SEO Site Audit Service: What It Is & Why It’s Beneficial

Let’s face it, your website could be doing better. When 88% of site visitors are unlikely to come back after a bad experience, that’s a lot of business you can’t afford to lose. Site performance isn’t just a nice-to-have—it’s a must-have.

It’s time to level up your online game with an SEO site audit service. A site audit reveals exactly what’s holding your site back and how to fix it. Better rankings, higher conversions, and a seamless user experience start here.

No matter your industry, Big Leap delivers tailored audits to help your business thrive online:

• Enterprise
• Multi-Location & Franchise 
• eCommerce & DTC
• B2B
• SaaS 

Learn what a site audit service entails and sign up to get yours to start seeing significant results.

What Is a Site Audit?

A site audit evaluates your website’s performance. This in-depth analysis identifies strengths, weaknesses, and opportunities to improve organic search visibility and user experience.

What Are the Benefits of Site Audits?

Here’s the lowdown on why you need a site audit. A site audit helps you:

• Identify weaknesses to help build a data-driven foundation for the right SEO optimizations.
• Rank higher in search engines by fixing technical issues and optimizing content.
• Improve user experience with faster load times and better mobile performance.
• Increase organic traffic by targeting relevant keywords and creating high-quality content.
• Boost conversions by optimizing calls to action and website forms.
• Save money on paid marketing by leveraging organic SEO.
• Sheds further light on your competition, helping you identify overlooked gaps.

Gain more insights into the areas site audits cover by exploring this 16-point site health checklist.

Site Audits for Different Types of Businesses

There is no one-size-fits-all approach to digital marketing strategies. That’s why Big Leap offers seven main types of audits to cater to the diverse range of businesses. 

Each focuses on various aspects of one’s digital presence to get your business in front of the right people. 

1. Enterprise
2. eCommerce
3. Small Business/Local
4. Multi-location/Franchise
5. B2B 
6. SaaS 
7. Mobile

Below, we discuss the specifics of each audit and key wins we’ve accomplished for our clients. Depending on your business’s needs, your audit may encompass fewer or more components. 

1. Enterprise SEO Audit

An enterprise site audit examines larger websites with hundreds or thousands of pages. It often covers a variety of tasks, such as large-scale content audits and technical SEO elements.

Specifics

• Scale & complexity: Enterprise SEO audits are focused on large websites and may span multiple subdomains or international markets.
• Customization: The audit may need to consider diverse markets, products, and services. It’s not just about individual pages; it may involve technical considerations like large-scale crawling, indexing, or content management systems (CMS).
• Site focus areas: Site architecture, page speed, content optimization at scale, duplicate content, global SEO, and more.

Example Use Case 

A Fortune 500 travel and transportation enterprise with multiple regional sites needed to streamline thousands of pages. Big Leap’s enterprise SEO audit would ensure their global strategy is cohesive, address localized SEO issues, and optimize technical performance across different geographical markets. 

Upon making these data-based audit recommendations, the travel and transportation enterprise won a: 

• 3,697% increase in conversions
• 86% boost in traffic share
• 100% growth in top 3 keyword ranking growth

2. eCommerce SEO Audit

A Big Leap eCommerce site audit provides an in-depth analysis of your online store’s performance and health, evaluating everything from site architecture to indexability and crawlability. 

Specifics

• Product page optimization: Focus on ensuring product descriptions, images, pricing, and reviews are optimized for both users and search engines.
• Conversion focus: Evaluate user experience factors that drive conversions, such as cart abandonment rates, checkout flow, and product search functionality.
• Schema markup: Using schema markup for product pages (product schema, review schema, etc.) is crucial for rich snippets in search results.

Example Use Case

Spoonful of Comfort leveraged an eCommerce SEO audit to bridge the gap between blog posts and product pages, increase the likelihood of conversions, and check technical elements (URL structure, site speed, internal linking structure, etc.). This would ensure a smooth site migration. 

Thanks to the comprehensive site audit, the Big Leap team helped Spoonful of Comfort earn:

• $462K revenue from blog posts
• 1,901% increase in organic transactions
• 2,362% increase in organic revenue 

3. Small/Local Business SEO Audit

A small business audit evaluates a site’s performance and local relevance, focused on improving a brand’s online presence and attracting more potential customers. 

