SaaS SEO Audit vs General SEO Audit: What's Different?
What a SaaS audit adds: rendering, the app subdomain, pricing and feature pages, funnel keywords and review platforms, and when a general audit is enough.
- Updated
- 6 min read
By Szymon Kokot Published Updated 30 min read
SaaS SEO Checklist (2026): 54 Checks for Software Websites
A SaaS SEO checklist covers 54 checks in ten areas: technical SEO, on-page SEO, funnel keywords, conversion pages, feature and integration pages, content, competitors and review platforms, backlinks, user experience and AI search visibility. A software site has problems a brochure site never meets: an app subdomain that must stay out of search, a pricing page that decides a large share of commercial traffic, a features section that is often one page when it should be twelve, and a signup flow that can waste every ranking you earn. This checklist follows the same 54 points as the Illucrum SaaS SEO Audit.
In short: A SaaS SEO audit checks whether crawlers can see a JavaScript-built marketing site, whether the app and login pages stay out of search, whether pricing, feature, integration and comparison pages exist and can rank, how visible the product is at each stage of the buyer's research, how it compares on review platforms, and whether AI assistants recommend it. All 54 checks run on free tools.
What does this SaaS SEO checklist cover?
This SaaS SEO checklist covers 54 checks in 10 sections, built for B2B and B2C software with a free trial, a demo or a freemium plan. If you sell services rather than software, use the website SEO checklist instead.
| # | Section | Checks | The question it answers |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Technical SEO | 1 to 10 | Can crawlers see the marketing site, and is the app kept out of search? |
| 2 | On-page SEO | 11 to 18 | Do the homepage, pricing and feature pages say clearly what they offer? |
| 3 | Funnel keyword strategy | 19 to 25 | Is the product visible at the problem, shortlist and decision stages? |
| 4 | Conversion pages and trust | 26 to 29 | Do the trial and demo pages turn search visits into signups? |
| 5 | Feature, integration and programmatic pages | 30 to 32 | Can buyers with very specific needs find a page built for them? |
| 6 | Content and blog | 33 to 34 | Does the content reach buyers before they know the product's name? |
| 7 | Competitors and search results | 35 to 38 | How does the product compare with competitors and review platforms? |
| 8 | Backlink profile | 39 to 43 | Which sites link to yours, and how healthy do those links look? |
| 9 | UX and conversion | 44 to 48 | Does a search visitor move smoothly toward a trial or demo? |
| 10 | AI search visibility | 49 to 54 | Do AI assistants recommend the product and cite the site? |
What do you need before you start?
You need verified Google Search Console and Google Analytics 4 access, the product's list of features and integrations, and a clear idea of your two or three buyer personas. Without Search Console, the keyword and indexing checks are guesswork. Without the feature and integration list, section 5 is too.
| Tool | Used for | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Google Search Console | Indexing, queries by funnel stage, positions, CTR, links | Free, needs a verified site |
| Google Analytics 4 | Behavior of search visitors on commercial pages | Free, needs property access |
| PageSpeed Insights | Performance, Core Web Vitals, JavaScript diagnostics | Free |
| Illucrum Bulk SEO Checker | Raw-HTML titles, headings, canonicals, links, word counts and schema for up to 25 URLs | Free, no account |
| Chrome DevTools | Raw source against the rendered page, network, mobile view | Free |
| Rich Results Test and Schema Markup Validator | Structured data, and the HTML Google renders | Free |
| G2, Capterra and your category's review sites | Review volume, rating and recency against competitors | Free to view |
| ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini | Whether the product is recommended in AI answers | Free tiers |
| A backlink tool | Referring domains and anchors for you and competitors | Free tiers exist; use one tool for every domain |
Before the first check, open a spreadsheet with four columns (check number, finding, evidence, severity) and fix a page sample you will use throughout: the homepage, the pricing page, two feature pages, one integration or use-case page if either exists, the trial or demo page and one blog post. Then write down where the marketing site, the app, the documentation and the help center live: same host, subdomain or separate domain. Several technical findings depend on it.
