Running SEO audits

Comprehensive technical and content SEO analysis with actionable recommendations

Last updated: Oct 5, 2025

SEO audits analyze your website's technical health and content optimization, identifying issues that affect your search engine rankings. ConvertMate's AI-powered audits check hundreds of factors and provide prioritized recommendations.

What SEO audits check

A comprehensive audit examines:

Technical SEO:
  • Page load speed and Core Web Vitals
  • Mobile responsiveness
  • SSL certificates and security
  • XML sitemaps and robots.txt
  • Structured data markup
  • Canonical tags and redirects
  • Broken links and 404 errors
On-page SEO:
  • Title tags and meta descriptions
  • Heading structure (H1, H2, etc.)
  • Image alt text and optimization
  • Internal linking structure
  • Content quality and keyword usage
  • URL structure
Content analysis:
  • Thin or duplicate content
  • Missing or outdated pages
  • Content gaps compared to competitors
  • Keyword cannibalization
  • Readability and user experience
Indexability:
  • Pages blocked from search engines
  • Indexation issues
  • Crawl errors
  • XML sitemap problems

Each issue includes severity rating (critical, high, medium, low) and estimated impact on rankings.

Running your first audit

To start an SEO audit:

  1. Go to Insights in the main navigation
  2. Select SEO audits
  3. Click Run new audit
  4. Enter your website URL (or use the default from your connected platform)
  5. Click Start audit
Run an SEO audit How long it takes: 5-15 minutes depending on site size. You'll get a notification when it completes. Credit cost: 200-500 credits based on the number of pages analyzed. The exact cost appears before you start.

You can run one audit at a time. If you start a new audit while one is running, you'll be asked to cancel the current one first.

Understanding audit results

The audit report includes:

Overall score - Rating from 0-100 indicating your site's SEO health. Higher is better. Category scores - Separate ratings for technical SEO, on-page optimization, content quality, and mobile experience. Issue breakdown - List of all problems found, grouped by severity. Priority recommendations - Top 5-10 actions that will have the biggest impact. Detailed findings - Complete analysis with specific pages affected and how to fix each issue. Historical comparison - If you've run previous audits, see how your score has changed.

Scores above 80 indicate good SEO health. Scores below 60 suggest significant optimization opportunities.

Viewing audit details

Click any audit to see the full report:

Summary tab:
  • Overall and category scores
  • Quick statistics (pages crawled, issues found, etc.)
  • Score trend if you have previous audits
  • Top priority actions
Issues tab:
  • All problems organized by category
  • Filter by severity level
  • Search for specific issue types
  • Click any issue for detailed explanation and fix instructions
Pages tab:
  • List of all pages analyzed
  • Individual page scores
  • Issues affecting each page
  • Quick actions to optimize specific pages
Recommendations tab:
  • Prioritized action list
  • Estimated impact of each fix
  • Step-by-step implementation guides
  • Option to create tasks or reminders
History tab:
  • Past audits for comparison
  • Score progression over time
  • Which issues were fixed
  • New issues that appeared

Fixing issues

For each issue, you'll see:

What's wrong - Plain language explanation of the problem. Why it matters - How this affects your rankings and user experience. How to fix - Specific steps to resolve the issue. Affected pages - Which pages have this problem. Priority level - Whether to fix this immediately or later.

Some issues can be fixed automatically by ConvertMate:

  1. Review the suggested fix
  2. Click Apply fix next to the issue
  3. Confirm you want to make the change
  4. ConvertMate updates your site (for connected platforms)

Other issues require manual fixes on your platform. The audit provides detailed instructions for each.

Prioritizing fixes

Focus on issues in this order:

Critical (fix immediately):
  • Site not indexable
  • Broken core functionality
  • Major security issues
  • Critical page load problems
High (fix within a week):
  • Missing meta descriptions on important pages
  • Broken links on popular pages
  • Mobile usability issues
  • Slow page speed
Medium (fix within a month):
  • Suboptimal title tags
  • Missing alt text on images
  • Minor technical issues
  • Content quality improvements
Low (fix when convenient):
  • Nice-to-have optimizations
  • Minor formatting issues
  • Optional enhancements

The audit's priority recommendations already factor this in, so you can work through the list from top to bottom.

