Technical SEO audit checklist: what to check before hiring help

A technical SEO audit should check whether important pages can be discovered, accessed and processed for search before investigating their rankings. Indexing and ranking are different: inclusion in Google's index does not establish a position for a particular query. In Google Search Console, inspect selected URLs and distinguish the indexed-page report from a live URL test. A successful live test does not guarantee indexing. This checklist is not an audit of your website. Start with essential service pages, the contact page and examples of each page type. If Search Console access is unavailable, record that limitation rather than inferring index status from public checks.

Open each selected URL and record its final destination, response status and whether the main content is available. Ask the maintainer to inspect redirects, broken internal links, robots.txt rules and noindex instructions in metadata or response headers. robots.txt controls crawling; blocking crawling is not a reliable way to remove a URL from the index. Google must crawl a page to read its noindex instruction. Do not remove every restriction to increase indexed-page counts. Account, internal-search or test pages may be intentionally excluded. Confirm each restriction's purpose with the site owner and separate observed failures from untested suspicions.

Check whether the canonical points to the intended primary URL for that content, then compare it with internal links and sitemap entries. A canonical states a preference; Google can select a different URL. A sitemap helps discovery, not proof of indexing. Look for redirected, missing or intentionally excluded pages listed as preferred URLs. For multilingual sites, review canonicals and language alternatives together rather than pointing every translation to another language's homepage. Where available, compare Google's selected canonical with the site's declared canonical in URL Inspection.

Read the page on a phone and check that service details, important images, navigation and contact controls remain usable. Google uses mobile content for indexing and ranking, so do not remove essential explanations just to shorten a layout. Record slow or difficult interactions and request technical investigation with clear test conditions; one score is not a complete diagnosis. Review the page title, main heading and body together. Do they answer the same visitor need? Compare the title's promise with the scope, limitations and evidence in the text. Technical repairs cannot replace an unwritten answer or clarify an unexplained offer.

Commission an audit with actionable findings: affected URLs, evidence, expected behavior, priority, an owner and a retest method. Ask whether implementation and retesting are included or separate. Test the inquiry route with agreed test details; an email draft is not a sent message. Prioritize verified obstacles on important pages and contact journeys over cosmetic score changes. Save the baseline and change log. Retest under comparable conditions and review search data when available, without attributing every traffic change to one repair. An audit does not guarantee rankings or inquiries. Migrations and issues across multiple templates may require a broader investigation.