The free Google test is five checks you can run in under an hour. You search your main service in a private window, test your homepage in PageSpeed Insights, check indexing in Search Console, compare your business details across listings and study the competitor ranking above you. Together they show how your business looks to a buyer who has never heard of you.
Why your own view of your site misleads you
You see your website differently from a buyer. You're signed in to Google, your browser remembers your site, and your search history shapes some of what you see. A buyer searching for the first time has none of that.
A private or incognito window gets you closer to their view. It starts signed out with no history, though Google still uses your location, so the results reflect where you're sitting.
Run the test now. Some of what you find will be uncomfortable.
Step 1: search your main service in a private window
Open a private window and search the term a buyer who doesn't know you would type, rather than your business name, such as "plumber in Austin" or "business accountant Chicago".
Look at three things. Do you appear on page one, in the map results or below them? How does your listing read next to the others, and would your title and description make a first-time buyer click? And when you click through, what does the first screen of your site tell that buyer?
Most owners haven't looked in a year or more, and results shift as competitors improve their listings. Repeat it every quarter.
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Book a free strategy callStep 2: test your homepage on mobile
Go to PageSpeed Insights, enter your homepage URL and look at the mobile results. Read the top section first. If Google has enough data from real visitors, it shows a Core Web Vitals assessment that passes or fails, based on how fast the main content loads (LCP), how quickly the page responds to taps (INP) and how much the layout jumps around (CLS). The Core Web Vitals report in Search Console uses the same real-visitor data.
The score out of 100 below it comes from a lab test on a simulated phone. Lighthouse, the tool behind it, rates 90 and above as good, 50 to 89 as needing improvement and anything under 50 as poor. The score moves between runs, so treat it as a diagnostic.
The suggestions under the score show what's slowing the page. On service business sites the usual culprits are uncompressed images, scripts that hold up the page from displaying and images far down the page that load before anyone scrolls to them. Most of them can be fixed without a redesign.
Step 3: check that Google has indexed your key pages
Open Google Search Console. If you haven't set it up, it's free and takes a few minutes, as long as you can get into your website or domain settings. Open the Page indexing report and compare the number of indexed pages with the number you expect Google to have.
Then paste your homepage and your main service page into the URL Inspection bar at the top. For each one it tells you whether the page is on Google, when Google last crawled it and which URL it treats as the main version.
A page that isn't indexed can't appear in search results. A page last crawled months ago won't reflect your recent changes yet, and the Request Indexing button in the same tool asks Google to look again.
Step 4: compare your business details everywhere
Search your business name and open your Google Business Profile. Check the name, address and phone number, then compare them with your website footer and with any directory listings you have, such as Yelp or your industry association.
They should match. An old phone number or the wrong suite number sends buyers to the wrong place, and it makes the picture Google builds of your business from around the web less consistent. Fix every mismatch you find, starting with the listings you control.
Step 5: study the competitor ranking above you
Go back to your search from step 1 and click the business ranking directly above you. Spend a minute on their site and ask three questions. Does it load faster than yours? Is their copy more specific about what they do and for whom? Is it easier to get in touch?
The answers point to the gaps costing you buyers right now. A full competitive audit can wait, because a minute of honest comparison usually shows the most pressing problem.
What to do with what you find
If a key page isn't indexed, URL Inspection usually says why, such as a noindex tag, a crawl error or Google choosing a different canonical, so fix that specific reason. If mobile is slow, work through the top suggestions in PageSpeed Insights, starting with images. Update each mismatched listing directly, claiming it first if you need to. And if you don't rank at all, start with a technical audit before any content work.
This test covers roughly the first half hour of a full SEO audit, and it reliably turns up the problems doing the most damage.
If it turns up more than one or two issues, the 30-day SEO quick wins plan sets out an order for working through them, so you fix the biggest problem first instead of whatever you noticed first.
