SEO Website Auditing

Conducting a website audit involves a thorough examination of various aspects of a website to assess its performance, identify issues, and recommend improvements. Unlike checklist audits, we model your site as a Markov chain and run a PageRank-style eigenvector analysis to reveal which pages actually receive (or leak) authority. By creating a transition matrix based on user data, these models show the likelihood of a user moving from one page to another, providing data-driven insights for SEO strategy. This allows for strategic adjustments to guide users more effectively toward conversions, you get a numerical Authority-Flow score (0-1) for every URL, plus a Graph-Health index (diameter, clustering, orphan count). If your current agency isn’t giving you eigenvalues ( an eigenvalue tells you how much a matrix scales a special kind of vector without rotating it), you’re flying blind.

Here’s a detailed guide to how London’s tgbarker performs a comprehensive website audit:

1. Technical SEO Audit

• Crawlability and Indexability
  • Ensure all important pages are crawlable and indexed by search engines.
  • Use tools like Screaming Frog or Google Search Console to identify crawl errors, broken links, and issues with robots.txt.
• Site Speed
  • Test the website’s loading speed using tools like Google PageSpeed Insights, GTmetrix, or Lighthouse.
  • Optimize images, enable browser caching, and minimize CSS and JavaScript.
• Mobile-Friendliness
  • Check if the website is mobile-friendly using Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test.
  • Ensure responsive design and that all elements are accessible and readable on mobile devices.
• HTTPS Status
  • Verify the site is using HTTPS.
  • Check for mixed content issues where some elements are served over HTTP.

2. On-Page SEO Audit

• Content Quality
  • Review the content for relevance, originality, and value.
  • Ensure the use of keywords is natural and not overstuffed.
• Title Tags and Meta Descriptions
  • Check if each page has unique, descriptive title tags and meta descriptions.
  • Ensure they include relevant keywords and are within the recommended length.
• Header Tags
  • Ensure proper use of H1, H2, H3 tags to structure content.
  • Each page should have one H1 tag, with relevant keywords included.
• URL Structure
  • URLs should be clean, descriptive, and include keywords.
  • Avoid long URLs with unnecessary parameters.

Why Building a Transition Matrix Matters in an SEO Audit

Most SEO audits focus on technical fixes, broken links, and that long list of “issues” tools love to generate. Useful, yes — but they miss something crucial: how your pages actually move when you optimise them.

Search performance isn’t static. A page doesn’t stay “weak,” “average,” or “strong” forever. It shifts over time based on improvements, competition, and Google’s changing interpretation of the content. This is where a transition matrix becomes a powerful tool.

A transition matrix is only useful if you have measurable signals indicating a page moving from one optimisation level to another. Here is a hypothetical example that explains this construct:

Use time-series metrics like:

On-Page Strength Indicators

• Title/H1 clarity score

• Semantic coverage score

• Internal link count

• TF-IDF / BM25 deviation

• Schema completeness

• Word count vs top 20

• Page Experience / CWV

Behavioural Indicators

• CTR change

• Bounce change

• Dwell time improvement

• Scroll depth

Technical Signals

• Speed improvement

• Crawl depth

• Indexing status

• Canonical correctness

You measure these at two points in time:
t₀ (before changes) → t₁ (after changes)

3. Measure How Pages Change State

Say you have 50 pages.

At t₀:

• 10 in State A

• 15 in State B

• 18 in State C

• 7 in State D

At t₁, after content updates, fixes, etc. you re-classify the same pages:

Example movement:

• Some pages moved from C → B

• Some from B → A

• Some from D → C

• Some stayed where they were

Now you count transitions.

4. Build the Transition Counts

Example (made-up but realistic):

This is NOT the transition matrix yet — it’s the raw counts.

5. Convert to Probabilities (Normalised Rows)

Each row must sum to 1.0.

Example normalisation:

Row for B

Counts: 5, 8, 1, 1 → total = 15
Probabilities:

• B→A = 5/15 = 0.333

• B→B = 8/15 = 0.533

• B→C = 1/15 = 0.067

• B→D = 1/15 = 0.067

6. Final Transition Matrix (Example)

Here’s the fully normalised matrix:

This is now a valid Markov transition matrix.

7. What You Can Do Next

This matrix lets you:

Predict outcomes

Multiply the vector of current pages by the matrix to predict optimisation progress after one cycle.

Compute long-term distribution (stationary vector)

Eigen decomposition will reveal the “steady state” — the percentage of pages that will end up fully optimised if you continue your current workflow.

Run “what if” SEO scenarios

For example:
“If I focus more internal linking + schema, do I increase the probability of C → A transitions?”

Our real-world examples cover many different markets to see exact examples we cover industries such as financial, travel & tourism, car insurance, healthcare medical supplies and agriculture

3. Off-Page SEO Audit

• Backlink Profile
  • Use tools like Ahrefs, Moz, or SEMrush to analyze the website’s backlink profile.
  • Identify toxic backlinks and disavow them if necessary.
• Social Media Presence
  • Evaluate the website’s presence and engagement on social media platforms.
  • Ensure consistent branding and linking back to the website.

4. User Experience (UX) Audit

• Navigation
  • Ensure the website’s navigation is intuitive and user-friendly.
  • Check for a logical structure and easily accessible menus.
• Design and Layout
  • Evaluate the design for aesthetics and functionality.
  • Ensure consistency in fonts, colors, and styles.
• Accessibility
  • Check if the website is accessible to all users, including those with disabilities.
  • Use tools like WAVE or Lighthouse to identify accessibility issues.

5. Content Audit

• Content Relevance and Freshness
  • Review existing content for relevance and accuracy.
  • Identify outdated content and update or remove it as necessary.
• Content Gaps
  • Identify topics and keywords not currently covered on the website.
  • Create a content plan to address these gaps.

6. Analytics and Reporting

• Google Analytics and Search Console
  • Ensure Google Analytics and Search Console are properly set up and tracking data.
  • Review key metrics such as traffic sources, bounce rates, and conversion rates.
• Goal Tracking
  • Verify that goals and conversions are properly set up and tracked.
  • Analyze the performance of different marketing channels.

7. Security Audit

• Vulnerabilities
  • Check for security vulnerabilities, such as outdated software and plugins.
  • Ensure strong passwords and implement security measures like firewalls.
• Data Protection
  • Ensure compliance with data protection regulations like GDPR or CCPA.
  • Implement SSL certificates and privacy policies.

8. Local SEO Audit (if applicable)

• Google My Business
  • Verify the Google My Business listing is accurate and optimized.
  • Ensure consistency of NAP (Name, Address, Phone number) across all listings.
• Local Citations
  • Check for accurate and consistent citations across local directories.

Tools for Website Audit:

• Google Search Console
• Google Analytics
• Screaming Frog
• Ahrefs / Moz / SEMrush
• Google PageSpeed Insights
• GTmetrix
• Lighthouse
• WAVE (Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool)

Reporting and Recommendations:

• Compile findings into a comprehensive report.
• Prioritize issues based on their impact and difficulty.
• Provide actionable recommendations for each identified issue.

Conducting a thorough website audit will help identify areas of improvement, enhance user experience, and boost the website’s performance in search engines.