Most small sites that rank for nothing do not have a content problem yet. They have a technical problem that makes their content invisible, and it is usually one of twelve things.
Start With What Search Engines Can Reach
Check the robots file for rules left behind from a staging environment. Confirm the sitemap lists canonical URLs only. Look for pages that are reachable by clicking but missing from the sitemap, and pages in the sitemap that return a redirect.
Then Check How the Site Answers
Status codes are the fastest diagnostic on any site. A page that returns 200 with an empty shell is worse than a 404 because it tells search engines the page exists and then wastes the visit. Redirect chains of three hops or more are common on sites that have changed platforms twice.
Canonicals and Duplicates
Filter and sort parameters create near-duplicate URLs. Product variants do the same. Either canonicalise them to the parent page or block them, but do not rely on both, and never canonicalise a page to itself through a chain.
Speed Is a Commercial Metric
Measure the pages that carry revenue, not the homepage. Largest contentful paint on a mobile connection is the number that correlates with what you pay per click, because platform quality scores and user behaviour both respond to it.
Structured Data
Products, services, FAQ blocks and organisation details are worth marking up. It rarely lifts rankings by itself, but it changes how results look, which changes click-through rate on the same position.
Tracking You Can Trust
An audit is not finished until you know the tracking works. Submit a real form, place a real order, and confirm the event arrives with the right value. If form submissions are counted twice or not at all, every later decision is guesswork.