When was the last time you thought about your client’s SEO hygiene? You may be asking yourself what I’m talking about. Ludwig Makhyan, writing for Search Engine Journal, says that, “Taking proactive steps to keep your site clean and running smoothly can help buffer against external factors, supporting your long-​term goals for your site and marketing strategy.” That’s what SEO hygiene is all about. “Conducting routine checks on your client’s website and setting it up for long-​term success.”

SEO Hygiene Practices

The Basics

You’ll want to make sure your client’s webpages are all up-​to-​date with relevant keywords that will drive traffic. And you want to make sure that all the links on the site go where they’re supposed to. Makhyan tells marketers to keep an eye on page titles, meta tags, headers and subheaders, alt tags and link building. These are just the basics of SEO hygiene.

Code

Code is literally what your client’s website is made of. It’s also crucial to an SEO hygiene strategy since it’s the base of what search engines will be scanning. Makhyan says that you should, “Run your code through search engine inspection tools and spider simulators. If a block of code isn’t being displayed or there are issues rendering a page, your site’s traffic can plummet.” Remember that it’s okay to ask for help from your IT department.

Content

Sometimes you’re not the only one generating content for your client’s website. You may be sharing the responsibility with the client company’s employees. When that happens and communication between the content teams is weak or nonexistent, SEO hygiene suffers. “Teams may start competing for the same keywords across multiple pages and even end up creating duplicate content,” says Makhyan. An easy way to avoid this type of conflict would be to have content responsibility to fall to one team. However, that’s rarely the case. Instead, look over and analyze the new content on your client’s website to make sure that it’s optimized for search. This is an opportunity for you to sell your digital marketing services.

Website Architecture

Your client’s website’s architecture is the first thing visitors will notice when they get to the site. As the name implies, a website’s architecture is how your client’s website is set up and presented to visitors. If your client’s website looks bad, as in too many flashing graphics or fonts that don't contrast well with the background colors, and is full of broken internal links, the site’s user experience is going to be terrible. And not only will potential customers be driven away from the website and maybe even the brand itself, poor SEO hygiene in the architecture department can also make it difficult for search bots to find the website. So, Makhyan recommends that you keep an eye on your client’s website’s internal links, navigation elements, design principles, formatting, and headers and footers to ensure top-​notch SEO.

Not sure how your client’s website is fairing right now or where to start with SEO hygiene? Run a Digital Audit, available on AdMall by SalesFuel, to see where their digital presence excels and where it could use some work.