thorough SEO tech audit helps you to:
- Identify hidden problems that are costing you traffic
- Ensure your website is fast and user-friendly
- Make your site easier for Google to crawl and index
- Gain a competitive edge over businesses that are not auditing their sites
The good news is that many technical SEO issues are straightforward to fix once you know what to look for. You do not need to be a developer to carry out a basic audit or to understand the results.
Step 1: Check Your Website’s Indexing Status
The very first step in any SEO tech audit is making sure Google can actually find and index your pages. If Google cannot index your site, it will not appear in search results at all.
How to check:
Type the following into Google: site:yourwebsite.com
This will show you a list of all the pages Google has indexed from your site. If you see far fewer pages than you expected, or none at all, there may be an issue with how your site is configured.
Common indexing problems to look for:
- A “noindex” tag has been accidentally added to your pages
- Your robots.txt file is blocking search engines
- Your sitemap has not been submitted to Google
To check and resolve these issues, you can use Google Search Console, which is a free tool from Google. UK2 also has a helpful guide on how to use Google Search Console to make the most of this powerful resource.
Step 2: Test Your Website Speed
Page speed is one of the most important technical SEO factors. Google uses speed as a ranking signal, and slow websites frustrate users. Research consistently shows that visitors will abandon a page that takes more than three seconds to load.
How to check your speed:
Use Google’s free tool, PageSpeed Insights, to test your site. It will give you a score and a list of specific improvements you can make.
Common speed issues and how to fix them:
- Large image files: Compress your images before uploading them. Tools like TinyPNG make this quick and easy.
- Too many plugins: If you are using WordPress, excess plugins can slow your site down. Remove any that are not essential.
- No caching: Enable browser caching so that returning visitors load your pages faster.
- No content delivery network (CDN): A CDN stores copies of your website in multiple locations around the world, so visitors are served content from the server closest to them.
UK2 customers can benefit from Cloudflare integration, which can significantly reduce page loading times and give your SEO a meaningful boost. For more actionable tips on this topic, take a look at the UK2 guide on ten easy ways to increase your website’s page speed.
Step 3: Check for Broken Links and 404 Errors
Broken links are pages on your website that lead nowhere. When a visitor clicks on a broken link, they see a 404 error page. This is a poor user experience, and search engines take note of it too.
How to check for broken links:
Free tools such as Screaming Frog SEO Spider (free for up to 500 URLs) or Ahrefs Webmaster Tools will crawl your site and identify any broken links.
How to fix them:
- If a page has been moved, set up a 301 redirect from the old URL to the new one
- If a page no longer exists and has no suitable replacement, remove any internal links pointing to it
- Check for broken external links in your blog posts and update them with working alternatives
Keeping your site free of broken links not only improves your SEO but also ensures a smooth experience for your visitors.
Step 4: Review Your SSL Certificate
An SSL certificate is what gives your website the “https” prefix and the padlock icon in the browser bar. Without one, browsers may warn visitors that your site is “not secure,” which will drive people away and also harm your SEO rankings, as Google gives preference to secure websites.
How to check:
Simply look at your website URL in a browser. If it begins with “https” and shows a padlock, your SSL certificate is active. If it shows “http” or a warning message, you need to act quickly.
If you host your website with UK2, SSL certificates are available as part of hosting packages, making it straightforward to keep your site secure. You can find more information in the UK2 SSL knowledgebase.
Step 5: Check Your Website Is Mobile Friendly
More than half of all web searches now happen on mobile devices. Google uses “mobile-first indexing,” which means it primarily looks at the mobile version of your site when deciding how to rank it. If your site does not work well on a smartphone, your rankings will suffer.
How to check:
Use Google’s Mobile Friendly Test to see how your site performs on mobile devices. It will flag any issues and suggest improvements.
Common mobile issues to fix:
- Text that is too small to read without zooming
- Buttons that are too close together and difficult to tap
- Content that is wider than the screen and requires horizontal scrolling
- Pop-ups that block the main content on mobile screens
Choosing a responsive website theme or template is the most effective way to ensure your site looks great on all screen sizes. If you are looking to build or rebuild your site with mobile in mind, take a look at UK2’s website builder, which is designed to produce responsive, mobile-ready websites.
Step 6: Audit Your Page Titles and Meta Descriptions
Every page on your website should have a unique title tag and meta description. These are the pieces of text that appear in Google search results, and they have a direct impact on both your rankings and your click-through rate.
What to check:
- Does every page have a title tag? Is it unique and descriptive?
- Are your title tags between 50 and 60 characters long?
