Check discovery and indexing controls
Start with response status, redirects, internal links, canonical declarations, robots directives, and sitemap membership. Inspect representative page types and the pages that matter commercially. A sitemap is a discovery aid, not permission to index or proof of indexing. Compare declared canonicals with rendered content and the site’s intended URL inventory.
- ✓ Investigate conflicting noindex, canonical, and robots rules.
- ✓ Find orphaned pages and redirect chains on important journeys.
Check rendering, semantics, and delivery
Confirm the main content and links are available in the rendered page and usable without fragile interactions. Review headings, forms, images, layout stability, and loading behavior. Inspect structured data for valid references and content consistency. Performance should be measured under stated conditions rather than reduced to an unexplained single screenshot or a guaranteed ranking outcome.
- ✓ Test mobile navigation, form completion, and error recovery.
- ✓ Compare field evidence with controlled diagnostic runs where available.
Prioritize by affected users and implementation risk
Group issues by root cause and template so one correction can improve multiple pages. Separate critical access failures from minor cleanup. Record the intended change, owner, validation method, and rollback path. After deployment, recrawl affected URLs and check the relevant conversion journey. SearchGraph can support evidence collection; implementation still needs accountable review.
- ✓ Fix broken access and incorrect indexing controls first.
- ✓ Keep a pre-change baseline and a deployment record.