A WordPress SEO audit is your website’s ultimate health check. It’s a systematic scan that reveals how search-engine-friendly your setup really is, highlights what’s working, what’s weak, and where to double down to better your rankings.
Running regular audits offers several key benefits:
- Spots technical hiccups before Google does.
- Highlights where your content could work harder.
- Helps you track ups and downs in content performance.
- Keeps you a step ahead of your competition.
For modern WordPress site owners, there are two main approaches: go manual for full control, or tap into SEO plugins (like SEOPress PRO) to whip through technical checks and get insights in a matter of minutes.
In this guide, we’ll show you how to run a thorough WordPress SEO audit using SEOPress PRO. You’ll learn how to:
- Collect baseline performance data.
- Analyse your technical setup.
- Review content effectiveness.
- Assess user experience.
- Size up the competition.
- Build a solid plan for improvements.
Everything you need to fix a dip in rankings or fine-tune for growth.
How to conduct a WordPress SEO audit with SEOPress PRO
SEOPress PRO is a powerful ally in the WordPress SEO toolkit, offering deep-dive auditing that connects directly with your Google Search Console data. That means you’re not just spotting potential issues, you’re working with real performance insights to guide your next steps.
The plugin runs 52 checks across 13 key categories, covering everything from meta tags to homepage Core Web Vitals. And despite its scope, a full site audit of 1,000 URLs typically takes less than five minutes, depending on your server setup and the size of your site.
Step 1. Data collection and initial assessment
Before jumping into optimizations, it’s important to get a clear picture of how your site is currently performing. Start with the basics: Can Google find your site?
Head to Google and search for site:example.com (swapping in your actual domain).
If your pages don’t show up, log into your WordPress dashboard, go to Settings > Reading, and check that the “Search Engine Visibility” option isn’t selected.
Once that’s sorted, fire up the SEOPress PRO Site Audit tool. It runs a full crawl of your website, from meta tags and indexing to deeper technical elements.
Getting started is straightforward:
- Install and activate SEOPress PRO.
- Head to SEO > Audit in your WordPress dashboard.
- Choose your audit settings and which post types to scan.
- Hit “Run audit” to kick off the process.
- Once complete, use the impact ratings to focus on the most important fixes.
In just a few clicks, you’ll have a clear, prioritized plan to sharpen your SEO and boost site performance.
While the audit is working in the background, open up Google Analytics and Google Search Console (GSC). GSC connects with SEOPress PRO, making it easy to review:
- Traffic trends and any noticeable dips.
- Keyword performance and shifts in ranking.
- Core Web Vitals results.
- Page speed data and areas that might be slowing things down.
Together, these insights give you a reliable starting point. They’ll help surface any red flags or quick wins so you know exactly where to focus next. If you spot sudden drops in traffic or ranking changes, take note – those often signal deeper issues worth investigating.
Step 2. Technical audit
Your site’s technical setup is the bedrock of good SEO. If search engines can’t crawl, understand, or index your content properly, your rankings will suffer, no matter how great the content is.
Here’s what to look out for:
- Indexability issues: Use the meta robots analysis to spot pages that might be blocking search engines or sending conflicting directives. This helps ensure nothing important is being kept out of search results.
- Canonical tag checks: Canonical tags guide search engines to the preferred version of a page, helping you avoid duplicate content problems. SEOPress PRO checks that these tags are present and correctly set on each page.
- Broken internal links: These disrupt user journeys and harm SEO. The audit will flag any broken links so you can fix them promptly.
- 404 monitoring: A built-in feature tracks error pages, making it easier to catch and clean up dead ends across your site.
- robots.txt and .htaccess access: For more advanced site control, you can edit these files directly within SEOPress PRO, making it ideal for managing crawl rules and redirects.
If you’re assessing security vulnerabilities, you’ll need to run separate checks using tools like Sucuri, since those fall outside the scope of typical SEO plugins.
Getting your technical setup right means search engines can fully access, interpret, and rank your content the way it’s meant to be seen.
Step 3. Content analysis
Content analysis evaluates how effectively your content speaks to both users and search engines. SEOPress PRO’s Site Audit makes this process smoother by scanning your entire site for optimization opportunities that matter.
It starts with a review of your meta titles and descriptions. These elements need to be sharp, appropriately sized, and include your target keywords. Even strong rankings can fall flat if your SERP preview snippets aren’t enticing enough to drive clicks.
From there, it checks your heading structure, looking at how your H1s, H2s, and subheadings stack up. A clear hierarchy helps search engines interpret your content and makes it easier for readers to follow along.
You’ll also get automatic checks for:
- Last modified dates to flag outdated pages.
- Structured data that supports rich results.
- Open Graph and Twitter/X Cards for cleaner social shares.
- Internal backlinking patterns and how your anchor text is distributed.
- Outbound links, including NoFollow usage.
- Keyword usage in permalinks to support URL relevance.