Section 1: How do you check technical SEO on a SaaS site? (checks 1 to 10)
Technical SEO checks on a SaaS site cover the usual foundations plus three risks specific to software companies: marketing sites built with JavaScript frameworks, app subdomains and login walls, and documentation hosted separately. A single one of these can hide most of a site from search.
1. Page speed (mobile and desktop)
Run each sample page through PageSpeed Insights for mobile and desktop and record both Performance scores, judging on the mobile score of the weakest page. Marketing sites built with React or Next.js often ship a JavaScript bundle sized for an application rather than a landing page, so read the "Reduce unused JavaScript" and "Reduce JavaScript execution time" diagnostics specifically.
Good result: a mobile Performance score of 90 or above on every commercial page.
Record: mobile and desktop scores per page, unused JavaScript and execution time.
2. Core Web Vitals (LCP, INP, CLS)
Core Web Vitals are Google's measures of loading (Largest Contentful Paint), responsiveness (Interaction to Next Paint) and visual stability (Cumulative Layout Shift). Read the field data at the top of each PageSpeed report and the Core Web Vitals report in Search Console. Watch CLS on the pricing page, where a plan table that loads late shifts the content at the moment someone is deciding.
Good result: LCP of 2.5 seconds or less, INP of 200 milliseconds or less and CLS of 0.1 or less.
Record: the three values per page, field or lab, and any URL group marked Poor.
3. HTTPS and SSL certificate
Confirm the marketing site, documentation and signup pages all load over HTTPS, and that http:// redirects to https:// in one hop. Check each host separately: the app and docs subdomains often run on a different certificate and configuration from the marketing site. Run each host through SSL Labs.
Good result: valid certificates and grade A or A+ on every host, with no mixed content.
Record: certificate expiry and SSL Labs grade per host, and any mixed content.
4. Mobile usability
Open the pricing page, a feature page and the trial page in DevTools device mode at 390 pixels wide, then on a real phone. Pricing tables are the usual failure: three or four plan columns that overflow sideways or collapse in an order that puts the wrong plan first. Check plans can still be compared, the signup button is reachable without zooming and form fields are usable.
Good result: every commercial page works on a phone, including the plan comparison.
Record: per page, whether the layout holds and how the pricing table behaves, with screenshots.
5. JavaScript rendering and indexability
JavaScript rendering is whether a page's content exists in the HTML the server sends, or only appears after scripts run in the browser. This is the highest-value check on many SaaS sites. Paste the homepage and two feature pages into the Bulk SEO Checker, which reads the raw HTML without running JavaScript: if a page that looks full in the browser comes back with no H1 and a word count near zero, its content depends on JavaScript. Confirm with the Rich Results Test, which shows the HTML Google rendered. Google renders JavaScript; most AI crawlers largely don't.
Good result: the H1, body copy, navigation links, canonical and meta tags are all in the raw HTML.
Record: for each of those five elements, whether it is in the raw HTML, the rendered page or both.
6. Robots.txt and XML sitemap
Read robots.txt on every host (marketing site, app, docs), because each subdomain has its own. Look for rules that block feature, integration, pricing or documentation paths. Then open the sitemap, confirm it is valid and submitted in Search Console, and paste its URLs into the Bulk SEO Checker in batches of 25 to confirm each returns 200 and is canonical. No app, login or account URL should be listed.
Good result: crawlers can reach every marketing, pricing, feature and documentation page, and the sitemap lists only those.
Record: robots.txt rules per host, sitemap URL count, and any failing or app URL in the sitemap.
7. App subdomain and login-wall handling
The app, login and account areas should stay out of search without hiding anything that should be found. Request the app's root and a logged-out dashboard URL and record the status code and any noindex directive. Then search site:app.yourdomain.com and count the results. Zero is the target: anything more is login screens and empty states appearing in search under your brand.
Good result: no app or login pages indexed, and no marketing page caught by the app's rules.
