I wanted to use my prioritized SEO audit to show how I would use it in the field. I checked on one of Canada’s famous sports and outdoor gear sites –
Cabelas.ca
I had to skip a lot of important steps, as I don’t have access to their private data from GSC and Analytics, and I didn’t want to depend on third party tools such as SEMrush and Ahrefs because they are not always reliable.
I kept the order of the audit as
per our prioritized audit template. Normally, most steps would be done in a different order to make the audit more efficient.
Google Business Profile Optimization
Cabela’s is a huge site so they have pretty good GBP listing.
Check for pages with 301, 302, 404, meta refresh redirects
404 – they have less than 1% of pages that are 404. Most of them with Herobox url ending, such as “https://www.cabelas.ca/category/freshwater-specialty-reels/HeroBox”. This is a result of href=”HeroBox” used as a relative URL on their category pages. This can be easily fixed to make crawling more efficient.
302 – they have a number of pages that are 302. Most of them are from wishlist links (such as https://www.cabelas.ca/wishlist/addcabelasproduct/145194/377393). /wishlist is correctly marked as Disallow in robots.txt
301 – Most 301 links are http to https redirects, for checking product availibility on product pages. (such as http://www.cabelas.ca/checkproductvariantavailability/933?specs=20547). They should be turned into https if possible
Do important pages get internal links from other related pages?
I used their best sellers list to prioritize pages that are important (for the lack of analytics data and not wanting to use third party tools).
Their product pages get lots of internal links, but most are navigational links with exactly the same anchor text. For example https://www.cabelas.ca/product/136715/caravan-canopy-v-series-2-green-canopy only has “Caravan Canopy V Series 2 Green Canopy” as internal anchor text.
Most profitable product pages could benefit from contextual internal links with diverse anchors.
Compress image file size
Most of their logos are properly compressed, and their main product images are in AVIF format as Google recommends. Some of their jpegs (like https://cdn.dynamicyield.com/api/8768423/images/26965628deee5__huntelectronics-megamenu-image-940-533.jpg) could benefit from compression without losing image quality. This could be done automatically.
Content gap analysis on the most important pages
This is one of the most important steps. Cabelas is an established site, and could easily rank for any newly added content. The problem with this step is that it usually has to be done in part manually. It also needs to be done carefully so that pages don’t lose their relevancy.
The most popular branded product in the camping lantern category is
https://www.cabelas.ca/product/143948/nite-ize-radiant-314-rechargeable-lantern so I used it to try to find some content gaps as an example. My own keyword databases and keywords tools suggest that the common entities associated with Nite Ize lanterns are: emergency (intent), battery, volt, radio, waterproof, flashlight and so on. This page mentions battery once, but not the other words.
Cabela’s ranks for “Nite Ize lantern +keyword” for any of those keywords. But this is because the site is established and this lantern does not have that much competition. However this would not be the case for some smaller sites. For example, a smaller site should mention that all the lanterns have emergency use. Other words properly placed could bring in extra traffic even if the product doesn’t feature them. In that case the feature (such as waterproof) could be indicated as N/A, but could be a link to another lantern on their site that actually is waterproof. Even mentioning the word “waterproof” once could help it rank much higher for “Nite Ize lantern waterproof” (without quotes).
Check for title tag length
All titles are below 120 characters. Even though not all the words will show in SERPS, they will all get indexed. Pages with short title are mostly categories. No changes needed to title length.
Do most important pages get linked from the homepage?
All titles are below 120 characters. Even though not all the words will show in SERPS, they will all get indexed. Pages with short title are mostly categories. No changes needed to title length.
Answer questions about the brand
This is a huge site and not all important pages can be linked from the homepage. Most top sellers are 2 clicks away from the homepage. The
most important products could be listed on the bottom of their category pages (instead of recently viewed). Then they would be 1 click away, which would be good for user experience and crawl priority.
Mobile friendliness
Their category and top seller pages are mobile friendly according to
https://search.google.com/test/mobile-friendly/
Date on SERPS
I looked at the SERPS for the keywords of top selling products and it seems that Google does not care about the time associated with products. This is also true for the “review” terms.
