Technical SEO audit checklist for Wordpress by danielkcheung.com.au [v1.5]

	B	C	D	E	F	G
1	>> Preliminary questions
2	#	Thing to check	Method	Instructions	Response	Triage
3	1	Why is this audit being performed?		link		N/A
4	2	Was this website recently migrated from another platform, server, or domain?	ask the client	N/A		N/A
5	3	What was the reason for the migration?	ask the client	N/A		N/A
6	4	If a migration was performed, was there a drop in rankings, conversions or organic traffic?	ask the client	N/A		N/A
7	5	When did the migration take place?	ask the client	N/A		N/A
8	6	Are there crawls of the website pre-migration?	ask the client	N/A		N/A
9	7	Do you or the client have admin access to Wordpress dashboard?	ask the client	N/A		N/A
10	8	Do you or the client have admin access to DNS settings?	ask the client	N/A		N/A
11	9	Is Google Tag Manager being used?	manual check in-browser	N/A		N/A
12	10	Do you or the client have access privileges to Google Tag Manager?	ask the client	N/A		N/A
13	11	Do you or the client have access privileges to Google Search Console?	ask the client	N/A		N/A
14	12	Do you or the client have access privileges to Google Analytics?	ask the client	N/A		N/A
15	13	Is Google Search Console connected?	Google Search Console	N/A		N/A
16	14	Does Google Search Console have data?	Google Search Console	N/A		N/A
17	15	Is Google Analytics connected?	Google Analytics	N/A		N/A
18	16	Does Universal Google Analytics have data?	Google Analytics	N/A		N/A
19	17	Is there more than one UA profile?	manual check in-browser	N/A		N/A
20	18	Has Google Analytics 4 been set up?	Google Analytics	N/A		N/A
21	19	Does Google Analytics 4 have data?	Google Analytics	N/A		N/A
22	18	Are AMP pages being tracked in a separate Google Analytics property?	Google Analytics	N/A		N/A
23	>> Crawling-related (mostly) \| robots.txt \| GSC \| sitemaps \| internal search \| JS \|
24	#	Thing to check	Method	Instructions	Response	Triage
25	1	Is there a robots.txt file?	manual check in-browser	link		N/A
26	2	Are crawlers or search engine crawlers being blocked in the robots.txt file?	Google Search Console	link		N/A
27	3	Are paginated URLs being blocked in robots.txt?	manual check in-browser	link		N/A
28	4	Are JavaScript files being blocked in robots.txt?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb	link		N/A
29	5	Does the robots.txt file disallow parametised URLs?	manual check in-browser	link		N/A
30	6	Are there any host status problems reported in Search Console crawl stats?	Google Search Console	link		N/A
31	7	Are there crawl requests being made as reported in Search Console crawl stats?	Google Search Console	link		N/A
32	8	Are there crawl requests being made for "refresh" purposes in Search Console crawl stats?	Google Search Console	link		N/A
33	9	Are there crawl requests being made for "discovery" purposes in Search Console crawl stats?	Google Search Console	link		N/A
34	10	According to Search Console crawl stats, have HTML files been crawled in the last 72-hours?	Google Search Console	link		N/A
35	11	Does the website have a sitemap?	manual check in-browser	link		N/A
36	12	Is the sitemap XML or HTML?	manual check in-browser	link		N/A
37	13	Is the sitemap index URL(s) referenced in the robots.txt file?	manual check in-browser	link		N/A
38	14	How many URLs are in the sitemap?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb	link		N/A
39	15	Are there more than 1000 URLs in a sitemap?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb	link		N/A
40	16	Are non-indexable URLS in the sitemap?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb	link		N/A
41	17	Are there URLs that are blocked in robots.txt that are found in the sitemap?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb	link		N/A
42	18	Have sitemaps been submitted to Google Search Console?	Google Search Console	link		N/A
43	19	Has Google Search Console processed the submitted sitemap(s)?	Google Search Console	link		N/A
44	20	Can internal search URLs be crawled?	SEO Pro Extension	link		N/A
45	21	Are any redirects done via JavaScript?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb	link		N/A
46	22	Are redirects being done client-side via meta refresh?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb	link		N/A
47	23	Does the website have pagination?	manual check in-browser	link		N/A
48	24	Have paginated URLs been included in the sitemap(s)?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb	link		N/A
49	25	Are there any internal links not wrapped by an <a> tag?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb	link		N/A
50	>> Rendering
51	#	Thing to check	Method	Instructions	Response	Triage
52	1	Is there a trend of increasing "Submitted URL seems to be a soft 404" in Search Console index coverage errors?	Google Search Console			N/A
53	2	What theme is being used?	manual check in-browser			N/A