Record: the app host, status codes and directives for logged-out URLs, and the site: count.
8. Canonical tags and duplicate URLs
Check each sample page has a self-referencing, absolute HTTPS canonical in the Bulk SEO Checker export. Then test the duplicates SaaS sites create: the same page with UTM parameters, with and without a trailing slash, and pages reachable at two routes, such as /features/reporting and /product/reporting. Each variant should redirect or carry the main page's canonical.
Good result: one main address per page, with every duplicate pointing to it.
Record: missing or wrong canonicals, and duplicate routes that return 200 with no canonical.
9. Structured data
Run the homepage, pricing page and a feature page through both validators and record the types found. The relevant set for software is Organization, SoftwareApplication (or Product), BreadcrumbList and Article on blog posts. Don't copy your G2 or Capterra rating into your own markup: Google's review snippet guidelines require ratings collected directly from users, not aggregated from other sites.
Good result: valid, specific markup on each page type that matches what the page shows.
Record: types per page, errors and warnings, and any third-party rating in the markup.
10. Index coverage
In Search Console, open Indexing, then Pages, and record the indexed and not indexed totals and the reasons. On SaaS sites the reasons to watch are "Crawled, currently not indexed" on thin feature or integration pages and "Duplicate without user-selected canonical" on parameter URLs. Run URL Inspection on pricing, every feature page and the trial page individually.
Good result: every commercial page indexed, and exclusions that are intentional.
Record: indexed and not indexed counts, the reason breakdown and the status of each commercial page.
Section 2: How do you check on-page SEO on a SaaS site? (checks 11 to 18)
On-page SEO checks on a SaaS site focus on the pages with commercial intent: the homepage, the pricing page and the feature pages. SaaS on-page problems are rarely missing tags; they are pages written as brand positioning when the searcher behind them is looking for a product.
11. Title tags
Check the Bulk SEO Checker export for missing and duplicate titles, then read them. Two SaaS failures are common: feature pages titled "[Product] | Features" instead of naming the capability, and a pricing page whose title doesn't contain the word "pricing", which is the term people search.
Good result: unique titles of about 50 to 60 characters, each naming the capability or page topic first.
Record: missing and duplicate titles, feature titles that don't name their feature, and the pricing page title.
12. Meta descriptions
Check descriptions on commercial pages only. Google rewrites most meta descriptions and they don't affect rankings, so treat them as ad copy for the pricing, trial, comparison and top feature pages, where a searcher is close to deciding.
Good result: a specific description of about 140 to 160 characters on each commercial page.
Record: missing or duplicate descriptions on commercial pages, and any that repeat the brand tagline.
13. Heading structure (H1 to H3)
Check each sample page has one H1 and a logical H2 and H3 outline, using the Headings table of the Bulk SEO Checker. On feature pages, H2s should name capabilities ("Real-time reporting"), not stages of a story ("How it works"). On the pricing page, plan names should be real headings, not styled text.
Good result: one H1 naming the page's topic, and H2s that read as an outline of capabilities.
Record: pages with no H1 or several, skipped levels and the H2 outline of each commercial page.
14. Homepage positioning and category clarity
Read the homepage H1 on its own and ask which category of software it describes. "Work better, together" describes nothing; "Project management software for remote teams" names a category, a use and a buyer. Check the target customer is named above the fold. This check most often explains why a product ranks for its own name and nothing else.
Good result: the H1 and first screen state the category, the buyer and the use.
Record: the exact H1, whether it contains a category term, and whether the buyer is named above the fold.
15. Pricing page
Confirm the pricing page exists, returns 200, has no noindex and is linked from the main menu. Check whether prices are published as text, or hidden behind "Contact sales" or inside an image. Published pricing can rank for "[product] pricing" searches and be quoted by AI assistants; hidden pricing gives up both.
Good result: an indexable pricing page with prices and plan names in plain text and "pricing" in the title and H1.
Record: indexability, title and H1, whether prices are text, and whether plans are compared in a table.
