Checking through a staging website ahead of a launch can be quite a task, and if you’ve not done it before it can be hard to know where to start. That’s why I’ve put this list of checks to conduct on a staging website together.
Areas to Check on a Staging Website
Don’t think of this as a list of checks that you must complete, rather a suggested and customisable list of things to be aware of on a staging website.
Tracking and Analytics
Google Search Console
- Do you have access to all of the necessary versions of GSC?
- Are there any manual actions?
- Has the preferred domain been set?
- Is Google Tag Manager implemented?
- Do you have access to Google Tag Manager?
Keyword Tracking
- Have KPIs and keyword tracking been set up for the domain if necessary?
Content
Meta and Header Tags
- Are all necessary meta tags visible on all pages?
- Are there any empty meta tags?
- Are any meta tags duplicated?
- Do title tags contain appropriate branding?
- Are H1 tags missing? Or are there multiple H1s per page?
- Are all necessary meta tags which do not have bespoke meta dynamically generated appropriately?
Images
- Do product images contain the correct alt text?
- Does the alt text of imagery correctly describe the image?
- Are images given an appropriate, relevant name that is visible within the URL?
Location
- Is important content less than 4 clicks from the homepage?
Other Domains and Subdomains
- Are there any owned domains or subdomains that are hosting duplicate content? Use Site:search
- Do the subdomains have a robots.txt?
- Do the subdomains have an XML sitemap?
Duplicate Content
- Are there any forms of duplication on the site and how and why do they occur?
Content Size/Low-Quality Content
- Are there pages with low-quality content?
- Are there any pages with inappropriately sized content?
Schema and Structured Data
Each of the below can be tested against: https://validator.schema.org. There are many benefits to adding schema markup to your websites.
Company Logo Schema
- A logo in a ‘usable’ image format is required.
- The homepage should be marked up correctly with schema.org Organisation schema values in a JSON script. Required values include URL (of the homepage), Logo (image source URL).
Sitelinks Search Box Schema
- Homepage should include the necessary markup for the site links search box.
- https://developers.google.com/search/docs/beginner/establish-business-details
Review Schema
- There should be fully crawlable semantic metadata on products and reviews to signal to robots the significance of that element.
Video Schema
- Product videos are marked up correctly with schema.org video object markup. Required values include name, description, thumbnail URL, content. Recommended values include duration and upload date.
Social Sharing - Twitter Cards and Social Tags
- Twitter Card markup shall be implemented to provide Twitter with extra details to display about the content on the page. See documentation for more details:
- https://developer.twitter.com/en/docs/twitter-for-websites/cards/overview/markup
- Open Graph markup shall be used to give social networks details on how to display assets once a user has shared them on Facebook and Twitter. More information is available here:
- https://ahrefs.com/blog/open-graph-meta-tags/
Breadcrumb Schema
- Breadcrumbs should be used and possess schema.org formatting to increase the click real-estate within the SERP.
Crawling and Indexing
Crawl
- Are an excessive number of pages being crawled?
- Are there any orphaned pages?
- Are an excessive number of non-indexable pages being crawled?
Indexation
- Does a site: command in Google return the expected number of results (vs Indexable pages in Screaming Frog). You should also cross-reference this number with the Valid pages in the Coverage report in Google Search Console.
- Can Google successfully crawl, render, and index the executed JavaScript? Use the following tools:
- https://search.google.com/test/mobile-friendly
- https://search.google.com/test/rich-results
Robots.txt
- Is there a robots.txt that allows for suitable indexability?
- Are any sources blocked unnecessarily?
- Are there any canonical tags present to associate duplicate content?
- Are there any canonical tags that do not return a 200 status code?
- Is there 1 canonical tag per page?
- Are there any conflicts between canonical tags?
Redirect non-www pages to www
- Do non-www pages redirect to www or vice versa?
Parameters
- What parameters are being used and what for?
