Why I Recommend a Super-duper Website Audit Around Six Months After Launch

26/09/26 • WEB DESIGN, SERVICES, SEO, WEB DEVELOPMENT, AFTER LAUNCH SEO

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I can technically check a website immediately after launch.
A proper performance audit is more useful once we have real search, traffic and conversion data.
Around six months is often a good point for a fuller review.
I look at search visibility, traffic, conversions, technical performance, backlinks, competitors and local visibility.
The important bit is deciding together what is actually worth doing next.

There is a difference between checking that a website works properly and reviewing how well it is actually performing.

The technical checks happen during the build and immediately after launch.

But if we want to understand how people are finding the website, what Google is doing with it and whether it is actually generating useful business, we need some data first.

Three visitors and somebody accidentally clicking the contact page probably isn’t enough to base a twelve-month marketing strategy on.

Why do I recommend around six months?

After roughly four to six months, Google Search Console and analytics usually give us a much more useful evidence base.

By then, I can start looking at things such as:

Which searches are generating impressions
Which pages are attracting visitors
Which pages are beginning to rank
Where users may be dropping away
Which channels are producing enquiries
Which areas of the website are showing potential

For websites with relatively low traffic, I generally favour the later end of that four-to-six-month period. More data usually gives us something more meaningful to work with.

What do I look at during the audit?

Website performance and analytics

I can review:

Traffic and acquisition trends
Strongest and weakest landing pages
User journeys and engagement
Enquiries, purchases or other important conversions

Google search performance

Using Search Console, I look at:

Search impressions and clicks
Click-through rates
Average search positions
Growing and declining queries
Pages with realistic potential to improve
New content and keyword opportunities

This lets us see what Google is already beginning to associate the website with rather than relying entirely on what we thought people might search for before launch.

Technical and on-page SEO

If I’ve designed and built the website, the technical foundations should already be in place from launch. I’m good. Trust me. Clean semantic code, crawlability, mobile usability, accessibility, page structure and performance are all considered as part of the build rather than being things I suddenly discover six months later.

That doesn’t mean there’s never anything to improve, though. Real-world usage can highlight things we couldn’t see before launch, content and the website may have evolved, the occasional issue can slip through the net, and web technology and best practice don’t exactly stand still.

So at this stage I revisit areas such as:

Crawlability and indexation
Page performance and Core Web Vitals
Mobile usability and accessibility
Titles, headings and content structure
Internal linking
Broken links and redirects
Any newer technical opportunities or improvements that have become apparent since launch

The point isn’t to redo the technical SEO. It’s to check that everything is still working as intended and see whether six months of actual data gives us opportunities to make an already solid website even better.

Backlinks, competitors and local visibility

I don’t just look at your website in isolation.

Depending on the business, I can also review:

Your existing backlink profile
Two or three relevant competitors
New backlink opportunities
Competitor content and keyword gaps
Your Google Business Profile and reviews
North Wales-specific local search opportunities

That gives us some context. A metric being “good” or “bad” means a lot more when we understand what the businesses competing for the same customers are doing.

The point isn’t to produce a massive report

I’m not particularly interested in handing you 94 pages of coloured graphs, alarming red triangles and mysterious SEO scores before wishing you the best of luck.

The useful part of the audit is answering three fairly simple questions:

What’s working?
What’s holding us back?
What should we do next?

From there, I can prioritise the recommendations and we can decide together where your time and budget are most likely to have an impact.

What does a website audit cost?

For most small to medium-sized websites, I can usually complete the main audit work within a day. At my current rate, that means a typical full website, SEO and performance audit costs around £320.

If you don’t need the full works, I can also carry out a more focused, slimmed-down audit for around £200 – £300, concentrating on the areas that are most relevant to your website and business. So, to channel my inner Doge: WOW DATA! SUCH OPPORTUNITIES! VERY VALUE!

I’ll always agree the scope and cost with you first, so you know what I’m looking at and what you’ll receive before I start.

Has your website been live for around six months?

I offer website, SEO and performance audits for businesses across North Wales.

I’ll use the real search, analytics and competitor data we’ve gathered to show you what has happened since launch, where opportunities are developing and what I recommend we concentrate on next.

Fill in the enquiry form, email me at kev@kevadamson.com, or call on 07974 697740 and we can have a proper rummage around in all that filthy data.

Also in the After Launch SEO series: