SEO Audit Skill
Use this skill when you run a quarterly SEO review, diagnose an organic-traffic drop, or plan your content strategy. It analyses the data and exports you provide across five phases and returns prioritised recommendations.
---name: seo-audit-skilldescription: Audit a website's SEO health, surface keyword opportunities, identify content gaps, and benchmark against competitors. Use when running a quarterly SEO review, diagnosing organic-traffic drops, or planning content strategy. Trigger with "audit SEO for", "keyword opportunities", "why is traffic down".---
# SEO Audit Skill
Audit a website's SEO health across five phases — technical audit, content audit, keyword analysis, competitor benchmarking, and prioritised recommendations. All data comes from your SEO tools, analytics, and search console; the skill does not crawl sites itself, it analyses the data you provide.
## Where the Data Comes From
| Source | What It Adds || --- | --- || **Search console via MCP** (e.g. Google Search Console) | Impressions, clicks, CTR, position, index coverage, crawl data || **Web analytics via MCP** (e.g. GA4) | Traffic data, user behaviour, conversions, landing-page performance || **SEO tools via MCP** (e.g. Ahrefs, Semrush) | Keyword rankings, backlinks, technical crawl data, competitor analysis || **companyRAG collections** | Past audits, keyword research, content-strategy docs || **File upload (crawl exports)** | Crawl exports, CMS inventories, metadata tables, screenshots from your tools |
> **No connected source?** Provide the data in chat or upload the relevant files — the skill works the same way.
## SEO Audit Workflow
Follow these five phases in order. Each phase builds on the previous one and feeds into the prioritised recommendations.
### Phase 1: Technical Audit
Assess the technical foundations that affect crawlability, indexability, and site performance.
**Technical audit checklist:**
| Category | Check | What to Look For | Data Source || --- | --- | --- | --- || **Crawlability** | Robots.txt | Unintentional blocks, missing directives | Crawl export / manual check || | XML sitemap | Present, submitted, up-to-date, no errors | Search console / manual check || | Crawl errors | 4xx, 5xx, redirect chains, orphan pages | Search console / crawl export || | Internal linking | Broken links, deep pages with no internal links | Crawl export || **Indexability** | Index coverage | Pages indexed vs. submitted, noindex misuse | Search console || | Canonical tags | Missing, self-referencing, conflicting with other signals | Crawl export || | Duplicate content | Identical or near-identical pages without canonical resolution | Crawl export || **Performance** | Core Web Vitals | LCP, INP, CLS scores | PageSpeed Insights / Search console || | Mobile usability | Mobile-friendly errors, responsive design issues | Search console / manual check || | Page speed | Load times, render-blocking resources, image optimisation | PageSpeed Insights / crawl export || **Structured data** | Schema markup | Present, valid, relevant types (Organisation, Article, Product, FAQ, etc.) | Rich results test / crawl export || **Security** | HTTPS | Full HTTPS migration, mixed content, certificate validity | Crawl export / manual check || | Hreflang (if multilingual) | Correct language/region targeting, reciprocal tags | Crawl export |
**Technical audit output format:**
```TECHNICAL AUDIT FINDING: Category: [crawlability / indexability / performance / structured data / security] Issue: [specific description] Severity: [critical / high / medium / low] Pages affected: [count or scope — from crawl data] Evidence: [specific data point from connected source] Impact: [how this affects search visibility or user experience] Recommendation: [specific fix] Effort: [quick fix / moderate / significant]```
### Phase 2: Content Audit
Assess the quality, relevance, and performance of existing content.
**Content audit methodology:**
1. Inventory existing content — compile all indexable pages with their metadata (title, description, H1, word count, publish date, last updated)2. Classify each page by performance:
| Category | Criteria | Action Direction || --- | --- | --- || **Performing** | Rankings + traffic + conversions meeting targets | Maintain and optimise incrementally || **Underperforming** | Has impressions but low CTR or declining traffic | Optimise — improve title, meta, content quality || **Thin** | Low word count, limited depth, no unique value | Expand, consolidate, or remove || **Cannibalising** | Multiple pages competing for the same keyword | Consolidate into a single authoritative page || **Decaying** | Previously performed well, now declining | Refresh — update data, expand coverage, re-promote || **Orphaned** | No internal links pointing to it | Add internal links or assess whether to keep |
1. For each underperforming or decaying page, document:
```CONTENT AUDIT — PAGE: URL: [page URL] Target keyword: [primary keyword — from SEO tools or user input] Current position: [ranking — from SEO tools] Impressions: [from search console] Clicks: [from search console] CTR: [from search console] Traffic trend: [growing / stable / declining — from analytics] Content quality: [assessment based on depth, freshness, uniqueness] Recommendation: [optimise / refresh / consolidate / remove]```
### Phase 3: Keyword Analysis
Identify keyword opportunities — terms where the site can realistically improve rankings or capture new traffic.
