Technical SEO and SEO Audits - Engage 2017 Portland - Bill Hartzer

Improving SEO and User Experience – The Technical Side



About Me• Senior SEO Consultant, BillHartzer.com• Founder, DFWSEM Association (2004)• US Brand Ambassador, Majestic.com• Practicing Organic/Natural SEO since 1996

• Formerly Senior VP, Advice Interactive (Advice Local)• Senior SEO Strategist, Globe Runner• Director of SEO, Standing Dog


Overview• Before You Begin• Gather Data• Analyze• Present Results

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Before You Begin – Info to Gather• Access to site (if possible), log file data• Google Analytics, Search Console access• Bing Webmaster Tools access• Prior history: What SEO was done in past?• Prior history: Domain Names used• List of Domain Names owned, redirected• List of Competitors• Ask: anything else we need to know?

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Content – Optimize Content on Site

• Google Search Console - Search Analytics• SEMrush.com Keyword Research• Current Rankings

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GSC Search Analytics Pages Trick

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Featured Snippets Keyword Research• http://seorave.com/find-featured-snippet-opportunities/

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Current rankings, Focus on Pages Ranking 5th to 20th

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Gathering Phase• Gather the Data• Save the Data (MS Excel, MS Word)• Start making notes (Notepad)

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Google Searches• site:domain.com• site:domain.com –site:www.domain.com

• Click last page of SERPs to get page count

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Screaming Frog

Adjust memory to crawl large site over 100k pages

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Integrity (aka Scrutiny)What it does:• Crawls site, reports redirects, 404 errors• Mac only, finds more errors

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Siteliner.com

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Bing Webmaster Tools

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Bing Webmaster Tools• Spot issues to fix

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Google Search Console

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SEMRush Site Audit

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Website Log Files• Weblog Storming, AwStats

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Website Log Files, Crawl & Analytics• OnCrawl combines all three

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Audit Site Structure• Internal Link Structure• Manual Review of Site• URL Hierarchy• Grouping of Topics• GA: In-Page Analytics

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Gather Off-Site Data• It’s not all about on-site and on-page.

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Google Search Console Links

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Ahrefs Links

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Majestic.com Links

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Majestic.com Topic Review

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Majestic Trust Flow, Citation Flow• Trust Flow = Number of clicks from a seed set of

trusted sites to a given URL, or Domain• Citation Flow = Number of citations to a given URL, or

Domain

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Majestic Anchor Text Review

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URIValet.com• Check Server Headers

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WebPageTest.org• Page Performance

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Miscellaneous Data to Review• All sorts of extras

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Site Speed, DNS Health• Tools.Pingdom.com

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Site Speed Review – Google Analytics


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Robots.txt Issues

• Default CMS file?• Disallowing wrong?• Using “allow”?• Not specifying sitemap.xml URL• Directives conflict with other signals

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Sitemap Issues• Google Search Console sitemaps• New pages not updated on sitemap• Issues with multiple sitemaps• No sitemap file?

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Subdomain Issues• Duplicate content?• Using subdomain rather than directory• Wildcard subdomains turned on?• www versus non-www issues

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Canonical Issues• Review canonical tags• Not using canonical correctly• Conflicting signals with canonical, others• Canonical tags to help with dupe content

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Use of Structured Data• Taking advantage of Schema.org• Not just for local addresses• Reviews and Events• Person, Place, Organization• Products and Offers

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Local Listings – Audit the listings• Google My Business• Bing Places for Business• Yahoo! Local

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Local Citations – Separate Audit• Are citations correct?• Same address, suite #, phone number?

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Analysis Phase• Analyze the Data• Make Assumptions & Recommendations

• You’re Fat!• You need to exercise!

• OK, well maybe not like that…

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Analysis Phase• Analyze gathered data• Look for Obvious Issues• Look for Odd Data Points• More notes!

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Analyze Google Analytics

• Changes over time, year over year data• Conversion Data• Bounce Rates• Pages Per Session• Drops in Traffic:

Panda or Penguinin past few years?

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Panda or Penguin Issues From Past?

• Verify with SEMRush, Google Analytics

• Moz Google Algorithm Change Historymoz.com/google-algorithm-change

• Panguin Toolbarracuda-digital.co.uk/panguin-tool/

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Analyze Keyword Data, Rankings• Look for keyword opportunities

Anything ranking on 2nd page?• Review SEMRush Keyword Data• Review GSC Search Analytics

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Analyze On-Site Data• Title Tags• Meta Descriptions• Headings H1, H2, etc.• Internal Anchor Text• External Links (outgoing links)• Google Pages Indexed vs. Crawled

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Analyze On-Site Data• Conflicting signals? Overall Topic focus• Conflicting signals?

Robots.txt vs. Canonical vs. Meta Robots vs. Nofollow• Internal Duplicate Content• Not Enough Unique Content• Internal links within content present?• Review Navigation• Review Footer, footer links, copyright

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Analyze Off-Site Data• Link Velocity Matters (getting new links)• Review anchor text (over optimized?)• Diversity of anchor text• Look for Toxic, Low Quality Links• Run Link Risk, Link Detox report

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Presentation Phase

• Present the Data• Show the Results• Make it look great!

• Action Plan• Implementation Plan

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Present The Results• Use internal or formal doc needed?• Who will implement?• Implement changes in-house?

Outsource?• MS Word doc, spreadsheets with data• PowerPoint needed for presentation?

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Present The Results - Document• Cover Page• Table of Contents• Overview (summary, positives, negatives)• Website Crawlability (404s, 301s, One-Page issues)• Content Optimization (site arch., keyword issues)• Linking (Internal links, externals links, link profile)• Overall Recommendations

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Finally – Additional Lists• List of Priority Issues• Present Action Plan for Implementing

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SEO Audit Toolset• Google Page Speed Test• Mobile Friendly Test• Google Search Console - time downloading a page (if

slower than 2 seconds to get the code, they'll abandon the crawl)

• Webpagetest.org (diversity of testing environments is helpful... browser types, locations, connection speeds)

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SEO Audit Toolset• WebPageTest• Google Search Console• Google Analytics• GPSi page speed insights• G Structured Data Test• GSC Disavow• GSC Fetch & Render• Marie Haynes' Disavow Blacklist

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SEO Audit Toolset• Google Mobile Test• Google AMP Test• Bing Mobile Test• W3c mobileOK Checker• Deep Crawl• Google AW Keyword Planner• Moz Keyword Explorer• What is my IP

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SEO Audit Toolset• Builtwith• Server Software Detection• SEO Server Header Checker Tool• SSL Server Test powered by Qualsys SSL Labs• Redirect Checker• Serpstat• semrush• GA Code Checker

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SEO Audit Toolset• W3c CSS Validator• W3c Markup Validator• hreflang testing tool• tracker map• OSE, Majestic, A hrefs, Link Research Tools• Bing Webmaster Tools• Kerboo• Panguin tool• OnCrawl

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Contact

Bill HartzerSenior SEO ConsultantEmail: [email protected]: (214) 236-4378

Web: https://www.billhartzer.comTwitter: @bhartzerFacebook: http://www.facebook.com/bhartzer

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Technical SEO and SEO Audits - Engage 2017 Portland - Bill Hartzer

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