16. Feature pages
Map how features are presented. Does each core capability have its own URL, title, H1 and explanation, or are twelve features listed on one /features page? One page can't rank for twelve different capability searches. Count the core features and how many have a page of their own.
Good result: every core capability has its own indexable page.
Record: the number of core features, the number with their own page, and the list without one.
17. Content quality and depth
Read the feature and use-case pages as a buyer with three competitors open in other tabs. Does each page say what the feature does, who it is for, what it replaces and what its limits are? Copy built on "powerful", "flexible" and "intuitive" without a single specific is the finding.
Good result: commercial pages that answer a buyer's evaluation questions with specifics.
Record: per page, a one-line verdict and the questions it leaves unanswered.
18. Internal linking
Use the Links table of the Bulk SEO Checker to see which pages link to pricing, each feature page and the trial page, and with what anchor text. Check the direction of the links: do blog posts link to the feature pages they discuss, or all to the homepage? Do feature pages link to each other and to the trial? Compare the sitemap with the pages reachable by links to find orphan feature or integration pages.
Good result: content links to features, features link to pricing and trial, and no commercial page is orphaned.
Record: links into each commercial page, blog-to-feature links and orphan pages.
If working through this on your own product is more time than you want to spend, the SaaS SEO Audit covers the same 54 points and ends in a scored report with the fixes in order.
Section 3: How do you check funnel keyword coverage? (checks 19 to 25)
Funnel keyword checks measure how visible the product is as buyers move from a problem, to a shortlist, to a decision. Most SaaS products are visible at only one of those stages. Use three months of Search Console data, under Performance, Search results.
19. Funnel stage coverage
Export all queries and sort them into three groups. Awareness queries describe the problem ("how to reduce churn"). Consideration queries build a shortlist ("best churn software", "[competitor] alternatives", "[product] vs [competitor]"). Decision queries are about your product ("[product] pricing", "[product] review", "[product] free trial"). Add up the clicks per group.
Good result: meaningful non-branded clicks at the awareness and consideration stages, not only at decision.
Record: clicks and impressions per stage, and the thinnest stage.
20. Comparison and alternatives visibility
Search "best [category] software", "[product] vs [top competitor]" and "[top competitor] alternatives" in a private window and record the top five results. Then check whether you have a page aimed at each of those query shapes at all. These are the searches where buyers build their shortlist, and many products have no page for them.
Good result: a page of yours ranks for the main "best", "vs" and "alternatives" queries in your category.
Record: per query, the top five results and whether you have a page for it.
21. Ranking keywords overview
Filter out branded queries and count the non-branded queries with impressions and how many rank in the top 10. Read the top 15 by impressions and judge whether they come from potential buyers. This is the plainest measure of whether search brings in anyone new.
Good result: a solid set of relevant non-branded queries, several on page one.
Record: the number of non-branded queries, the number on page one, and the top 15 with position and CTR.
22. Branded vs non-branded split
Filter queries with a regular expression matching your product name and its misspellings, record the clicks, then invert the filter. For a SaaS product, a mostly branded split usually means search works as a shortcut to the login page for existing users rather than as a way to find new ones.
Good result: more than half of search clicks from non-branded queries.
Record: branded clicks, non-branded clicks and the split.
23. Keyword mapping and cannibalization
List your key pages and the one query each should win. Look for collisions: two feature pages aimed at the same capability, a blog post competing with the feature page it should support, a use-case page overlapping a feature page. Confirm in the Search Console Pages tab which URL Google actually shows for each contested query.
Good result: one page per important query, with no pages splitting the same search.
Record: the page-to-query map, each collision and the URL Google currently prefers.
24. Keyword placement
For each commercial page, check its target query appears in the title, the H1, the first paragraph, at least one H2 and the meta description. This is a coverage check, not a density calculation. What you are looking for is a page that never says plainly what it is.
Good result: each commercial page states its topic in all five places and reads naturally.
Record: per page, the target query and where it appears.
