9 Types of Marketing Audits for New Clients + Free Templates

Onboarded a new client? Great!

Whether your client is a small startup or has been in business for years, a marketing audit is in place. It can feel tempting to skip the marketing audit because it seems unnecessary or takes too much effort. 

However, you may change your mind after learning that it can be a highly organized task with marketing audit templates and checklists.

This guide explains marketing audits and how to conduct one for your client. Use one of our nine free marketing audit templates that you can use immediately. Lastly, learn how to create a marketing audit report to impress your clients. 

Let’s begin.

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What is a marketing audit?

A marketing audit comprehensively evaluates a business’s current marketing strategies, tactics, systems, and performance. It can be focused on one marketing channel (e.g., Facebook ads) or an overview of all marketing activities. 

The purpose of a marketing audit is to:

• Identify strengths, weaknesses, and opportunities to improve marketing effectiveness
• Optimize resource allocation
• Achieve better business outcomes

Think of it as a medical checkup for a company’s marketing efforts. It involves collecting and analyzing data, comparing metrics to KPIs, and compiling a report.

💡 When someone mentions a “full marketing audit,” they usually mean conducting multiple smaller audits, each for a specific marketing channel.

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Components of a marketing audit

What you’ll cover in a marketing audit depends on the scope and your goals. These elements can find a place in most audits: 

• ‍SWOT analysis: Identify and categorize Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. ‍
• Market research: Identify the exact market size, demand, and ideal customer for better targeting.‍
• Competitive analysis: Identify their strengths and weaknesses and your client’s unique business aspect.

After an in-depth analysis of these elements, you’ll have the latest picture of your client’s business performance.

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Marketing audit best practices

While conducting a marketing audit for your client, keep these best practices in mind to extract the most value out of your marketing efforts:

• Before you start, define clear objectives and goals
• Define KPIs that matter to your client
• Set a timeline 
• Keep stakeholders and team members in the loop
• Look beyond analytics to gather data (such as sales data, customers)
• Benchmark against competitors
• Interpret findings in an objective, unbiased manner
• Offer specific recommendations
• Set up tracking and performance monitoring to follow through
• Conduct audits regularly (once or twice a year per client)
• Audits are best done by a third party (i.e., a marketing agency) to avoid bias in reporting

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Objectives of a marketing audit

At the start of a new working relationship, marketing audits can establish a baseline and set clear expectations. The data you uncover can be used to create a roadmap and reveal solutions.

It’s about finding where your efforts can be improved and which marketing activities should be discontinued. Is there a need to redirect budgets for better results? A marketing audit will answer those questions and more:

• Demonstrate your agency’s expertise
• Build trust and rapport with a new client
• Identify which marketing channels to prioritize
• Uncover low-hanging fruit, such as new markets or platforms
• Find out why a particular channel isn’t showing results
• Avoid costly mistakes
• Get audience and customer insights along the way
• Helps with budget allocation and planning
• Determine the best way forward for client success

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How often should you conduct a marketing audit?

The ideal frequency to conduct marketing audits is once or twice a year on an annual basis or when you have just onboarded a new client to your agency. Doing so once every six months will give your campaigns enough time to show results.

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Marketing audit templates and checklists

As an agency, you can carry out multiple types of marketing audits for a client. It all depends on the scope of your engagement; audits can be complete (comprehensive) or specific (systematic).

If your agency is only hired for one aspect of your client’s marketing, you will likely stay within those channels (e.g., paid ads only).

Once you're clear on what you need and are trying to achieve, you can choose the right type of audit and use templates to get you there.

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1. Internal marketing audit

Internal marketing audits focus on evaluating organizational factors that influence marketing performance. It includes reviewing the business structure, systems, brand values, identity, employees, resources, budget, and strategy. 

💡It’s a good starting point to get an overview of new clients you onboard and for smaller businesses.

🔗 Download the free internal marketing audit template.

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2. External marketing audit

An external marketing audit assesses how outside factors affect marketing strategy. It includes competitor analysis, market research, and audience behavior. It can help with benchmarking against the market and setting realistic targets.

💡 Do an external audit before launching new marketing or ad campaigns.

🔗 Download the free external marketing audit template.