Specifics 

• Focused, local SEO: The primary focus is typically on local SEO strategies, ensuring the site ranks well in local search results and local directories. So when people look up local services like yours online, your brand and business will appear.
• Simpler site structure: Small business sites have fewer pages (compared to enterprise brands), making the audit less complex but still essential for local and national visibility. The audit may look at URL structure, website navigation, service pages, keyword gaps, and mobile performance.

Example Use Case

American Roofing, a Salt Lake City roofing business, aimed to improve its site performance to help break through the noise in the contracting/home services industry. The audit noted areas of focus, such as mobile and security optimizations and pages that could rank for local keywords.  

These optimization strategies ultimately helped American Roofing earn: 

• 431% increase in new users
• 351% increase in organic sessions
• 2,589 increase in ranking keywords

4. Multi-location/Franchise SEO Audit

A multi-location or franchise business benefits from an audit that evaluates performance and growth potential across all geographic locations. Insights from the audit help optimize campaign workflows and unlock new revenue opportunities across multiple markets.

Specifics

• Multiple locations: The audit centers on ensuring that each location is properly optimized for local SEO while maintaining national consistency across the business.
• Scaling Local SEO: This ensures each location has a unique landing page optimized for capturing more leads, elevating local rankings via listing profiles, and fine-tuning local directory backlinks. 

Example Use Case

Paul Mitchell Schools sought to drive more organic traffic to their corporate website while also leading users to microsites for individual schools to convert as leads/students. Big Leap’s multi-location audit uncovered opportunities to streamline content across locations, build an SOP to source local information, and leverage stronger local keywords across platforms. 

YOY data Paul Mitchell Schools earned include: 

• 40.73% increase in conversions/student leads
• 34.04% increase in organic traffic sessions (national)
• 40% increase in organic traffic sessions (local)
• 33.7% increase in organic traffic sessions (local and national)

5. B2B Site SEO Audit

In today’s competitive B2B landscape, even industry leaders face challenges generating leads. A B2B site SEO audit with our team removes the guesswork, providing clear, data-driven insights to optimize your brand’s digital presence.

Specifics

• Lead generation optimization: Focuses on conversion optimization and lead generation strategies, such as content offers, CTAs, and optimizing for long-tail keywords relevant to business buyers.
• Industry-specific terms: The content and keywords will be tailored toward B2B products and services, which are often more niche than B2C.
• Content strategy: Strong emphasis on thought leadership, industry expertise, and optimizing content for decision-makers in businesses.

Example Use Case

B2B software company CORE wanted to launch a new site with a solid SEO backbone. The audit unveiled opportunities to enhance its SEO and user experience. These included areas such as optimizing content for relevant keywords, mapping out all pages that needed to be redirected to the new site, and site speed and structure.

Upon the audit implementations, this improved targeting for decision-makers with a 5,170% increase in site impressions and a 6,694 increase in keyword positions. 

6. SaaS SEO Audit

A SaaS site audit identifies key opportunities to drive qualified traffic, streamline sales cycles, and boost conversions. With over a decade of industry experience and a data-driven approach, we provide actionable insights to optimize your website for sustainable growth.

Specifics

• Freemium models & signups: SaaS audits focus on the user journey and conversion optimization to help businesses capture more qualified leads. 
• Content marketing: Focuses on content marketing efforts (blogs, case studies, webinars) to support the SEO strategy.
• Technical SEO for performance: Speed and technical performance are crucial for SaaS sites that often feature complex web apps or tools that must function without issues.

Example Use Case

Workfront aimed to restore its organic search performance after rebranding while also increasing conversion rates. By examining user behavior and content performance, the audit revealed that Workfront’s rebranding had subtly shifted its target audience, making its existing content less effective. 

This insight led to a refined strategy focused on optimizing key landing pages through messaging adjustments, A/B testing, and conversion-focused improvements. 

The results were significant, with one landing page achieving a 104% increase in conversions.

7. Mobile SEO Audit

Given that 98% of users visit sites on their phones, mobile site audits are essential to any brand’s digital marketing mix. These audits dive into responsive design, page speed, and more to ensure your mobile site is user-optimized. 