25. Search intent alignment
Search your top 10 non-branded queries and note the dominant result type: product pages, guides, listicles, review platforms or community threads. Compare with the page you point at each query. A feature page competing in a results page full of listicles won't win by being improved; the query needs a different kind of page.
Good result: each commercial page is the same kind of page that ranks for its query.
Record: per query, the dominant result type, your page type and whether they match.
Section 4: How do you check the conversion pages? (checks 26 to 29)
Conversion page checks look at the pages where search traffic becomes trials, demos and signups, and at the trust signals buyers look for before committing. Search visitors arrive without the warm-up of an ad sequence or a sales call, so these pages carry more of the persuasion than most teams assume.
26. Trial, demo and signup page
Find the main conversion page and confirm it returns 200, has no noindex and is linked from every key page. "[Product] free trial" and "[product] demo" are real searches, so check the page names what it offers in its title and H1. Read it as someone arriving cold from Google and ask whether it explains what happens after they click.
Good result: an indexable page that states the offer plainly and says what happens next.
Record: indexability, title and H1, and what the page assumes the visitor already knows.
27. Trust signals on conversion pages
Count the trust signals on the pricing and trial pages: customer logos (used with permission), named testimonials, review platform ratings, security and compliance information such as SOC 2 or GDPR, "no credit card required" where true, and any guarantee. Note which types are missing.
Good result: several verifiable trust signals next to the point of signup.
Record: the signals present on each conversion page and the types that are absent.
28. Calls to action by funnel stage
On each key page, find the main call to action, check it is visible without scrolling and read the button text. Count competing actions: a page offering "Start free trial", "Book a demo", "Download the guide" and "Talk to sales" in one view offers nothing. Check the action fits the stage: a blog post shouldn't open with "Talk to sales".
Good result: one clear primary action per page, matched to where the visitor is in their decision.
Record: per page, the main action, its wording, its position and the number of competing actions.
29. Company, security and legal pages
Buyers check who is behind a product before they hand over data. Confirm there is an About or company page naming the people and company, a security page or trust center describing how data is protected, and a privacy policy and terms linked from the signup page. For B2B products, check whether a data processing agreement and sub-processor list are available.
Good result: buyers can see who runs the product, how data is handled and what terms they would sign.
Record: which of these pages exist, and which are missing or hard to find.
Section 5: How do you check feature, integration and programmatic pages? (checks 30 to 32)
Feature, integration and programmatic pages reach buyers with very specific needs: users of another tool checking whether yours fits their stack, or a particular kind of team looking for a tool built for them. This is where many SaaS products have their largest untouched search opportunity.
30. Integration pages
If the product has no integrations, mark this check N/A. Otherwise, list every integration and check how it is presented: its own page with a URL, title, H1 and explanation, or a grid of logos on one /integrations page. Search "[your product] [integration name]" for three or four of the biggest integrations and see whether anything of yours ranks.
Good result: each significant integration has its own page that users of the other tool can find.
Record: total integrations, the number with their own page, and results for the sampled searches.
31. Use-case and persona pages
Check whether the site has pages for specific buyers or situations, such as "/for-agencies" or "[category] software for [industry]". Confirm each is genuinely different from the homepage, not the same page with one word changed, and that it links to the relevant feature pages. Note which of your main personas have no page.
Good result: a specific, useful page for each main persona and use case.
Record: existing pages, how different each one is, and the personas without a page.
32. Programmatic page opportunity
Programmatic pages are sets of pages built from a template and a dataset, such as one page per integration, template or industry. List the repeatable data the product has, check whether people search for combinations of it (autocomplete is a quick signal) and whether competitors have built such pages. If programmatic pages already exist, check each carries real, specific value; hundreds of near-identical pages can hurt more than they help.
Good result: repeatable data with real demand is either covered by useful pages or identified as an opportunity.
Record: the data types, evidence of demand, competitor examples, and the quality of any existing set.