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3. Website audit

A website audit focuses on their primary website and website traffic so you can help improve your client’s overall online presence. Examples of what to analyze:

• Website design: Does the design align with the industry and current trends? Is there branding consistency and mobile responsiveness?
• User experience: Is the website quick to load? Easy to navigate? Is it accessible to most users?
• Content and SEO: Is the content valuable, helpful, and tailored for their target audience? Do they display topical authority? Are the right keywords being incorporated into the content?
• Website structure: Are there clear CTAs on each page? Is it easy to find contact information quickly? Are there lead generation and lead capture elements set up?

💡 Think web page load speeds aren’t important? Renault saw a 13% increase in conversions after shaving 1 second off their website loading speed! 

🔗 Download the free website audit checklist.

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4. SEO marketing audit

An SEO marketing audit is sometimes part of a website audit but can be done separately and in-depth. After getting access to your client’s Google Search Console, you can do this audit in two parts:

• Technical SEO includes website speed, crawl ability, indexability, mobile friendliness, website security, broken links, 404-page errors, structured data, and mobile friendliness.
• Non-technical SEO: Includes content quality and adherence to E-E-A-T guidelines, on-page SEO (title tags, meta description, URLs, keyword optimization,) images, keywords, etc.

💡 SEO audits can identify quick fixes that are preventing clients from ranking! Case study: How SinkusStudio helped a client grow traffic by 70% in 12 months.

🔗 Download the free SEO audit checklist here.

Watch this video for tips to get access to a client's Google Search Console account:

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5. Content marketing audit

A content marketing audit is a deeper dive into the content inventory of a website. You’ll be reviewing the following points:

• Customer personas
• Publishing frequency
• Good/poor performing pages
• Search intent and keywords
• Topical depth and authority
• Content strategy (TOFU-MOFU-BOFU)
• Call-to-actions
• Image optimization
• On-page SEO

💡 Case study: How Influence & Co used thought leadership and content marketing for FitOn.

🔗 Download the free content audit template.

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6. Google Analytics audit

Conduct a Google Analytics (GA) audit to analyze a website’s organic performance. Incorrect Google Analytics setup can significantly hinder businesses' understanding of user behavior. Remember the recent switch to the GA4 property, which no longer tracked audiences separately?

After getting access to your client’s Google Analytics account, you can:

• Look for poor-performing pages
• Traffic sources
• Integration with other tools
• Proper account setup
• Data collection settings
• Event tracking
• Sync with funnels

💡 Case study: Learn how InFlow identified discrepancies in analytics for a client through an audit

🔗 Download the free Google Analytics audit template.

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7. Social media marketing audit

A social media marketing audit should include analyzing your client’s presence on the marketing channel, audience engagement, and branding. Analyze the performance of specific social media platforms and their effectiveness for your client, and decide what adjustments you need to make to reach the target audience.

It’s essential to align your social media posts with customer personas.

💡 Case study: The power of social media analytics in Coca-Cola’s creative campaigns.

🔗 Download the free Instagram audit template here. You can customize this for other social media platforms!

A common bottleneck with social media audits is requesting and waiting for access to your client’s accounts, which can cause hours and weeks of delays. Use Leadsie to get access with just a few clicks!

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8. PPC audit

If your client asks you to manage their ad strategy, begin with conducting an in-depth pay-per-click (PPC) audit. Examine factors like campaign settings, keyword targeting, ad copy, landing page quality, bid management, conversion tracking, and budget allocation.

💡 Case study: How refining targeted ads brought in +731% in revenue (ScandiWeb).

🔗 Download the free PPC audit template.

Read more: How to easily access a client’s Google Adwords accounts.
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9. Sales audit

Identify the loopholes in your client’s sales strategy by reviewing sales revenue growth, sales funnel effectiveness, sales team productivity, customer acquisition cost (CAC), customer lifetime value (CLV), sales process efficiency, and sales forecasting accuracy. 

Sometimes, the best solution is to double down on key products instead of launching new ones. Use the data from a sales audit to decide.

🔗 Download the sales audit template here.

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How to do a marketing audit for a new client

A marketing audit can be a game-changer and yield valuable insights for new businesses or ones that haven't fully built out their marketing departments. Established companies can benefit from comprehensive and systematic marketing audits of specific marketing functions.