Differences/Specifics

• Mobile-friendliness: This involves evaluating the mobile technical aspects of your site to ensure it is responsive, loads fast on mobile devices, and provides a seamless user experience across screen sizes. 
• Navigation: Mobile-specific issues, such as navigation difficulties and content accessibility, are reviewed.

Example Use Case

An online store with a significant mobile user base needs a mobile SEO audit to ensure the site loads quickly and offers a smooth mobile shopping experience. The audit would focus on improving mobile usability, addressing slow load times, and optimizing mobile-specific features.

Additional Site Audit Examples

A site audit led by professional digital marketers is a firm foundation for an excellent online strategy. Here are additional examples where a professional site audit helped businesses reap lucrative outcomes. 

We encourage you to explore Big Leap’s case studies to learn more about what we can achieve for you with a comprehensive site audit.

Auto Care Bolsters Online Performance

Automotive care company Auto Care approached our professional SEO site auditors with the intention of growing its traffic, rankings, and sales.

Areas of focus in the site audit included:

• Optimizing metadata and heading tags
• Fixing broken pages and links
• Recommending a new site theme to enhance UX or functionality
• Optimizing images
• Speeding up pages

Implementing these recommendations laid a successful foundation for Auto Care’s site health, which manifested in:

• 105% increase in traffic
• 77% increase in goal conversions
• 24% decrease in bounce rate

Dr. Harvey’s Takes Full Advantage of a Professional Technical SEO Site Audit

Great products, but no one knows about them? That’s a common problem when you miss out on site audits. Dr. Harvey’s, a brand offering premium pet food, faced this challenge.

The Big Leap team helped elevate Dr. Harvey’s connections with pet parents with a strategy that included a technical SEO site audit. Because the client’s site was custom-coded, this required technical improvements to optimize the site’s performance.

These changes ultimately contributed to massive wins for Dr. Harvey’s that included:

• 580% ROI
• 481% increase in users
• 29% organic revenue growth

Explore more of our case studies.

Professional Site Audit vs. DIY: The Pros & Cons

While the DIY route is an option, leaning on professional site audit services from folks like Big Leap gives you access to an expert team that can truly help you elevate your online potential.

Let’s break it down.

DIY SEO Site Audit

The Pros:

• Free: There are no upfront costs, as you’re your own boss.
• Control: You’re in the driver’s seat.

The Cons:

• Time-consuming: If you haven’t done a site audit before, the technical knowledge and effort required can take some time to catch up to.
• Limited insights: Without an expert by your side, you might miss out on critical issues.
• Cost: You will need to invest in site audit tools, which can be costly if there is a lot of trial and error in the DIY journey.

Professional SEO Site Audit:

The Pros:

• Expert analysis: You get in-depth insights from SEO professionals, ensuring you’ve got all your bases covered.
• Comprehensive report: You’ll receive detailed findings and actionable recommendations.
• Less work: Professionals handle the technical aspects for you.
• Objective assessment: You get an unbiased evaluation of your website’s performance.

The Cons:

• Cost: A professional site audit does require some monetary investment.
• Partnership may require time: It might take time to find the right site audit team that not only can work well with your team but also has the expertise to address your business’s unique needs.

Big Leap’s Site Audit vs. Automated Site Audits

While automated site audits (which tech companies are known to provide) offer a quick overview of technical issues plaguing your site, they often lack the depth and nuance of a comprehensive, human-led audit.

Here’s why a human-led audit conducted by experts like Big Leap offers a significant advantage:

• • Customized analysis: Human auditors can tailor the audit to your specific website’s needs and goals, identifying issues automated tools may miss.
  • In-depth insights: An automated audit simply spits out a report after you type in your domain. Our experts delve deeper into your website’s performance, analyzing factors like content quality, user experience, and SEO best practices.

• Navigate erroneous errors: Tools often flag issues  that may actually be a waste of valuable time and resources to address. But our experts recognize when this happens and don’t bog down the process by dealing with things that simply aren’t worth it. 
• Actionable and strategic recommendations: We provide clear, actionable recommendations tailored to your business objectives, helping you prioritize improvements and measure results. Our team can offer strategic advice on optimizing your website for long-term success.

By combining the power of human expertise with advanced tools, we can deliver comprehensive site audits that drive real results.