Section 6: How do you check content and the blog? (checks 33 to 34)
Content checks look at whether the blog or resource hub reaches buyers at the awareness and consideration stages, long before they search for the product by name.
33. Blog and content hub
Count the published posts and note the date of the most recent one and how many were published in the last six months. Check the topics match the problems buyers search for, and that posts link to the feature pages they relate to. An abandoned blog is a weaker signal than no blog, because the date of the last post is visible.
Good result: an active blog targeting buyer problems, with posts that lead toward the product.
Record: post count, date of the latest post, posts in the last six months and whether posts link to product pages.
34. Keyword gap vs competitors
Search 10 to 15 non-branded target queries and record who ranks. Where a competitor ranks and you are missing, open their page and classify it: guide, comparison, integration page, use-case page, glossary entry, template. The gap is usually a kind of page you haven't built, not a keyword you forgot.
Good result: no major topic or page type where competitors rank and you have nothing.
Record: query-by-query rankings and the page types competitors have that you don't.
Section 7: How do you check competitors and search results? (checks 35 to 38)
Competitor checks compare the product with its search competitors and with the review platforms that often outrank every vendor. Start by searching your main non-branded terms and "best [category] software" in a private window and noting the domains that recur; separate product competitors from platforms and publishers.
35. Authority comparison
Record a third-party authority score (such as Domain Strength, Domain Rating or Authority Score) for your site and your two or three product competitors, from the same tool on the same day. The figure is an estimate, not a Google metric. Its use is calibration: whether you are competing with peers or with sites several years ahead.
Good result: within about 10 points of the strongest competitor on the same scale.
Record: each score, the tool and date, and the gap to the strongest competitor.
36. Review platform profiles
Search your product on the review platforms that matter for your category, usually G2, Capterra and a few specialists. Check each profile is claimed, complete, in the right category and has current screenshots. Record the review count, rating and date of the latest review for you and your two main competitors.
Good result: claimed, complete profiles with review volume and recency close to your competitors'.
Record: per platform, claim status, category, review count, rating and latest review date for you and each competitor.
37. Competitor content benchmark
Count, for your top two competitors and for yourself: feature pages, integration pages, use-case pages, comparison pages and blog posts published in the last six months. Put the numbers in one table. It is often the clearest single explanation of a ranking difference.
Good result: page counts roughly level with competitors on the page types that matter.
Record: the counts per page type for each competitor and for you.
38. Search result features
Search 5 to 10 target queries and note what appears around the regular results: AI Overviews, featured snippets, People Also Ask, videos and review platform listings. Record whether you appear in any of them and which domain wins each. FAQ rich results no longer appear in Google, since May 2026, so don't plan for them.
Good result: you appear in at least some of the features shown for your target queries.
Record: per query, the features present, whether you appear and who wins each.
Section 8: How do you check the backlink profile? (checks 39 to 43)
Backlink checks look at the links from other websites to yours, recorded as a snapshot with today's date. Search Console's Links report is a sample with no history, so the figures work as a baseline for later comparison rather than a trend.
39. Referring domains and link diversity
In Search Console, open Links and read the top linking sites. For a software product, a healthy profile includes review platforms, integration partners' directories, tech press, newsletters and podcasts. A count inflated by one syndicated directory listing isn't a link profile.
Good result: links from a spread of real, relevant sites, with no single source dominating.
Record: the number of linking sites, the top 20 with a note on each and the share of the top five.
40. Link quality and unnatural patterns
Check Security and Manual actions in Search Console first; a manual action for unnatural links is the one case where cleanup is urgent. Then scan the linking sites for built or bought links: exact-match commercial anchors from unrelated blogs, networks of similar sites, sitewide keyword links. Random spam you didn't create is normal and mostly ignored by Google; a disavow file is only worth it for a large artificial pattern.
Good result: no manual action and no sign of built or bought links.
Record: manual action status and any suspicious pattern, with examples.