- Does every page have a meta description? Is it between 150 and 160 characters?
- Are there any duplicate titles or descriptions across different pages?
How to fix issues:
Use a tool such as Screaming Frog or Google Search Console to identify pages with missing or duplicate titles and descriptions. Then update each one to accurately reflect the content of that page and include relevant keywords naturally.
This is one of the quickest wins available during an SEO tech audit, and the results can be significant.
Step 7: Submit and Review Your XML Sitemap
An XML sitemap is a file that lists all the important pages on your website. Submitting it to Google helps search engines discover and index your content more efficiently.
How to check:
Your sitemap is usually found at yourwebsite.com/sitemap.xml. You can submit it to Google through Google Search Console.
What to look for:
- Make sure your sitemap is up to date and includes all the pages you want Google to index
- Check that it does not include pages you have marked as “noindex”
- Ensure there are no errors flagged in Google Search Console
If you are using WordPress, plugins such as Yoast SEO or Rank Math will generate and update your sitemap automatically.
Step 8: Check for Duplicate Content
Duplicate content occurs when the same or very similar content appears on more than one URL. This can confuse search engines and dilute your rankings, as Google struggles to decide which version of the page to show.
Common causes of duplicate content:
- Your website is accessible at both “www” and “non-www” versions (e.g., www.yoursite.com and yoursite.com)
- Product pages with multiple URLs due to filter or sort options in an online shop
- HTTP and HTTPS versions of the same page both being accessible
How to fix it:
Set up a canonical tag on each page to tell Google which version is the “official” one. Also, ensure your website consistently redirects to one preferred version of your URL. Your web hosting control panel, such as the cPanel available through UK2, makes it straightforward to set up these redirects.
Step 9: Review Your Internal Linking Structure
Internal links are the links that connect one page of your website to another. A clear and logical internal linking structure helps search engines understand which pages are most important and helps visitors navigate your site easily.
What to check:
- Are your most important pages linked to from your homepage and main navigation?
- Do you have any “orphan pages” that have no links pointing to them at all?
- Are your anchor texts (the clickable words in your links) descriptive and relevant?
How to improve your internal links:
When you publish new blog posts or pages, look for opportunities to link to them from existing content. Equally, link from new pages back to relevant existing content. This creates a web of connections that search engines can follow.
For guidance on building a well-structured website from the ground up, the UK2 blog on SEO for beginners is a great starting point.
Step 10: Monitor Your Results Over Time
An SEO tech audit is not a one-time task. Search engines update their algorithms regularly, and your website will evolve too. Setting a reminder to carry out an audit every three to six months will help you stay on top of any new issues and ensure your site continues to perform well.
Use the following tools to keep track of your progress:
- Google Search Console: Monitors your indexing status, search performance, and any manual penalties
- Google Analytics: Tracks your traffic, user behaviour, and conversions
- PageSpeed Insights: Measures your loading speed over time
- Screaming Frog: Identifies technical issues across your entire site
Over time, you will build a clear picture of what is working and where you still have room to improve.
The Role of Web Hosting in Technical SEO
One factor that is often overlooked in an SEO tech audit is the quality of your web hosting. Your hosting provider directly affects your website’s speed, uptime, and security, all of which are important SEO signals.
A website that is frequently offline will be penalised in search rankings, as Google’s crawlers will be unable to access your pages reliably. Slow servers will make your pages load slowly regardless of how well optimised your code is. And poor security can leave your site vulnerable to attacks that damage both your users and your rankings.
UK2 offers a range of web hosting packages designed to deliver reliable speed and uptime for small business websites. From shared hosting for those just starting out to more powerful cloud hosting for growing businesses, there is an option to suit every need.
Summary: Your SEO Tech Audit Checklist
To make it easy to get started, here is a summary of the key steps covered in this guide:
- Check your indexing status in Google Search Console
- Test your page speed with PageSpeed Insights
- Identify and fix broken links and 404 errors
- Ensure your SSL certificate is active and working
- Test your site on mobile devices
- Review and update all page titles and meta descriptions
- Submit and review your XML sitemap
- Check for and resolve duplicate content
- Improve your internal linking structure
- Schedule regular audits to monitor ongoing performance
Carrying out a full SEO tech audit might seem like a lot of work at first, but working through it step by step makes the process very manageable. Even fixing just a handful of the issues identified in an audit can produce a meaningful improvement in your search rankings and the number of visitors coming to your site.
If you would like to learn more about how to improve your website’s SEO performance, take a look at theUK2 SEO guide for small websites for further reading and practical advice.