Templates / SEO content checklist
SEO content checklist
The concrete checks, ordered the way the work actually happens, from before you write to the week after you publish.
Most SEO checklists are a pile of items with no sequence, so people run them all at the end and discover the piece was aimed at the wrong search in the first place.
This one is ordered. Intent checks happen before drafting, because that is when they are cheap to act on. Structure checks happen during. On page checks happen after the writing is done and not before, because doing them early turns a draft into keyword arrangement.
Run it top to bottom once and you will feel where your process is weak. Most teams find it is the first section, not the last.
How to use it
- 01Run section one before a single word is drafted. If a piece fails there, no amount of on page work will save it.
- 02Keep section three closed until the draft reads well as writing. Optimizing a draft you have not finished is how keyword stuffing happens.
- 03Do the read aloud check in section three. It catches more real problems than any tool, and it takes six minutes on a 1,500 word piece.
- 04Treat the technical section as a hard gate. A page that is not indexable is not published, however good it is.
- 05Set a calendar reminder for the two follow up checks, at day three and day thirty. Publishing without a follow up date is where content goes to be forgotten.
- 06Keep the whole list to one page. A forty item checklist gets skimmed, and skimming defeats the point.
The template
1. Before you write. Intent.
The cheapest place to fix a piece. Fifteen minutes here saves a rewrite.
[ ] Search the primary keyword yourself and look at the whole first page.
[ ] Name the format that is ranking: how to, list, comparison, tool, definition, video. Match it or have a reason not to.
[ ] Write in one sentence what the searcher wants in the first thirty seconds.
[ ] Read the top three results and write one line each on what they miss. That gap is your angle.
[ ] Confirm this is a search someone in your audience actually makes, not a phrase your team invented.
[ ] Check you do not already have a page targeting this term. If you do, improve that page instead of publishing a second one.
[ ] Decide the single call to action before drafting, because it changes how the piece ends.
[ ] Note the related questions from the results page. Each one is a candidate section.
2. While drafting. Structure.
Structure checks, not word checks. If it does not work as a document it will not work in search.
[ ] One H1, and it contains the primary keyword in a form a human would say.
[ ] The promise is delivered in the first hundred and fifty words. No history, no throat clearing.
[ ] H2s read as a coherent list on their own. Read them with everything else hidden.
[ ] Each section has one job. Any section doing two becomes two sections.
[ ] The related questions from section one are answered somewhere in the piece.
[ ] There is at least one worked example with real specifics, not a hypothetical.
[ ] Paragraphs are four lines or shorter.
[ ] Every number, claim or statistic has a source link. Anything unsourced gets cut, not hedged.
[ ] The piece answers the search in the first screen and earns the rest of the scroll.
3. After the draft. On page.
Now, and not before. Optimizing an unfinished draft produces text arranged around a phrase.
[ ] Title tag under 60 characters, contains the primary keyword, reads like a promise rather than a label.
[ ] Meta description under 160 characters, contains the keyword, describes what the reader gets.
[ ] URL slug is short, readable, hyphenated, no dates, no stop words. Never change it after publishing.
[ ] Primary keyword appears in the title, the first hundred words and at least one H2, naturally in all three.
[ ] Read the piece aloud. Any sentence you stumble on gets rewritten, especially the keyword ones.
[ ] Related terms appear because the piece covers the topic properly, not because you inserted them.
[ ] Images have descriptive alt text that says what is in the image, not the keyword again.
[ ] Images are compressed and sized for the web. Nothing above about 200KB without a good reason.
[ ] Open graph title, description and image are set, because that is what people see when the link is shared.
[ ] Author is a real named person with a real bio.
[ ] Publish date is visible, and the update date is set to update rather than being faked later.
4. Links.
The most skipped section, and the cheapest ranking work you own outright.
[ ] At least three internal links out to other relevant pages of yours.
[ ] Anchor text describes the destination. No click here, no read more.
[ ] At least two older pages updated to link into this new one. This is the step almost everyone forgets.
[ ] Every external link opens the source you actually used, not a page that cites it.
[ ] No broken links. Click every one.
[ ] The call to action link works and goes where the copy says it goes.
[ ] Nothing links to a competitor with an unqualified recommendation you have not verified.
5. Technical, before publishing.
A hard gate. Fail any of these and the page is not ready, whatever the copy is like.
[ ] The page is indexable. No stray noindex left from staging.
[ ] Canonical tag points at this URL, not at a template default or a staging domain.
[ ] The page loads on a phone on a slow connection without layout jumping around.
[ ] Headings are real heading tags, not bold paragraphs styled to look like headings.
[ ] Any structured data you use validates, and describes what is genuinely on the page.
[ ] The page is reachable from somewhere on the site. An orphan page with no links in is a page nobody finds.
[ ] It appears in your sitemap.
[ ] View it logged out. Nothing important is hidden behind a login or a cookie banner that will not dismiss.
6. After publishing.
Two follow ups, both short. Put them in the calendar before you publish.
[ ] Same day: view the live URL logged out, on a phone, and click the call to action.
[ ] Same day: request indexing in your search console.
[ ] Same day: add the URL to your content calendar row so you can find it again.
[ ] Same day: schedule the social posts that reuse it.
[ ] Day 3: check the page is indexed. If it is not, check the canonical and the internal links first.
[ ] Day 30: look at which searches actually brought people in. They are rarely only the term you targeted.
[ ] Day 30: if a term you did not target is bringing people in, add the section that answers it properly.
[ ] Day 30: check whether the piece answers its question in the first screen, now that you know who is landing on it.
The one page version
Print this. It is the whole checklist compressed into what you will actually run.
Before: search it, match the format, name the gap, one CTA.
During: one H1, promise in 150 words, H2s make sense alone, one worked example, every number sourced.
After: title under 60, description under 160, clean slug, read it aloud, alt text, compressed images.
Links: three out, two old pages pointing in, all of them clicked.
Technical: indexable, canonical correct, works on a phone, in the sitemap, reachable.
Then: index request today, indexing check on day 3, search terms review on day 30.
Where this usually goes wrong
- Optimizing before the draft is good. If the writing does not stand up, keyword placement changes nothing except how it reads.
- Targeting the same term with three pages. They compete with each other, and the fix is to merge them into one strong page rather than publishing a fourth.
- Repeating the keyword in every alt tag. Alt text exists so people using a screen reader know what is in the image, and stuffing it fails both purposes.
- Changing the URL after publishing without a redirect. It throws away everything the page had earned, quietly.
- Never adding internal links from older pages. New pages sit with nothing pointing at them, and it is the one ranking factor entirely within your control.
Common questions
How long should content be for SEO?
As long as the search needs and no longer. Look at what ranks and at what the question actually requires. Padding to hit a word count makes the answer harder to find, which is the opposite of the goal.
How many times should the keyword appear?
Enough that the page is obviously about the topic, which usually happens naturally when you cover it properly. Title, first hundred words and one heading, then write for the reader. Counting past that is a warning sign.
Should I update old posts or write new ones?
Update, in most cases. An existing page has history and links, and improving it is usually faster than starting over. Write new when the search intent is genuinely different from anything you have.
How soon should I expect to see results?
Longer than you want, and it varies by site and topic, so anyone quoting you a fixed number is guessing. Check indexing at day three, check which searches you are appearing for at day thirty, and judge the piece on whether it answers the question well.
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