SEO Quick Wins

Check your homepage for a meta description. Add a compelling 150-160 character summary that includes your primary keyword and a call to action.

Social shares look broken without an og:image tag. Add a 1200x630px image meta tag to your homepage for better click-through on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter.

Add 'twitter:card', 'twitter:title', and 'twitter:description' meta tags.

Audit every page for missing or duplicate meta descriptions. Each should be 150-160 characters with a clear CTA.

Check every page for missing or multiple H1 tags. Each page should have exactly one H1 with the primary keyword.

Check all page title tags are 50-60 characters. Longer titles get truncated in SERPs, losing click-through impact.

Add WebSite JSON-LD with SearchAction markup. Enables the sitelinks search box in Google results.

Ensure your homepage H1 includes your primary keyword. The H1 should clearly communicate what your site offers.

Rename image files from 'IMG_4032.jpg' to descriptive, hyphenated names like 'seo-audit-dashboard.jpg'.

Add FAQ sections to your highest-traffic pages. Google deprecated FAQ rich results in 2023 and schema alone shows minimal direct AI Overview lift, so lead with a clean Q&A format (which AI systems extract more readily than long body prose) and mark it up with FAQPage JSON-LD as a low-cost extra.

Write 40-60 word direct answers immediately after your H2 headings. This concise format targets featured snippets.

Audit each content page and add 3-5 contextual internal links. Distributes authority and helps crawlers discover pages.

Link sibling pages within the same topic cluster to each other. For example, if you cover multiple subtopics in a category, cross-link them to build topical authority.

Rewrite top H2s as the exact questions users ask (e.g. 'What is X?'). Pairs with a 40-60 word direct answer to win snippets and AI Overviews.

Embed a full text transcript beneath each video so search engines and AI can parse the content. Add timestamps where possible.

Wrap important content images in <figure> with a descriptive <figcaption>. The caption gives Google extra context for image ranking.

Preload your primary web font in the HTML head to reduce Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS) and prevent flash of unstyled text.

Run a manual Lighthouse audit on the Homepage and fix one major issue.

Add fetchpriority='high' to the largest above-fold image to tell the browser to prioritize loading it.

loading='lazy' on above-fold images delays LCP. Remove it from any image visible on initial load.

Explicitly set width and height attributes on every <img> to prevent CLS layout shifts.

Use <picture> element with AVIF source (50% smaller), WebP fallback, and JPEG last resort.

Run PageSpeed Insights on your top 5 pages. Targets: LCP < 2.5s, INP < 200ms, CLS < 0.1.

Run hero/banner images through ShortPixel, TinyPNG, or Squoosh. Typical 50-70% reduction with no visible quality loss.

Use Chrome DevTools Coverage tab to identify unused CSS/JS. Remove or lazy-load unused bundles to cut page weight.

Add <link rel='preload' as='image' href='hero.avif' fetchpriority='high'> so the browser fetches your hero image before render.

Any <img> using srcset with width descriptors needs a sizes attribute (e.g. sizes='(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px') so the browser picks the right file.

Set decoding='async' on images outside the initial viewport to prevent image decode from blocking the main thread.

Add <link rel='dns-prefetch' href='https://cdn.example.com'> for external image/asset CDNs to shave DNS lookup time off the critical path.

Prevent duplicate content issues by adding self-referencing canonical tags to all major pages.

Verify all images on your homepage and key landing pages have descriptive alt text for accessibility and SEO.

Add a 'robots.txt' file to allow crawling of main pages and disallow sensitive routes.

Create a sitemap listing all public routes to help search engines index the site.

Configure security headers on your server or CDN (X-Content-Type-Options, HSTS, X-Frame-Options).

Go to GSC → Sitemaps → paste your sitemap URL. Ensures Google knows about every indexable page.

Bing's share is roughly ~4% of global search but notably higher on US desktop (~17%, StatCounter 2026). Submit your sitemap in Bing Webmaster Tools for free visibility.

Even for single-language sites, add <link rel='alternate' hreflang='en' href='...'/> to signal language to Google.

Use GSC's URL Inspection → 'View Tested Page' to confirm Googlebot sees your rendered content, not blank pages.

Audit for 3xx → 3xx chains using Screaming Frog (free for up to 500 URLs; full licence £199/yr) or a free redirect checker. Each hop wastes crawl budget.

Implement IndexNow API to instantly notify Bing and Yandex of new/updated pages. Free, 5-minute setup.

Implement BreadcrumbList JSON-LD schema on all pages. Improves SERP appearance with breadcrumb trail.

Add Organization JSON-LD with name, logo, URL, and social profiles. Helps Knowledge Panel generation.

Add Article or BlogPosting JSON-LD schema to content pages with headline, datePublished, and author.

Add explicit Allow rules for GPTBot, ClaudeBot, PerplexityBot, Google-Extended, and CCBot so your content can be cited by AI search engines.

Create a /llms.txt route listing 10-20 core hub URLs plus a one-line brand description. Adoption by major AI crawlers is still unproven (near-zero measured citation lift so far), but it is low-cost and useful for coding assistants and RAG pipelines.

Add Person JSON-LD with the author's name, credentials, and professional profile URLs to establish individual authority (E-E-A-T).

Run your key pages through Google's Rich Results Test to confirm your JSON-LD (FAQ, Article, Product) is valid and eligible for rich results.

Ensure favicon.ico, apple-touch-icon.png, and a web manifest are correctly linked in your HTML head for consistent branding across browsers and devices.

Create a helpful 404 page with a search bar, navigation links to key sections, and popular content to reduce bounce rate.

Add contextual links between related pages and tools on your site. Internal cross-linking distributes authority and improves crawlability.

Ensure all buttons and links in the sidebar and mobile menu are at least 44x44px (Apple HIG) / 48x48px (Google Material).

Verify all external links use `rel='noopener noreferrer'`.