41. Anchor text distribution
Open Links, then Top linking text, and sort anchors into branded, bare URL, generic and exact-match commercial. A product that earns coverage is mostly linked by name, because journalists and partners use the product name. A profile dominated by exact-match commercial anchors was bought, whether or not the current team bought it.
Good result: mostly branded and URL anchors.
Record: the approximate share of each group.
42. Backlinked pages and broken link targets
Open Links, then Top linked pages, and paste the URLs into the Bulk SEO Checker. SaaS sites lose links through renamed features, retired landing pages and moved documentation. Any linked URL that returns an error, or redirects to the homepage instead of its closest equivalent, is wasting those links; a 301 to the right page recovers them.
Good result: every linked URL loads or redirects once to a relevant page.
Record: broken or poorly redirected linked URLs and how many sites link to each.
43. Competitor link gap
Run your domain and your competitors through the same backlink tool on the same day and record referring domains. Then list domains that link to two or more competitors but not to you: integration directories, category listings, comparison articles, podcasts and newsletters are typical.
Good result: referring domains within about 20% of the median competitor.
Record: referring domains per domain, the tool and date, and the gap list by type.
Section 9: How do you check UX and conversion? (checks 44 to 48)
UX and conversion checks follow a search visitor from landing to signup and note what stops them. Rankings that don't turn into trials or demos are a cost, not an asset.
44. Signup friction
Start a signup yourself in a private window. Count the required fields, note whether a credit card is required before the trial starts, whether single sign-on is offered, how many steps come before the product is usable and whether email verification blocks the first session. Cold search traffic drops off at each of these more than warm traffic does.
Good result: a short form with no field that isn't needed to start.
Record: field count, credit card requirement, sign-in options, steps and where verification sits.
45. Page layout and readability
Read the feature and pricing pages at mobile width. Look for paragraphs longer than four lines, features described in prose where a list would work, comparisons that can't be scanned, and pages with no image of the product itself. Buyers scan before they read.
Good result: commercial pages that can be understood by scanning headings, lists, tables and product visuals.
Record: per page, the sections that are dense or hard to scan.
46. Click-through rate vs position
Click-through rate (CTR) is the share of people who see a result and click it. In Search Console, compare each commercial page's CTR with pages of your own site that rank at similar positions. A page that ranks well but is clicked much less than its neighbors usually has a weak title or description, or faces a search result feature that answers the question first.
Good result: no commercial page with a CTR far below the site's own pages at the same position.
Record: pages with low CTR for their position, with position, impressions and CTR.
47. Accessibility basics
Check the lang attribute on the <html> element, that signup form inputs have labels, that meaningful images have alt text, and that the main buttons pass color contrast (the DevTools accessibility pane shows the contrast ratio). Enterprise buyers increasingly ask for an accessibility statement during procurement, and finding problems now is easier than during a deal.
Good result: labeled form fields, alt text, a lang attribute and sufficient contrast on key pages.
Record: each problem found and the page it is on.
48. Funnel coherence
Follow one journey from end to end: a blog post, the feature page it relates to, pricing, then the trial. At each step, check there is an obvious next action and the message carries over. Many SaaS funnels break at the first step, where the blog post offers no route into the product.
Good result: a path with a clear next step at every stage and no dead ends.
Record: the path you followed and the step where it breaks.
Section 10: How do you check AI search visibility for a SaaS product? (checks 49 to 54)
AI search visibility checks measure whether AI assistants recommend the product when buyers ask which tool to choose. SaaS is among the categories most exposed to this, because "what is the best tool for X" is exactly the question buyers now ask assistants. Run every test logged out or in a temporary chat, and record the date.
49. AI recommendations for category questions
Ask ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini the questions a buyer would: "best [category] software", "best [category] tool for [use case]", "[category] tools for small teams". Record whether your product appears and where in the list. Then ask "[your product] vs [top competitor]" and check the answer is accurate. Record the sources each answer cites, because they show where the recommendation is decided.
Good result: recommended by two or more assistants for category questions and compared accurately.
Record: per assistant and question, whether you appear, your position and the cited sources.
