Ideally when performing an audit, it is ideal if one has achieved International Software Testing Qualification /Certification (ISTQB /ISEB) aka software tester.

Having website on an outdated platform can be painfully limiting for you and can be disruptive to your audience

MIGRATION

1. Need a site map of website before an audit can be done with a mapping document showing old IA and NEW IA framework
2. Validate that content has been modified / deleted to new website in accordance to set standards – Publishing Guidelines.
3. Making sure you match up 301 redirects to your new web pages. Map them out – old URL to new URL, otherwise you will receive a 404 error -Broken links error message.
4. Match up pages with the same intent
5. Copy your GA code across to the new website or search Console
6. Setting up a custom report in Google Analytics with the registration of any 404 errors. This is so handy that you could have possibly missed during migration.  (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqgQRsnnW-E&ab_channel=Semrush)
7. Remove temporary website blocks which effect ranking.
8. Using the Dashboard to monitor your report.
9. Make sure all backlinks to the old intranet (e.g. Squiz CMS) are now pointing to the new website. A backlink monitor tool can help here.

How to Audit Your Content: 5 Essential Steps

AUDIT

• Creation of a new project – identify what needs to be fixed.

• Goal: Improve user experience and SEO
• Review Taxonomy if applicable
• Audit using a tool like SEMRush from an SEO perspective (e.g. how many web pages based on a site map) and crawl many pages. Identify pages with issues such as 
  • duplicate content issues
  • internal and external broken links (keep a crawl log).
  • low text-HTML ration
  • structured data invalid (affects visibility) in Google search results e.g. recipes – structure data testing tool for articles
  • pages with low word count
  • pages with missing meta- descriptions
  • too much text in title tags
  • images with missing ALT attribues.
• Test for load speed
• Making sure all subdomains (if present) have been correctly set up on new site and correctly referenced by calling pages.
• Identify points of contact – Design , business, tech, web author
• Are the font’s right size
• Need to have a well defined process
• Check for presence of URL /IA mapping document  and check every transference link reference.
• WCAG
• If e.g. product is discontinued, a redirect to the category could be set.
• For each new web page on new site, check all internal url page and external web links
• Also make sure there is a 301 URL redirect  for each old URL or permanent 408 redirect (e.g. links made plural on images as well)
• Test browser compatibility (e.g. as part of browser SOE or Browser versions) for each new web page making sure its compliant for desktops /mobiles/tablets using Google Toggle Device Inspect Tool (right mouse click in Google Chrome)
  • Test menu and submenu navigation
  • Presence for Meta title and descriptions
  • Test web page presentation
  • All online forms – making sure all fields work (UAT)
  • check web page file size
  • Identify author for each document
•  All pages in draft (edit mode) are to be transferred or deleted.

Audit Report will become Actions Item Report

e.g. Update all internal web links