Once you identify what type of marketing audit you need to perform for your client, it’s time to do it. Follow the steps below:

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1. Set SMART marketing goals

Clear marketing goals are essential for a meaningful audit. By understanding your objectives, you can assess the effectiveness of your strategies and make informed decisions.

Set SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Time-bound) goals to keep everyone aligned.

Example of a SMART marketing goal:

• Increase launch sign-ups by 20,000 (100%) using targeted Instagram ads in the next two months tracked through unique UTM parameters by boosting weekly conversions by 100% and cutting cost per sign-up by 15%.

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2. Get access to your client’s assets

The next step is to access your client’s assets and accounts. One way is to do this manually by contacting your client and requesting access to multiple accounts — it’s overwhelming and not fun.

A better way is to automate access requests with Leadsie. Share your Leadsie link with your client, get access to the marketing assets, and get started!

Create your account on Leadsie and share your Leadsie link to get access quickly.

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3. Collect data

Once you get asset access, conduct an in-depth marketing audit using templates or checklists to guide you.

Start by asking your client if there’s any specific setting you should know about. Review basic settings, every feature, current marketing performance, and numbers, and document everything. At this stage, you shouldn’t make any changes but gather data.

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4. Identify issues and organize data

After you have enough data, it’s time to organize it. Analyze data and start identifying opportunities and threats. You’ll divide the insights into three parts: needs improvement, doing well, and stop putting effort.

Once you’ve categorized the findings, deciding what you want to prioritize will be easier. Ideally, you’ll want a mix of short-term and long-term fixes to show quick results to your client while improving their long-term strategy.

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5. Create marketing strategies for each improvement area

Based on your priority list, create marketing strategies for each modification. Determine how you’ll fix something and write processes in concrete action steps. Once all are done, solidify your marketing strategy by creating a final marketing audit report (more on this below.)

Talk to your client and show them your findings. Explain critical findings and your marketing plan. Tell them exactly why you’re doing things this way and what to expect in the next few months.

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6. Implement recommendations, track, and optimize

After your client approves your marketing strategies, start implementing the changes. But don’t stop there—keep documenting every change and tracking results.

You can audit every marketing channel, but unless you can take meaningful action afterward, keeping the scope manageable for your agency is advisable.‍

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How to create a marketing audit report

Now that you have gathered sufficient data and findings from your audit process, the next step is to turn them into a helpful marketing audit report.

An effective marketing audit report should clearly identify areas for improvement and outline your proposed solutions, leaving your client with a clear understanding of the next steps.

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Elements of a marketing audit report

A marketing audit report should address the following:

• A summary of the key findings and recommendations.
• The methodology used to conduct the marketing audit.
• Objectives and SMART goals.
• Suggestions for improvement or adjustment.
• Any areas to stop putting in effort.
• Any potential new channels or opportunities.
• Marketing strategies with actionable steps.
• Key takeaways and conclusion.

🔗 Download the free marketing audit report template to use.

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Case study: How Leadsie helped EmberTribe simplify marketing audits and client onboarding

EmberTribe is a growth marketing agency helping e-commerce companies scale their business into bigger brands, and they like to do it fast. Before Leadsie, the EmberTribe team often struggled with onboarding clients through marketing audits.

As EmberTribe believes, “The unmeasurable part is the client experience,” and onboarding is the first impression you make, so it has to be perfect.

Using Leadsie, EmberTribe now audits up to 50 clients and onboards at least 15 clients per month hassle-free while providing top-class onboarding.

Happy clients, happy agency, happy us. 🎉 Read the full case study here >>

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Ready to supercharge your marketing audit with Leadsie?

An effective marketing audit is essential to improve marketing efforts for your clients.

Requesting access to different marketing channels one by one can be tiresome and time-consuming, and let’s not forget the unpleasant client onboarding experience 😩

We don’t want you to upset your clients by making a dull first impression. We want you to take it to the next step by oversimplifying the process for them so they appreciate you!

That’s why we created Leadsie — to simplify conducting marketing audits and onboarding new clients for you. Request access to as many marketing platforms as you want in one go. Simply choose the assets you’d like access to and share your Leadsie link with your client.

They will grant permission, and you’ll get access. It doesn’t have to be complicated for you and your clients!

It’s more secure for everyone and saves a ton of time! Give Leadsie a try with our 14-day free trial…enter your email in the box below!