**Keyword opportunity methodology:**
1. Current keyword portfolio — from SEO tools, list all keywords the site currently ranks for with position, search volume, and traffic contribution2. Gap identification:
| Opportunity Type | Definition | How to Find || --- | --- | --- || **Quick wins** | Ranking positions 4–20 with meaningful search volume | Filter current rankings by position range || **Content gaps** | Keywords with search volume where the site has no ranking content | Keyword gap analysis in SEO tools || **Long-tail expansion** | Specific variations of keywords where the site already ranks for the head term | Related keyword analysis, "People also ask" data || **Emerging topics** | Growing search trends in the site's domain | Trend analysis, search console rising queries || **Competitor keywords** | Terms competitors rank for that this site does not | Competitor keyword gap analysis |
1. For each opportunity, document:
```KEYWORD OPPORTUNITY: Keyword: [term] Search volume: [from SEO tools — never generate this] Current ranking: [position, or "not ranking"] Difficulty: [from SEO tools — never generate this] Opportunity type: [quick win / content gap / long-tail / emerging / competitor] Existing content: [URL if the site has relevant content, or "none"] Recommended action: [optimise existing page / create new content / add to existing content] Business relevance: [high / medium / low — how closely does this align with business goals?] Priority: [from prioritisation framework in Phase 5]```
### Phase 4: Competitor Benchmarking
Benchmark the site's SEO performance against key competitors to identify relative strengths and weaknesses.
**Competitor selection:**
- Identify 3–5 competitors: direct business competitors AND search competitors (sites that rank for the same keywords but may not be direct business competitors)- Source: user input for business competitors; SEO tools for search competitors
**Benchmarking dimensions:**
| Dimension | Metrics to Compare | Data Source || --- | --- | --- || Domain authority / strength | Domain rating, domain authority, or equivalent | SEO tools || Keyword overlap | % of shared keywords, unique keywords per competitor | SEO tools || Content volume | Number of indexed pages, content publishing frequency | SEO tools / manual check || Backlink profile | Total referring domains, quality distribution, link velocity | SEO tools || SERP feature presence | Featured snippets, knowledge panels, image results, video results | SEO tools / manual search || Content depth | Average content length, topic coverage breadth | SEO tools / manual assessment |
**Benchmark output format:**
```COMPETITOR BENCHMARK: Competitor: [name / domain] Relationship: [direct competitor / search competitor / both]
Where they outperform us: - [Dimension]: [specific evidence from data] - [Dimension]: [...]
Where we outperform them: - [Dimension]: [specific evidence from data] - [Dimension]: [...]
Key content they have that we lack: - [Topic / keyword]: [their URL, ranking, estimated traffic]
Actionable takeaway: - [Specific, data-backed action]```
### Phase 5: Prioritised Recommendations
Synthesise findings from all phases into a prioritised action plan.
**Prioritisation framework:**
Score each recommendation on three dimensions:
| Dimension | Score 1 (Low) | Score 2 (Medium) | Score 3 (High) || --- | --- | --- | --- || **Impact** | Marginal traffic or ranking improvement | Moderate improvement to target keywords | Significant traffic, ranking, or conversion impact || **Effort** | Significant development or content effort | Moderate effort — days, not weeks | Quick fix — hours, not days || **Confidence** | Hypothesis — limited supporting data | Directional — some data supports this | Strong evidence from data |
**Priority = Impact × Effort × Confidence** (max 27). Execute highest-scoring actions first.
**Recommendation output format:**
```RECOMMENDATION [N]: Finding: [What the audit revealed] Phase: [Technical / Content / Keyword / Competitor] Action: [Specific, actionable recommendation] Impact: [1–3] — [rationale] Effort: [1–3] — [rationale] Confidence: [1–3] — [rationale] Priority score: [calculated] Owner: [who should execute — SEO, content, engineering] Timeline: [suggested timeframe]```
## Output Template: SEO Audit Report
```# SEO Audit Report — [Domain]Date: [date]Audit period: [date range of data analysed]Auditor: [name]
## Executive Summary [3-5 sentences: overall SEO health assessment, top 3 opportunities, top 3 risks]
## Technical Health Critical issues: [count] High-priority issues: [count] [List of technical findings sorted by severity]
## Content Assessment Total pages audited: [count] Performing: [count] | Underperforming: [count] | Thin/remove: [count] [Top content findings]
## Keyword Opportunities Quick wins: [count] Content gaps: [count] [Top keyword opportunities sorted by priority]
## Competitor Landscape [Key competitor insights and gaps]
## Prioritised Action Plan [Top 10-15 recommendations sorted by priority score]
## Appendix [Detailed data tables, full keyword lists, technical crawl details]```
## Guardrails
- Never generate SEO metric values (search volume, keyword difficulty, domain authority, traffic estimates, CTR by position). All data must come from your tools.- Never guarantee ranking improvements or traffic outcomes. SEO results depend on many uncontrollable factors.- Never present qualitative claims about keywords ("high volume", "low competition") without data from your tools.- Flag outputs: `[From SEO data]` for tool-sourced data · `[Framework methodology]` for this skill's approach · `[AI analysis]` for model synthesis · `[Data needed]` for placeholders requiring real data.
> **Tip:** Request XLSX, DOCX, or Markdown output via companyFILES for a formatted, instantly shareable report.