Missing titles
There are no pages with missing titles.
Analyze top SERPS for words in titles
I looked at the SERPS for “Nite Ize lantern” again and our page includes all the important words that other top 10 results include
Does every category have a practical name and purpose?
All the categories seem to be properly named
Check for thin content
Most page with thin content are 404, wishlist, search, or category pages (with or without) parameters. Some product pages (like https://www.cabelas.ca/product/2850/gerber-exchange-a-blade-saw) have thin content and if they are top sellers they should add more content, particularly to fill entity gaps
Check for duplicate titles
Certain product pages have duplicate titles like (https://www.cabelas.ca/product/119140/under-armour-mens-tech-6-boxerjock-2-pack and https://www.cabelas.ca/product/143366/under-armour-mens-tech-6-boxerjock-2-pack). If they are availible and they are different products and should include more descriptive titles. Otherwise should be merged together, just with different colours as options. Certain categories have duplicate titles like https://www.cabelas.ca/category/waders/2248 and https://www.cabelas.ca/category/waders/1952. They should be merged as one of them has only 1 product. Other products are “herobox” https://www.cabelas.ca/product/110786/HeroBox that is the same product as https://www.cabelas.ca/product/110786/zeiss-conquest-v4-rifle-scope but for some reason has its own different canonical. They should be merged together into https://www.cabelas.ca/product/110786/zeiss-conquest-v4-rifle-scope
Check for dates in title tags
Title tags in SERPS for some top sellers that we checked do not include year. This could be tested with some limited categories to see if there is a CTR or rankings boost.
Is internal anchor text relevent?
All internal anchor is usually the same as the name of the product without variation. Top sellers could benefit from contextual internal links with diverse but related anchors. For example “Nite Ize Radiant Lantern” could be linked with anchor text mentioning words like LED, water resistant, night vision and other words that describe its function but are used as queries.
Check for junk pages
Site has some junk pages indexed like 17 l.emails.cabelas.ca pages. Other than there doesn’t seem to be any other unusual pages.
Is there working breadcrumbs?
Site uses breadcrumbs, but they can be marked with SCHEMA. That would increase the chance that SERPS will show their category instead of just “product” listed before the name (for example https://www.cabelas.ca › product › nite-ize-radiant-400).
Check for duplicate or near duplicate content
There is no near duplicate content other than what we mentioned before (thin pages, redirects…)
Do they answer reviews on GBP
No. Could be important to review major concerns of customers and address them.
Do title tags include important entities about the topic?
For most products it is the full product name included, without other entities. Some shorter title tags for top sellers could benefit from some important entetites added. (like adding “waterproof” for some lanters).
Do they use favicon
Yes: /favicon.ico
Are heading unique?
H1’s are duplicated when title tags are duplicated. H2’s are duplicated for generic terms like “Shopping Cart Unavailable” and Narrow Your Results. Product pages do not use H3’s and H4’s.
Do H1 include target keywords?
For most products it is the full product name included, without other entities. Some shorter H1s for top sellers could benefit from some important entetites added. (like adding “waterproof” for some lanters).
Dissalow pages in robots.txt
Other than “herobox” pages, most other pages thank you and cart pages are dissalowed.
Check for bad internal links
Lots of pages have 404 and 302 pages that should be fixed
No pages with 500 errors
Good server!!!
Does the main keyword appear in the first 100 words of content
Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Some important pages could benefit from the important words mentioned more often. It may sound like and old tactic, but every study shows keywords in the first 100 (unique) words are still a factor.
Are images resized?
pagespeed.web.dev suggests that pages have images that should be properly resized. This include the main image. For example the main image on https://www.cabelas.ca/product/145758/fenwick-aetos-fly-rods
Check response times
73% of the response times was within 1 second. 97% within 2 seconds. Not bad
Is above the fold content unique
No, just product image.
Check Google Cache
Everything shows up normally
Check internal linking opportunities
All top sellers could benefit from contextual internal linking.
Do all links look like clickable links?