Running regular audits

To track improvements:

After making fixes - Run a new audit to confirm issues are resolved and see how your score changed. Monthly audits - Check for new issues and monitor overall SEO health. After major site changes - Audit immediately after redesigns, migrations, or significant content updates. Competitive monitoring - Regular audits help you stay ahead of competitors' SEO efforts.

Compare audit results over time to see:

  • Score trends (improving or declining)
  • Which fixes had the biggest impact
  • New issues that appeared
  • Overall progress toward SEO goals

Exporting audit reports

To share or save audit results:

  1. Open the audit you want to export
  2. Click Export at the top right
  3. Choose format:

- PDF - Formatted report with charts and summaries (good for stakeholders) - Excel - Detailed data table (good for tracking and analysis)

  1. The download starts immediately

PDF reports include:

  • Executive summary
  • Visual score breakdowns
  • Top recommendations
  • Detailed issue list with fixes

Excel exports include:

  • All issues with severity and priority
  • Affected URLs
  • Fix instructions
  • Historical data if available

Site-wide vs. targeted audits

Site-wide audit - Analyzes your entire website. Best for comprehensive health checks. Targeted audit - Focus on specific sections, like product pages or blog articles. Faster and cheaper.

To run a targeted audit:

  1. Start a new audit
  2. Choose Advanced options
  3. Specify URL patterns to include (e.g., /products/ or /blog/)
  4. Set maximum pages to analyze
  5. Start the audit

Targeted audits use fewer credits and complete faster. Useful when you've updated a specific section and want to verify those changes.

Common issues and fixes

Slow page speed

Cause: Large images, too many scripts, or server performance issues. Fix: Compress images, minimize CSS/JS, enable caching, use a CDN. ConvertMate helps: Auto-optimize images, suggest script optimizations.

Missing meta descriptions

Cause: Pages don't have unique descriptions for search results. Fix: Write compelling, unique descriptions for each important page. ConvertMate helps: Generate meta descriptions automatically using AI.

Mobile usability problems

Cause: Text too small, clickable elements too close, viewport not configured. Fix: Use responsive design, larger fonts, appropriate spacing. ConvertMate helps: Identify specific mobile issues, suggest fixes.

Duplicate content

Cause: Same content appears on multiple URLs. Fix: Set canonical tags, use 301 redirects, or rewrite duplicate content. ConvertMate helps: Detect duplicates, suggest canonical tag placement.

Broken links

Cause: Links to pages that no longer exist or moved. Fix: Update links to correct URLs or remove broken ones. ConvertMate helps: Find all broken links, suggest replacement pages.

Audit limitations

SEO audits have some constraints:

Crawl limits - Audits analyze up to 10,000 pages. Larger sites need multiple targeted audits. External factors - Audits don't measure backlinks, domain authority, or competitor rankings. Platform access - Some fixes require platform permissions ConvertMate might not have. Real-time data - Audits use data from your most recent sync. Very recent changes might not appear. Geographic variations - Audits use US-based servers. Results might differ for region-specific content.

Troubleshooting

Audit fails to complete

  • Verify your website is accessible and not blocking crawlers
  • Check for firewall rules blocking ConvertMate's IP addresses
  • Try a targeted audit with fewer pages
  • Reduce the crawl depth in advanced options

Issues show as fixed but reappear

  • Changes might not have propagated to all pages yet
  • Your platform might have cached old versions
  • Check that fixes were applied correctly
  • Some issues resolve only after search engines recrawl

Scores seem inaccurate

  • Scores reflect technical factors, not rankings directly
  • Different SEO tools use different scoring methods
  • Your score improves as you fix issues, even if rankings lag
  • Focus on fixing issues rather than chasing a perfect score

What's next

After running audits:

Questions about SEO audits? Use the chat widget in the bottom-right corner or email support@convertmate.io.

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