54	3	Are there known issues with this theme?	not applicable			N/A
55	4	Does the website use a pagebuilder?	manual check in-browser			N/A
56	5	Does the pagebuilder have known issues?	not applicable			N/A
57	6	Is lazy loading applied to above-the-fold images?	Lighthouse			N/A
58	7	Does the primary navigation menu load when JavaScript is disabled?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb			N/A
59	8	Is all the body content visible when JavaScript is disabled?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb			N/A
60	>> Indexing-related (mostly)
61	#	Thing to check	Method	Instructions	Response	Triage
62	1	Does the website rank in the top 2 positions when searching for the brand name in Google?	manual check in-browser	link		N/A
63	2	Does http redirect to https?	SEO Pro Extension	link		N/A
64	3	Is the site www or non-www?	manual check in-browser	link		N/A
65	4	If www by default, does non-www redirect to www?	SEO Pro Extension			N/A
66	5	If non-www by default, does www redirect to non-www?	SEO Pro Extension			N/A
67	6	Do URLs end with a trailing slash or non-trailing slash?	manual check in-browser	link		N/A
68	7	If URLs have a trailing slash by default, do URLs without trailing slash redirect to trailing slash?	SEO Pro Extension			N/A
69	8	If URLs do not have a trailing slash by default, do URLs with a trailing slash redirect to non-trailing slash?	SEO Pro Extension			N/A
70	9	Are there orphaned URLs in the sitemap?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb	link		N/A
71	10	Are there 301 URLs in the sitemap?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb	link		N/A
72	11	Are there 404 URLs in the sitemap?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb	link		N/A
73	12	How are sitemaps generated on the website?	manual check in-browser	link		N/A
74	13	Do any of the sitemaps in Google Search Console show errors?	Google Search Console	link		N/A
75	14	Are there errors reported in Search Console index coverage?	Google Search Console	link		N/A
76	15	Are these errors expected?	not applicable			N/A
77	16	Are there URLs marked as "Submitted URL blocked by robots.txt in Search Console index coverage?	Google Search Console			N/A
78	17	Are there valid URLs reported in Search Console index coverage?	Google Search Console			N/A
79	18	Are there an increasing number of URLs reported as "Indexed not submitted in sitemap" in Search Console index coverage?	Google Search Console			N/A
80	19	Are there excluded URLs reported in Search Console index coverage?	Google Search Console			N/A
81	20	Is there a trend of increasing URLs reported as "Crawled - currently not indexed" in Search Console index coverage?	Google Search Console			N/A
82	21	Is there a trend of increasing URLs reported as "Discovered - currently not indexed" in Search Console index coverage?	Google Search Console			N/A
83	22	Is there a trend of increasing URLs reported as "Excluded by noindex tag" in Search Console index coverage?	Google Search Console			N/A
84	23	Is there a trend of increasing URLs reported as "Duplicate without user-selected canonical" in Search Console index coverage?	Google Search Console			N/A
85	24	Is there a trend of increasing URLs reported as "Duplicate, Google chose different canonical than user" in Search Console index coverage?	Google Search Console			N/A
86	25	In Search Console Search Performance, are clicks trending up, down or staying steady in the last 16-months?	Google Search Console			N/A
87	26	In Search Console Search Performance, are impressions trending up, down or staying steady in the last 16-months?	Google Search Console			N/A
88	27	Are there non-indexable URLs?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb			N/A
89	28	Should these URLs be set as noindex?	not applicable			N/A
90	29	Are there 301/302 redirections in place?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb			N/A
91	30	Are these redirections correct?	not applicable			N/A
92	31	Are there internal links pointing to 404 or 301 URLs?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb			N/A
93	32	Are there redirect chains?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb			N/A
94	33	Do URLs have canonicals set?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb			N/A
95	34	Are the canonical tags correct?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb			N/A
96	35	Are internal search URLs indexable?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb			N/A
97	36	Does the website have internal links pointing towards URLs generated by internal search?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb			N/A
98	37	How many indexable URLs does the website have?	Screaming Frog / Sitebulb	link		N/A
99	38	How may URLs are indexed on Google?	Screaming Frog with GSC API	link		N/A
100	39	How many URLs are not indexed on Google?	Screaming Frog with GSC API	link		N/A