Where SEOPress PRO steps things up is with its internal linking suggestions. These help you identify related content and pass link equity intelligently across your site, something often overlooked in standard audits.
When it comes to duplicate content, SEOPress PRO takes a wider view, scanning your whole domain. This is key for spotting content cannibalization, where multiple pages compete for the same keyword and dilute your ranking potential.
That said, not everything can be automated. Some aspects still need a human eye:
- Is your content deep and informative compared to top-ranking competitors?
- How readable is it? Are people engaging with it or bouncing away from the page?
- Does it cover the topic effectively and align with user intent?
These manual checks are what separate surface-level tweaks from meaningful improvements. Pages that are technically sound but still underperform often need more substance, clarity, or relevance, rather than another technical fix.
Step 4. User experience
User experience plays a major role in SEO performance, which makes this step a must in your audit. SEOPress PRO makes it easy to handle several key UX checks, while also flagging areas that need hands-on attention.
Start with your images. Review how alt text is being used across your site. With SEOPress PRO’s OpenAI integration, you can automatically generate and apply any missing alt text right from the Site Audit interface, saving you hours of manual editing.
Next, look at breadcrumb navigation. SEOPress PRO checks whether it’s set up properly so visitors can easily move through your site’s structure. Good breadcrumb use gives users and search engines a clearer understanding of your content hierarchy.
You’ll also get useful UX insights through SEOPress PRO’s analytics integrations:
- Google Analytics for engagement metrics.
- Matomo for deeper behavioural data.
- Performance tracking across key pages and user interactions.
That said, not everything can be automated. It’s important to manually assess your site’s navigation. Is it logical? Are users finding what they need without effort?
Take time to review accessibility features, including keyboard navigation, screen reader compatibility, and color contrast.
Don’t forget about conversion elements. Test your forms on different browsers and devices to ensure they work smoothly. Go through your conversion journeys to spot any friction points that could be hurting your results.
Finally, review your mobile experience in detail. While Core Web Vitals offer some insights, nothing beats real testing. Test on at least three different devices: As of 2024, Apple, Samsung, and Xiaomi cover the world’s leading smartphones.
Check your site on various screen sizes. Make sure content is readable, buttons are easy to tap, and pages load quickly.
Step 5. Competitive analysis
To sharpen your SEO strategy, you need a clear view of who you’re up against and where the real opportunities lie.
Begin by running keyword research with SEOPress PRO’s Google Suggest tool. It helps you uncover the exact phrases people are searching for in your niche, which can be a valuable insight for shaping content that actually gets seen.
For a closer look at the competition, use SEOPress Insights to explore backlink profiles and pinpoint link-building opportunities based on what’s working for others. As you dig in, focus on a few key areas:
- How does your content quality stack up against top-ranking competitors?
- Where are the gaps in their content that leave user needs unmet?
- How are others positioning themselves, and what tone or messaging are they using?
Assess your own content in terms of depth, relevance, and user experience, especially for the keywords you’re targeting.
The biggest wins often come from spotting what others have overlooked:
- Unanswered questions.
- Underdeveloped topics.
- Angles no one’s explored yet.
These are your best chances to stand out and climb past more established players.
Step 6. Action planning
Turning your audit insights into meaningful improvements starts with a clear plan. SEOPress PRO includes a range of tools to help you organize and follow through on your SEO strategy.
As soon as your Site Audit is complete, you’ll get an email alert letting you know the results are ready. These notifications make it easy to stay on top of your audits and respond promptly to any new findings.
Each audit generates a structured, easy-to-read report detailing the issues uncovered. Think of it as your SEO task list – everything laid out clearly so you know exactly where to focus your efforts.
To help you prioritize, SEOPress PRO includes an impact rating system that sorts issues by severity:
- High-impact – items that could be harming your rankings right now.
- Medium – lower-impact tweaks that offer solid performance gains.
You can export these findings to CSV, making it simple to build project plans, assign actions across your team, and monitor progress step by step.
Alongside the tool’s features, it’s worth building your own roadmap too. Start with the low-hanging fruit – the quick fixes that will deliver early wins – before moving on to the more technical, time-intensive tasks.
And finally, set a routine. Monthly or quarterly audits using SEOPress PRO will help you catch issues early, track improvements, and keep your site performance steadily moving forward.
When it comes to SEO, consistency often wins over one-off perfection.
Start improving your rankings today with a WordPress SEO audit
Keeping your WordPress site in top shape is the key to staying visible and competitive. A regular SEO audit helps you catch issues early, fine-tune performance, and spot opportunities for growth.
SEOPress PRO makes this process fast and accessible, no matter your experience level. And with recent updates, it’s even easier to use. You can filter out irrelevant issues, automatically skip noindex pages, integrate with Google Search Console, and it works with all major page builders, editors, and themes.
If your site’s underperforming, or you just want to stay ahead of the curve, now is a great time to take action.
SEOPress PRO’s Site Audit feature gives you everything you need to get started.
Ready to audit your site? Try SEOPress PRO’s Site Audit now.