50. Google AI Overview presence
Search your category, comparison and "best X for Y" queries in a private window. Note whether an AI Overview appears, expand its sources and record the cited domains. Comparison and alternatives queries carry the most intent, so weight them.
Good result: your site is cited in AI Overviews for several category or comparison queries.
Record: per query, whether an Overview appears, the cited domains and whether you are among them.
51. Review platform and community footprint
AI assistants draw heavily on review platforms and communities when recommending software. Compare your review volume, rating and latest review date with your two main competitors on the platforms from check 36. Then search Reddit and the communities your buyers use for your category and product, and read the sentiment.
Good result: review volume, recency and community presence close to the competitors being recommended.
Record: review figures for you and each competitor, and the number and tone of community mentions.
52. Answer-ready product and comparison content
Check that pricing exists as plain text, that a comparison or alternatives page exists for assistants to quote, and that each feature page answers its core question in the first 100 words. Cross-check with check 5: content that only appears after JavaScript runs is content many AI crawlers never see.
Good result: pricing, comparisons and feature answers in plain text, early on each page.
Record: whether pricing is text, which comparison pages exist, and where the direct answer sits on each feature page.
53. Product entity markup
Check the homepage and key pages for Organization and SoftwareApplication (or Product) markup. The Organization block should have a sameAs list linking to your G2, Capterra, LinkedIn and Crunchbase profiles. sameAs is the field most often left empty, and it is what lets a machine connect your site to your reputation on other sites.
Good result: complete organization and product markup, with sameAs links to real profiles.
Record: types found, missing fields and the full sameAs list.
54. AI crawler access and documentation
Check robots.txt on the marketing site and on the docs or help subdomain for the three classes of AI crawler: retrieval crawlers (OAI-SearchBot, Claude-SearchBot, PerplexityBot, Bingbot), user-triggered fetchers (ChatGPT-User, Claude-User, Perplexity-User) and training crawlers (GPTBot, ClaudeBot, Google-Extended, CCBot). Retrieval and user-triggered access decide visibility; blocking training crawlers is a separate choice. Assistants cite documentation constantly for "how do I do X in [product]" questions, so check the docs are indexable. An llms.txt file has a practical use for developer docs read by coding assistants, but no major AI search product has confirmed using it for ranking.
Good result: retrieval and user-triggered crawlers allowed on every host, and documentation indexable.
Record: the rule for each crawler on each host, whether each was intended, and whether the docs are indexed.
Frequently asked questions
How long does a SaaS SEO audit take to do yourself?
A first pass through this SaaS SEO checklist takes five to eight hours if you know the tools, spread over a couple of days. The rendering check and the feature and integration inventory take longest. The AI section takes under an hour and is often where the surprises are, because few teams have asked an assistant what it says about their product.
What makes SaaS SEO different from SEO for other websites?
Four things make SaaS SEO different: JavaScript frameworks can hide content from crawlers, the app and login pages must be kept out of search, pricing and feature page structure decides most of the commercial search opportunity, and review platforms carry unusual weight for both rankings and AI recommendations.
When should a SaaS company run its first SEO audit?
Run a first SaaS SEO audit once the marketing site has more than a handful of pages and Search Console has at least three months of data; before that there is little to measure. Earlier than that, the question is when to start SEO at all, which is a different decision.
How is a SaaS SEO checklist different from a general website checklist?
The website SEO checklist has sections on trust signals and local presence. The SaaS checklist replaces them with funnel keywords, pricing and trial pages, integration and programmatic pages and review platforms, and adds rendering and app subdomain checks to the technical section. The SaaS vs general audit comparison goes through the differences.
Most SaaS SEO problems are structural decisions: one features page instead of twelve, pricing behind a contact form, docs set to noindex, a trial that asks for a card. Decisions are cheaper to change than rankings are to earn. If you'd rather have the whole picture gathered and prioritized for you, the SaaS SEO Audit covers all 54 points at a fixed price listed on the pricing page.