Show your work: What a marketing audit should actually check

Somebody offers you a “free marketing audit.” You say yes. Three days later you get a 40-page deck, a score out of 100, and a call from a salesperson.

Friend, that is not an audit. That is a lead form wearing a trench coat.

What is a marketing audit?

Here is the textbook answer: a systematic review of your marketing channels, assets and results, used to find gaps and opportunities.

Here is the real answer: someone looks at the few places where a customer decides whether to contact you, and tells you what to fix first. For a local business, that list is short.

What should an audit look at?

Your website, read the way a stranger reads it. On a phone, in a hurry, with a problem. Can I tell in five seconds what you do and where? Is the next step obvious, like a call button or a booking form? Does the phone number dial when I tap it? Are hours, prices or insurance easy to find? A good audit quotes your actual pages. “Improve your call to action” is not a finding.

Your Google listing. When someone searches for a dentist, a clinic or a brake shop, the map results show up before any website. That is your Google Business Profile. An audit checks that the hours, phone and photos are filled in, and how your rating and review count stack up against the businesses next to you.

Mobile speed. Most local searches happen on a phone, and a slow page loses people before they see your number. Google publishes a free test. A good audit reports the result in seconds and tells you whether that is good or a problem.

The right ways to find customers. Not every business needs ads, social and a blog. A shop that is not getting calls from its own website should usually fix that before paying for clicks. A good audit picks the few that fit you and says which to skip for now, with the reason.

What should you get back?

One first move: the single thing to fix before anything else, with the evidence behind it. A short plan. And an honest list of what could not be seen from the outside, so you know where the audit is guessing.

If you get a score with no evidence, or 30 recommendations with no order, you got a list, not an audit.

Want to see one?

Our free audit follows exactly this approach. See a sample report first, or run one on your own site. It takes about a minute and the preview needs no email.

And if you would rather have someone fix what it finds, that is what we do. Hive is a Seattle marketing agency that runs full-funnel programs for growing businesses. Say hello.