Some links, like “Write a review” do not appear to look like clickable links. The anchor text is obviously a link so that is not too bad.
Is 404 useful?
It should link to other popular pages on the site.
Is the crawl depth too deep?
Most crawl depth is 3 or 4. Important pages are 3 deep.
Is there functional internal search?
Yes.
Web Content Accessibility Guidelines and Americans with Disabilities Act Compliance
accessibilitychecker.org claims to have found 6 critical issues just on the homepage. With 44 out of 100 score
Check canonicals
No major issues with canonicals
Do H1 match title tag
Yes.
Check for the number of redirects
http://cabelas.ca/ redirected to https://www.cabelas.ca/ in one jump.
Check alt attributes
Alts are missing from category pages. They are present and same as H1 on product pages.
Check for pages with few internal links
All important pages have more than 1 internal link.
Large number of external outlinks
Nothing unusual
Do links work with Javascript off
Site doesn’t seem to be loading with Javascript off
Does the site link to low quality sites
No
Is there pages with mixed secure and unsecure content
Few. Nothing to worry about.
Do the homepage and other important pages show up for branded search?
Yes
Is the sitemap including all the URLs
No, sitemap is old, needs to be updated.
Check if CSS and JavaScript are minified, compressed
CSS is minified, Javascript can be reduced and minified
Check for “first contentful paint”, “time to interactive” and “cumulative layout shift”
First contentful paint and time to interactive need to be lowered significantly on mobile, CLS is ok.
Popups, ads and interstitials.
Nothing Intrusive
Is header part of the content too big
Normal
Are important keywords surrounding videos
Very few videos
Does Meta description match the first paragraf?
Yes
Is there pages with missing, duplicate or multiple H1 tags?
Some duplicate issues that can be fixed, same as with title tags
Do outgoing social media links work
Yes
Check if plural is treated the same as singular
Mostly
Lazy loading
Implemented
CSS and JS off
Some issues with loading when they are off
Are bullet forms too long?
No
Duplicate meta descriptions
Issues with some pages, same as with title tags
Remove links to 404 pages
Not too many 404 pages, mostly “herobox” but links should be removed
Check archive.org
Nothing unusual
Check for infinite redirects
No infinite redirects
Check pages with an ad blocker
Reviews do not show. Shopping cart and some navigational links do not show
Check query parameters
Hard to say if they are necessary without diving deep into their CMS
Call to Action
No Calls to action on product pages
Missing meta descriptions
No issues
Check first 150 characters in meta descriptions
Sometimes they show not important product features. Would rewrite them for top sellers
External links open in a new window
Yes
Internal nofolllow
No internal nofollow
Links to internal search
Lots of Search Links are part of the navigational searches, but are nofollow
Structured data Validity
SCHEMA appears to be valid
Check if other types of structured data can be added to the website
Site could benefit from Breadcrumbs schema so that its categories would appear in the SERPS
Check if the SSL certificate is recognized by major web browsers.
Yes
Check SERPS to make sure Google didn’t index any unusual URL parameters.
Nothing unusual is indexed with parameters
Check for duplicate homepage
Homepage not duplicated
Check if pages are all either www or non-www.
Pages are consistently with www
Do forms ask for too much personal information?
Nothing unusual
Is directory indexing disabled
Directories are properly disabled
Check robots.txt and make sure you are not disallowing anything you want crawled
Appears ok
robots.txt is not blocking JavaScript and CSS
Appears ok
Check if the site has paginated content?
No paginated content
Check for pages containting only one media
No pages with only one media
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Do important landing page answer where a visitor is?
Seems clear to a visitor where they are at any moment and what can they do and why. Add to cart, availiblity, description and reviews are all obvious.
Check robots.txt for errors
Robots.txt doesn’t have errors
Check internal search
Internal search pages have NOINDEX, NOFOLLOW
Sitemap pages with 404, 301, 302
Almost half the pages are 404 error pages in the sitemap. They should all be fixed.
Do category pages have too many or too few items in them
Some categories (like https://www.cabelas.ca/category/waders/2248) have only 1 item. Check if they need to exist or they can be merged into another category?
