What is a website portfolio audit and why is it useful?

| Privacy | Continuous auditing | Continuous website audit |

Tristan Terlouw

Content Markeer

What is a website portfolio audit and why is it useful?

Consent and Preference

Tristan Terlouw

Digital Marketing Strategy Nixon

Over time, trends, technologies, and user expectations change and evolve. If your websites have not been audited in a while, they may have outdated features that are unnecessary, ineffective, or even harmful. Companies must audit their website portfolio to ensure that all their websites are functioning perfectly. Ensuring that websites are meeting expectations can be challenging, especially for large organizations with many sites. However, it is essential to do so.

Manually auditing hundreds of websites, conducting multiple checks per website, and performing manual auditing is a daunting task. It is not only time consuming, but also costly. By the time the first audits are completed, the first websites may have already changed. New cookies, additional third-party tags, and a constantly evolving list of active websites make it nearly impossible to keep everything under control.

In this blog post, we will discuss the benefits of automating website portfolio auditing. First, we will explain what auditing is and how it is used for website portfolios. Then, we will explain why you should automate auditing.

What Is auditing?

Auditing is the verification of records and processes to ensure accuracy and compliance. During an audit, you review records and systems to ensure they are accurate and compliant with the law. Auditing involves reviewing information, performing thorough tests, and providing an unbiased opinion of the findings.

Website auditing

Website auditing is the process of comprehensively assessing your website to ensure its smooth functionality, full-proof privacy, and seamless user experience. It helps you evaluate your website based on various parameters that determine its visibility in Google’s search rankings.

Additionally, it provides an in-depth analysis of your website, identifying any issues that may be hindering its performance. By suggesting areas for improvement, website auditing aims to increase website traffic and enhance user engagement.

Continuous website portfolio auditing

Continuous auditing is a new approach to auditing that goes beyond manual, periodic audits. It involves the use of automated tools and techniques to continuously monitor all of your organization’s websites in real-time. Unlike manual auditing, which is typically conducted on a periodic basis, continuous auditing allows for the continuous monitoring and analysis of data. This enables auditors to identify risks, errors, or anomalies as they occur rather than waiting for the next audit cycle, leading to increased efficiency, accuracy, and effectiveness in the auditing process.

Challenges of a manual auditing process

Many companies still rely on labour-intensive manual techniques to audit their websites. This can involve manually checking each page of a website and recording the results in a spreadsheet. This process can be time-consuming and difficult to manage, especially for large websites or portfolios of websites. Additionally, manual checks can be more prone to errors than automated audits.

Challenges that you may face when you manual audit your website portfolio:

Time-consuming: A manual website audit can take weeks or even months to complete, depending on the size and complexity of the website. This is because the auditor has to manually crawl every page on the website and inspect it for errors.
Prone to errors: It is easy to make mistakes when auditing a website manually, especially if the website is large or complex. This is because the auditor has to keep track of a lot of different factors, such as broken links, duplicate content, and technical SEO issues.
Difficult to collaborate: If multiple people are working on a manual website audit, it can be difficult to coordinate their efforts and make sure that everyone is on the same page. This is because the auditors have to manually share their findings and updates with each other.
Lack of standardization: There is no one-size-fits-all approach to manual website auditing. This means that different auditors may use different methods and tools, which can make it difficult to compare results.
Difficult to track progress: It can be difficult to track the progress of a manual website audit, especially if it is a large and complex project. This is because the auditor has to manually keep track of which pages have been audited and which issues have been found.
Spreadsheet hell: As you mentioned, working on a manually created spreadsheet can be a nightmare. It is easy to make mistakes, collaborate effectively, and keep track of progress.

How do you overcome these challenges?

Companies can overcome these challenges by using automation, specialized auditing tools, and regular monitoring. It is also important to stay informed about industry changes. Automated auditing solutions can streamline the process, minimize errors, and provide immediate feedback on audit results. By using automated tools, companies can improve the accuracy, efficiency, and overall success of their website portfolio audits. This can make your websites more user-friendly and enjoyable for your visitors, leading to increased satisfaction and engagement.

How to be in full control of your website portfolio?

The Nixon Platform helps you overcome the challenges of manual website portfolio auditing by continuously auditing all your websites at once. This gives you control over your entire website portfolio and saves you time and effort, allowing you to focus on more important tasks and improving your overall professionalism.

Automatically discover and scan your entire website portfolio, including all your websites, subdomains, and subdirectories. The platform continuously monitors for compliance issues, security risks, and performance problems. This eliminates the need for manual checks, which can be time-consuming and error prone.

Streamline your internal processes by assigning tasks to the right people. Experience time and cost savings with your optimized processes. Automate task assignment, improve efficiency, and maximise productivity. Get started with Nixon Digital. Chat one-on-one about how Nixon Digital can help your business.