Why Most SEO Audits Are Worthless
I've seen hundreds of SEO audits. The typical agency audit is a PDF export from Screaming Frog or Semrush with some logos slapped on it. Fifty pages of "issues" like missing alt text on decorative images, pages without meta descriptions, and "duplicate content" warnings that mean nothing.
These audits serve one purpose: to overwhelm you into thinking you need an expensive retainer to fix everything. The audit is a sales tool, not a diagnostic tool.
Here's the thing nobody tells you: 90% of what's in those audits doesn't affect your rankings. Google doesn't care about your alt text unless you're trying to rank in image search. Meta descriptions don't affect rankings at all. Most "duplicate content" isn't actually duplicate content in any way Google cares about.
Meanwhile, the 2-3 things actually destroying your organic traffic are buried on page 47, if they're mentioned at all.
What You Actually Get
My audit is different because I don't use templates. I look at your site the way I'd look at it if I was taking over your SEO tomorrow. What's broken? What's the biggest opportunity? What would I fix first?
- Prioritized Issues Only - Not 500 "errors." The 5-10 things that actually matter, ranked by impact.
- Root Cause Analysis - Not just "you have thin content" but why it's thin and what's causing it systematically.
- Specific Fixes - Not "improve your content." Actual technical specifications your dev team can implement.
- Competitive Context - How your technical foundation compares to who you're competing against.
- AI Search Readiness - Assessment of how your site performs in ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, and Grok.
- 30-Minute Walkthrough - Video call to discuss findings and answer questions.
What I Look At
Every site is different, but here's what I typically examine:
Crawling and Indexation
Is Google actually seeing your important pages? You'd be surprised how often the answer is no. I check your robots.txt, XML sitemaps, crawl logs, and index coverage reports. I look for the silent killers: JavaScript rendering issues, orphan pages, crawl traps, and parameter pollution.
Site Architecture
How is link equity flowing through your site? Are your important pages three clicks from the homepage or thirteen? Internal linking is the most underrated lever in SEO, and most sites get it completely wrong.
Technical Performance
Core Web Vitals matter less than Google wants you to believe, but they're not nothing. I look at what's actually slowing your site down and whether it's worth fixing. Usually it's one or two things causing 80% of the problem.
Content Effectiveness
Not a content audit. I look at whether your content structure is helping or hurting. Cannibalization, thin content at scale, topical gaps that matter. The strategic problems, not line-by-line editing.
Competitive Position
What do the sites outranking you have that you don't? Sometimes it's domain authority. Sometimes it's specific technical advantages. Sometimes it's content you're not creating. I tell you which.
What You Won't Get
- A 50-page PDF full of tool exports
- Hundreds of "issues" sorted by severity colors
- Recommendations to fix things that don't matter
- Vague advice like "create better content"
- A pitch for a $10,000/month retainer
- Vanity metrics or made-up scores
Who This Is For
This audit works best if you already have a website with some traffic and you're trying to figure out why you're not growing, or what's holding you back from the next level.
It's probably not for you if you're starting from zero, if your site is a single landing page, or if your real problem is that nobody wants what you're selling. No amount of SEO fixes that.
I'm honest about this: I'd rather turn away work than take money for something that won't help you. If I look at your site and the problem isn't technical, I'll tell you that on the call before you pay anything.
The Process
1. Intake Call (15 min) - Quick call to understand your business, what you've tried, and what success looks like. This helps me focus on what matters.
2. Deep Analysis (3-5 days) - I dig into your site, your competitors, and your data. Not automated. I'm actually looking at this stuff.
3. Audit Delivery - You get a written document with findings, prioritized recommendations, and implementation notes.
4. Walkthrough Call (30 min) - We go through everything together. You ask questions. We discuss strategy.
$499. That's It.
No hidden fees. No "levels" of audit. No upsell required to get the good stuff. You pay $499, you get the full analysis.
Why so cheap compared to agencies charging $5,000+? Because I'm one person with no overhead, and because I'd rather do 10 audits a month at $499 than 1 audit at $5,000. Volume keeps me sharp. I see more sites, more patterns, more problems.
If you want to move forward with implementation after the audit, we can talk about that. But there's no pressure. Many clients take the audit and hand it to their internal team or another agency. That's fine. The audit stands on its own.