- Are parameters specified within GSC? See documentation for further information:
- https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/6080548?hl=en
URL Format Rules
- All pages should have a unique, friendly URL that should also be short enough to be humanly readable (where possible).
- URLs should not contain a double slash (//).
- All URLs shall be generated exclusively in lowercase.
- All URLs should conform to trailing slash or non-trailing slash rules.
- Dashes (-) should be used rather than underscores (_).
- Where search terms generate a search URL, spaces should be processed with a dash (-).
- The URLs should not contain spaces, parentheses, or any ASCII characters.
URL Format Rules
- Is a consistent URL structure used?
Redirects
- Does the site use redirects internally which aren’t 301s?
- Are there any redirect chains or loops?
- If URLs are changing as part of the migration, old pages should be mapped to new ones to prevent authority loss.
XML Sitemap
- Are there pages within the XML sitemap that aren’t crawlable on-site?
- Are there crawlable pages that aren’t in the XML sitemap?
- Does the sitemap contain non-200 URLs?
- Does the sitemap contain more than 50,000 URLs?
- Are there any video or image XML sitemaps?
- Is the sitemap being processed by Google when it is submitted?
Response Codes
- The website shall respond with the appropriate HTTP status codes, in particular:
- 200 – OK,
- 301 – Moved permanently,
- 302 – Found,
- 404 – Not found,
- 500 – Internal server error.
404 Error Pages
- Does a 404 error result in a suitable, engaging no results page?
- Is a 404 status code returned for incorrect URLs at all levels of the site?
- How many current 404 errors are there?
- Are there any pages that don’t return a 404?
- Are there any soft 404s (check GSC)?
Mobile
- Has the site been configured for mobile? Is the site responsive?
- https://developers.google.com/search/mobile-sites/mobile-seo/
- Is there parity in the desktop and mobile linking structure?
International
- Is HREFLANG implemented correctly across localised sites?
- Are there links going to all localised content and across localised sites where necessary?
- Is on-page content localised, including meta titles and descriptions?
- Is the HTML lang attribute used correctly?
- Is Googlebot able to navigate, crawl, and index, all international versions of a site?
- Is the URL localised to the correct language?
- Is international targeting correctly configured in GSC?
- Are there any conflicts between the XML sitemap and HTML HREFLANG annotations?
HTTPS
- Is HTTPS across all pages?
- Do all internal links point to HTTPS?
- Do all pages canonicalised to HHTPS?
- Are there redirects in place from HTTP to HTTPS?
- Are there any unsecured assets preventing the gree padlock from being displayed?
Cloaking
- Does the website serve the same content to all users on all user agents?
Internal Linking
Excessive Internal Linking
- Does the page contain an excessive (500+) number of internal links?
Breadcrumbs
- Are breadcrumbs present across the site?
eCommerce Banners
- Do eCommerce banners on list pages utilise deep links?
Subcategories/Facets/Filters
- Are subcategories, filters and facets employed appropriately to ensure correct, non-duplicate internal linking?
No Follow Links and Linking to Index Pages
- Are there internal follow links going to pages that are noindexed?
- Are there internal nofollow links going to indexable pages?
Broken/Redirected Internal Linking
- Are there any links that are broken/redirecting internally?
Internal Linking Opportunities
- Are there internal linking opportunities?
- Is internal anchor text used effectively?
- Do they link to inconsequential content more than important organic content?
External Links
Disavow
- Is a disavow necessary?
External Links to 404s
- Are there external links to 404 pages or other pages which aren’t used anymore?
- Are there orphaned pages with backlinks?
- Are there any broken or fragmented links that can be redirected?
First Paint and Interactive
- What are the first paint benchmarks in Lighthouse?
- What are the time to interactive benchmarks in Lighthouse?
- Are there any other issues in Lighthouse that should be addressed?
User Experience
Popups
- Are there any intrusive popup banners or interstitials?
- https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2016/08/helping-users-easily-access-content-on
Performance Metrics
- Are there any issues with performance metrics within Analytics?
