Technical SEO Audits That Uncover What Google Can't Crawl

SEMrush found that 42% of websites have broken internal links. If Google can't efficiently crawl and index your site, no amount of content or link building will save your rankings.

42%

of websites have broken internal links that waste crawl budget and orphan ranking pages

SEMrush, 2023

Technical SEO Audit

Deep-dive technical analysis covering crawlability, site architecture, page speed, Core Web Vitals, indexation, and rendering issues with developer-ready fix specifications.

What's Included

Everything you get with our Technical SEO Audit

Crawlability Analysis

Full review of robots.txt directives, XML sitemap accuracy, internal link structure, redirect chains (3xx), and crawl budget allocation across your URL space.

Indexation Review

Audit of canonical tag implementation, meta robots directives, noindex/nofollow usage, hreflang tags for international sites, and Google Search Console index coverage report analysis.

Core Web Vitals Assessment

Field data (CrUX) and lab data (Lighthouse) analysis of Largest Contentful Paint, Interaction to Next Paint, and Cumulative Layout Shift across key page templates.

Site Architecture Mapping

Visual crawl map showing click depth, orphaned pages, internal link equity distribution, and URL structure issues that limit Google's ability to understand your site hierarchy.

Rendering and JavaScript Audit

Comparison of raw HTML vs. rendered DOM to identify content hidden behind JavaScript, lazy-load failures, and client-side rendering issues that prevent Google from seeing your content.

How the Technical Audit Works

1

Crawl Configuration

We set up crawl parameters matched to your site's size and architecture -- respecting server capacity while ensuring complete coverage of every URL, including JavaScript-rendered pages.

2

Full Infrastructure Crawl

Using Screaming Frog and custom scripts, we crawl every accessible URL and capture HTTP status codes, response times, canonical tags, meta directives, structured data, and resource load waterfalls.

3

Search Console Cross-Reference

We overlay crawl data with your Search Console index coverage, performance, and Core Web Vitals reports to identify mismatches -- pages you think are indexed but aren't, pages getting impressions but failing on speed.

4

Rendering Comparison

For JavaScript-heavy sites, we compare raw HTML source against the fully rendered DOM to identify content, links, or structured data that Googlebot might miss during initial crawl passes.

5

Issue Documentation and Prioritization

Every issue is logged with affected URLs, severity score, estimated traffic impact, and a step-by-step fix specification. Issues are grouped by theme (crawl, index, speed, architecture) and ranked by impact.

6

Walkthrough and Q&A

We present findings in a live session with your development team, explain the reasoning behind priority rankings, and adjust the fix sequence based on your deployment schedule and resource availability.

Key Benefits

Unblock Crawl Bottlenecks

Identify and fix the redirect chains, broken links, and robots.txt errors that prevent Googlebot from reaching your most important pages. On sites with 10,000+ URLs, crawl budget waste can mean hundreds of pages never get indexed.

Pass Core Web Vitals Thresholds

Get specific, code-level recommendations to bring LCP under 2.5s, INP under 200ms, and CLS under 0.1 -- the thresholds Google uses as ranking signals. We test on real-world devices, not just fast lab connections.

Fix Indexation Gaps

Discover pages stuck in 'Discovered -- currently not indexed' or 'Crawled -- currently not indexed' states and get actionable fixes for each. Many sites have 20-40% of their content effectively invisible to Google.

Developer-Ready Tickets

Every issue comes with the specific file, line-level fix, or server config change needed. Your dev team can start resolving issues immediately without needing to research solutions.

Research & Evidence

Backed by industry research and proven results

Mobile Speed and Abandonment

53% of mobile visits are abandoned if a page takes longer than 3 seconds to load, directly reducing engagement signals Google uses for rankings.

Google (2022)

Core Web Vitals Ranking Impact

Google confirmed Core Web Vitals (LCP, FID/INP, CLS) as a ranking factor in June 2021, making technical performance a direct input to search visibility.

Google (2021)

Crawl Budget and Large Sites

96.55% of pages get zero organic traffic -- for large sites, a significant portion of these are pages Google never fully crawls due to crawl budget waste on low-value URLs.

Ahrefs (2023)

Frequently Asked Questions

Our site loads fast -- do we still need a technical audit?

Page speed is one of roughly 15 technical categories we review. Fast-loading sites can still have serious indexation issues (canonical conflicts, noindex tags on important pages), crawl budget waste (parameter-based URL sprawl, redirect chains), broken structured data, or mobile usability failures. We regularly find critical issues on sites that score 90+ on PageSpeed Insights.

We recently migrated to a new CMS. Should we audit now or wait?

Audit immediately. CMS migrations are the #1 cause of avoidable organic traffic loss. Common post-migration issues include broken redirect mappings, changed URL structures, lost meta tags, missing structured data, altered internal link patterns, and new performance regressions from heavier page templates. The sooner these are caught, the less ranking equity you lose.

Will the audit slow down our site or affect users?

No. We configure our crawl rate to stay well within your server's capacity. For most sites we throttle to 2-5 requests per second, which is comparable to normal Googlebot activity. We can also schedule crawls during off-peak hours if your server resources are limited.

What CMS and hosting platforms do you support?

All of them. Technical audits are platform-agnostic -- we audit the HTTP responses and rendered output regardless of what generates them. That said, we have deep experience with platform-specific pitfalls: WordPress plugin conflicts, Shopify's canonical/URL structure limitations, Magento's layered navigation crawl traps, and headless CMS rendering challenges.

Find the Technical Issues Blocking Your Rankings

Get a developer-ready action plan for every crawl, indexation, and performance issue on your site.