01
Site Audit
Define a crawl boundary, inspect page-level errors and re-run a technical assessment after release.
Site AuditFor agency owners and SEO practice leads
Make the definition of done visible.
Running a search team means judging evidence, scope and accountability—not just reading a wall of audit warnings. Use DigestSEO's technical checks as a reviewable record while your agency owns assignments, decisions and client communication.
DigestSEO does not approve client work, operate a CRM, grant multi-seat roles or change client websites. Leadership sign-off happens in your own process.
01 / Delivery standards
The expensive part isn't finding issues. It's agreeing what counts as finished.
Two specialists can report the same audit differently. An agency lead needs the agreed crawl boundary, affected pages, severity, implementation owner and an after-state before saying a technical task is closed. Keep commercial scope separate from diagnostic findings.
02 / Engagement lifecycle
Six gates for a controlled engagement
These are agency operating decisions supported by evidence from DigestSEO, not automated stages inside an agency management platform.
- 01
Establish a prospect baseline
Use an authorized public-page check for discovery. Do not pass a sample audit off as a complete-site diagnosis.
- 02
Write the scope
Agree the property, URL patterns, page limits, exclusions, success criteria and who can approve additional work.
- 03
Run the technical assessment
Create a scoped Site Audit project; retain crawl dates, findings and affected URLs. Record inaccessible areas as limitations.
- 04
Prioritize outside the tool
Select the issues that fit impact, risk and contract. Assign developers or content owners in your existing task system.
- 05
Verify the changes
After implementation, crawl the same relevant scope again. Distinguish cleared findings from unverified pages or new regressions.
- 06
Report the delta
Show the original evidence, what shipped, what re-crawl confirmed, what was deferred and what Google data can actually support.
03 / Review checklist
What a lead should require before sign-off
Ask for the source, not just a colored score. Every accepted or deferred change should be traceable.
- 01
The correct client property and named Site Audit project.
- 02
The exact starting URL, crawl scope, page limits and exclusions.
- 03
Affected URLs and observed markup or status evidence.
- 04
Issue severity, business relevance and confidence—not a raw warning total.
- 05
Baseline and verification dates, with comparable crawl coverage.
- 06
The named implementation owner and external work-ticket reference.
- 07
A post-change crawl result: resolved, still present or not verifiable.
04 / Worked example
An audit has many warnings. The next sprint has limited room.
Illustrative example: a practice lead reviews a new ecommerce crawl containing duplicated metadata, broken internal links, and warnings from low-value filtered URLs. The lead does not turn the entire report into a fixed-price promise.
The agency first chooses indexable category pages with reproducible broken links and a clear implementation owner. It keeps the affected URLs and crawl baseline, then hands selected findings to developers; an eligible Fix Pack can package those selected findings into a Markdown brief.
Filter-page warnings are deferred until the indexing strategy and contracted scope are settled. After deployment, the lead requests a comparable re-crawl. A fixed status code is reported as a verified technical correction, not as proven sales or ranking growth.
05 / Honest reporting
Four claims that must not be conflated
An accountable client report says what a metric measures, where it came from and what it cannot establish.
- 01
Crawl Health Score tracks the share of crawled internal URLs without errors; it is not a keyword ranking or traffic score.
- 02
Authorized Search Console clicks and impressions describe Google Search exposure; they do not establish leads, revenue or conversions.
- 03
A developer's completed ticket means a change was delivered; a comparable re-crawl is needed to verify that the original technical finding cleared.
- 04
Optional GEO MCP results describe sampled citations from configured AI engines; they are not universal AI-search coverage or a guaranteed outcome.
06 / Product fit
Choose evidence for the management decision
Use only the surface that answers the current delivery question; optional MCP tools require setup and access.
02
SEO Dashboard
Review multiple saved projects, scheduled crawl history, issue trends, CSV issue exports and printable reports; not white-label reporting.
SEO Dashboard03
Fix Pack
From an eligible completed crawl, lock selected findings into a Markdown/master-prompt handoff; implementation remains external.
Fix Pack04
GSC MCP
With Google OAuth and property permissions, inspect Search Analytics, indexing and sitemap signals rather than inventing business outcomes.
GSC MCP05
Web Validator MCP
Validate authorized public markup, metadata and JSON-LD; the hosted site batch is bounded, not a full JavaScript-rendered crawl.
Web Validator MCP06
GEO MCP
Optionally self-host AI citation observations for configured engines and API keys; absence of a result is not proof of absence.
GEO MCP07 / Boundaries and access
Questions agency leads should settle up front
Can I oversee several client websites?
Yes. The SEO Dashboard supports multiple saved website projects with crawl scope, history, trends and schedules. Keep client ownership and commercial tracking in your own systems.
Does it replace our agency CRM?
No. DigestSEO has no CRM, billing, invoicing, lead marketplace, proposals or automated onboarding.
Can we export white-label client reports?
There is no white-label reporting infrastructure. Existing outputs include dashboard CSV issue exports and printable reports; eligible Fix Packs provide a Markdown export.
Can clients and specialists log in with separate roles?
No built-in multi-seat RBAC, client portal or approval workflow is claimed. Share appropriate exports through your existing access-controlled channels.
How do I confirm a developer fixed an issue?
Record the source crawl and affected URL, have your implementation team deploy the change, then re-crawl the comparable page and scope. Distinguish resolved, persistent and unverified findings.
What remains manual or external?
Contracts, work assignments, code and CMS edits, deployment, approvals, conversion tracking and client communications remain outside DigestSEO.
Can GSC or AI visibility be included in every report?
Only where authorized and relevant. GSC MCP needs Google account/property access; GEO MCP requires self-hosting and configured engines. Report collection limits and sampled observations.