What an SEO Audit Should Tell You
A sample finding, a sensible order for the fixes, and the questions to ask before paying for an SEO audit.
On this page
An SEO audit should leave you knowing which problems to fix first and what those fixes involve. For each important finding, you need the affected page, the evidence, an explanation of the problem, and a way to check the repair.
A score can help summarize a test. It leaves a lot unanswered, though. A broken quote form and a missing image description can both appear as warnings, but they affect your business in very different ways.
Start with the pages that matter to the business
Before anyone runs a scan, agree on what the website is supposed to do. For a local garden-maintenance business, that might mean explaining the services, showing where the team works, and helping someone request a visit. Those tasks give the review a focus.
The reviewer should then look at the pages involved: can search engines reach them, do they explain the offer, and can a visitor finish the task on a phone? A list of every warning on every page is harder to use than a report that shows where a customer could get stuck.
Access matters here. Google Search Console can report whether Google has indexed a page and which version it considers the main one. Its live URL test answers a different question: whether the page appears accessible now. Neither result promises a ranking. If the reviewer cannot see your account, the report should make that limit clear.
What a useful finding looks like
Here is an illustrative example from a fictional garden-maintenance website. It shows the level of detail to ask for; it is not a result from a MOAI client.
Finding: the service page sends visitors to a missing contact page
- Where: the “Request a garden visit” button on /garden-maintenance links to /get-a-quote.
- Evidence: opening that destination returns a 404 error. The working contact page is /contact. The report includes the date checked and a screenshot of the error.
- Why it matters: someone reading about the service reaches a dead end when they try to ask about a visit. A visit or button click alone does not show that an inquiry was received.
- Priority: repair before spending time polishing search titles or writing more articles.
- Proposed change: point the button to /contact and check other links using the old destination. Confirm whether any old public URL also needs a redirect.
- Check afterward: follow the button on a phone and desktop. If there is a form, test it and confirm that the message reaches the intended recipient.
That finding can be handed to a developer, quoted, fixed, and checked. “Improve your website’s conversion potential” gives the owner much less to work with.
The order of the fixes should make sense
A report should explain its priorities in ordinary language. Start with confirmed problems that stop an important page from working or prevent a customer from contacting you. Then review whether the pages can be found and whether they answer the questions people bring to them.
After that, the evidence may point to clearer service descriptions, better links between pages, or images that take too long to load. Cosmetic suggestions can wait when an essential task is broken. The exact order depends on what the review finds, rather than a fixed list that every business receives.
Recommendations also need to distinguish a confirmed fault from an idea worth trying. “This link returns an error” is a finding. “A clearer heading may help more people understand the offer” is a proposed improvement. Both can be useful, provided the report tells you which is which.
Choose an audit that fits the questions you have
For a small site with unclear problems, a focused review may be enough to decide what to tackle. A business comparing several service pages or trying to understand its search performance may need a broader scope. MOAI offers these two options:
| Details | Basic · $197 | Complete · $595 |
|---|---|---|
| Website review | Website health, mobile performance, search visibility and local business checks. | Everything in Basic, with a review of up to 100 pages. |
| Search and competitors | A focused starting review of website and search issues. | Available Search Console trends and a competitor comparison. |
| What you receive | A plain-English report with a prioritized top-10 fix list. | A written report and a 90-day improvement roadmap. |
| Delivery | Within two weeks once the agreed access and information are ready. | Within four weeks once the agreed access and information are ready. |
| Making the changes | Quoted separately. You can use your own developer. | Quoted separately. You can use your own developer. |
The SEO audit service page has the current scope. Ask about any specific concern before choosing an option, especially if the site is large or needs a specialist review.
Before you approve the work
Ask which pages will be reviewed, which accounts are needed, and what you will receive. Confirm who will make the changes and how those changes will be checked. You should be able to understand the report even if you hand the implementation to someone else.
Be wary of a promise to put you first on Google. An audit can identify faults and opportunities; competition, customer demand, and search systems still affect the result. If the conversation jumps straight from “your site has issues” to “you need a rebuild,” ask to see the evidence behind that recommendation.
Our improve-or-rebuild guide shows how to separate a repair list from a reason to replace the site.