Step 2: How to setup Sites and audit your website

💡 Why is this important?

You already paid for content—now you need to make sure it ranks over time.

SERPs change. Competitors update and release new content. Google moves the goalposts with algorithm updates.

If you don’t re-optimize, you will fall behind.

❓ What’s in it for you?

When you set up Sites + Content Audit, Surfer will:

Scan your whole domain
Flag underperforming pages
Recommend top articles to refresh
Unlock a 5-step re-optimization workflow

🛠️ What you’ll need:

Google Search Console connected to Surfer
At least 30 days of Google Search Console (GSC) data
Content Audit in Sites
Content Editor

📆 When to do it and how often?

Set it up once → Check insights weekly

You should set up Sites (and Content Audit) as soon as possible. After the setup, you should monitor content performance and review refresh recommendations at least once per week.

Prepare

Make sure your website is connected to Google Search Console. If not, do that first → How to setup Google Search Console.
For Sites to work properly, make sure you have at least 30 days of data in your Google Search Console.
Connect your Google Search Console to your Surfer account (see How to add Google Search Console to Surfer for more details).

Step-by-step

Note: If you’ve never used Sites, Topical Map or Content Audit, refer to the instruction below. If you used Topical Map or Content Audit before, refer to Sites Migration Guide to setup your Sites.

Go to Sites in Surfer.
Pick the domain you want to audit (use search if you’ve got many).

Note: Domain property means, that its site includes data from all directories and subdomains for a given website. If you want to optimize smaller part of your website, create a separate property in GSC (see How to setup Google Search Console (GSC) for more details) or filter specific sites in the next steps.

3. Select location your website is targeting. This location will be used as a reference point for all optimization guidelines in this project from now on. Locations are arranged by the number of clicks your website is getting—location on the top, generates most traffic.

Note: Some locations have multiple language options (f.ex. location “United States” targets American language results in USA but “United States - ES” targets Spanish content in USA results)—pick the most relevant option or create multiple Sites to cover more than one variant.

4. Select pages to audit:

“Top 100 pages” will select top 100 pages by traffic.
“Select manually” allows you to search for specific paths and directories or to select top 50, 100, 200, or 500 pages. Use search bar for easier setup.

Remember: The step to select pages is optional at this stage and you can choose them later, but we recommend to select at least a few when connecting your domain. You can always remove the unwanted pages later.

Note: Surfer does not limit how many domains or projects you can connect to Sites—you can add as many as you need. However, your plan sets a limit on the total number of pages you can audit across all connected domains.

For example, if your plan includes 500 pages, you can distribute them however you like:

Audit all 500 pages within a single Site,
Split them between multiple Sites (e.g., 200 pages for Site A, 50 pages for Site B, and 250 pages for Site C),
Or adjust anytime by adding or removing pages later.

Important: Only indexed pages with some traffic are available for auditing (up to your top 20,000 ranking pages).

💡 Even if you reach your page audit limit, you can still access and use Sites features—you'll just need to manage which pages are included in the audits to get the most out of your plan.

5. Click Finish. Surfer will start building your Dashboard, Content Audit, and Topical Map (takes a few mins). You can explore Dashboard data while you wait.

🎉 Done! Your first Content Audit is live. Now let’s find the best pages to update for a quick traffic recovery →