SEO Site Audit Report Example

So what does a site audit report look like, exactly? The right marketing agency will have a solidified site audit process.

For instance, Big Leap executes a 163-point site audit checklist (this is regularly updated) that covers three main phases:

• SEO Core Fundamentals: Looks at SEO factors, such as content, canonicalization, and site architecture.
• Technical Details: Evaluate technical aspects of the site, such as site speed, semantic markup, and mobile elements.
• Additional Improvements: Analyzes other site components that may help with UX or site performance, such as images and videos, along with multilingual sites.

SEO Site Audit Cost

The cost of an SEO site audit can vary significantly based on several factors, including:

• Website size and complexity: Larger, more complex websites typically require more in-depth analysis and, therefore, cost more to audit.
• Scope of the audit: A basic audit may cover only essential technical and on-page factors, while a comprehensive audit may include a deeper dive into technical SEO, content analysis, and competitor analysis.
• Experience and reputation of agency or consultant: More experienced and reputable professionals often charge higher rates.

Get a preview of what Big Leap’s SEO packages cost. 

How Often Should I Get an SEO Audit?

Companies should conduct an SEO audit to cover the basics once a quarter. A more extensive one, like the above example, should be done once a year. 

The frequency of your audits should depend on how large your website is—if you have a smaller website with fewer pages, twice a year should be plenty. Meanwhile, if you’re constantly producing new content and web pages throughout the year, a more frequent auditing schedule is required.

The Best SEO Site Audit Tools

Big Leap uses industry-leading tools and technology while avoiding the limitations of proprietary systems. This means you always retain full ownership of your data and information.

Here’s a comprehensive list of the types of audit tools we leverage:

1. Search Engine Reports Cloaking Checker: Checks whether a website is using cloaking techniques to show different content to search engines than to users.
2. Google NLP tool: Analyzes text for sentiment, entities, and structure using Google’s Natural Language Processing.
3. AI Content Detector: Detects AI-generated content to ensure originality and authenticity.
4. Google Analytics: Tracks website traffic, user behavior, and site performance.
5. Google Search Console: Provides insights into website indexing, search performance, and technical issues.
6. Web Developer Chrome Extension: A browser extension with various debugging tools for developers.
7. Link Redirect Trace: Analyzes redirect paths and HTTP headers in real time.
8. Redirect Path: Identifies HTTP response codes, redirects, and technical SEO issues.
9. robots.txt Tester Tool: Tests and validates robots.txt files to check which URLs are blocked from search engines.
10. Disavow links tool: Allows site owners to submit unwanted backlinks to Google to prevent negative SEO impact (used if a website is officially penalized and receives an unnatural links notice in GSC).
11. SEO Site Checkup: Analyzes website SEO issues and provides recommendations.
12. GTmetrix: Measures website speed and performance with detailed optimization tips.
13. Lighthouse: Google tool that audits website performance, accessibility, SEO, and best practices.
14. Reverse Whois Lookup: Identifies domain owners by searching for WHOIS data.
15. Rich Results Test: Checks if a webpage supports rich snippets for enhanced search results.
16. Twitter Card Validator: Previews how a webpage appears in Twitter cards.
17. Facebook Open Graph Debugger: Tests and previews how a webpage appears when shared on Facebook.
18. Semrush: Comprehensive SEO suite for keyword research, backlink analysis, and competitive insights.
19. Ahrefs: A powerful SEO tool for backlink analysis, keyword research, and site audits.
20. Screaming Frog: A website crawler that detects technical SEO issues.
21. Originality.ai: Detects AI-generated content and plagiarism in web content.
22. CopyScape: Plagiarism checker that finds duplicate content online.
23. Moz: Offers SEO tools for link building, keyword research, and site audits.
24. Qualys SSL Labs: Tests website SSL security and certificate strength.
25. iPullRank Map Broker: A tool for analyzing website architecture and internal linking.

Start with a Free Mini Site Audit with Big Leap

Big Leap offers a mini free site audit for new prospective clients looking to enhance their online visibility. This mini audit covers the general SEO health of your site, along with a competitive analysis.

Contact the team to learn more about this opportunity or to chat with us about getting an in-depth, 163-point site audit.