How are the title tag, meta description, H1, alt text and homepage copy judged?

Title tag

The Title tag row shows OK, Weak or Missing. The lead gets Weak title tag when:

• there is no title tag,
• the title is generic: under 4 characters, just a word such as Home, Welcome, Index or Coming soon, or just the website address, or
• it mentions none of your search keywords and nothing from the business's Google category.

Plurals and filler words (such as best, near and services) are ignored, a shortened form counts (roof for roofers), and common trade words count, such as attorney or law firm for lawyer and dental for dentist. A title that leaves out the city is not flagged for that alone. The evidence quotes the title and names your keyword, plus your city when that is missing too, for example Title tag 'Smith & Sons | Home' does not mention plumbers or Tampa.

Meta description

The Meta description row shows Present or Missing. The lead gets No meta description (the Missing Meta Description filter) when the homepage has none. A missing title tag or meta description also adds Weak rankings.

H1 heading

The H1 heading row shows OK, Missing, None seen (unverified), or a count such as 3 H1s. The lead gets No clear H1 when the homepage has no H1 heading with text in it, or more than one.

Image alt text

The audit counts the homepage's images, leaving out tracking pixels, spacers and images marked as decorative. Only a missing alt attribute counts as missing; an empty one is correct for decoration. The lead gets Images missing alt text when 4 or more images are counted and half or more have no alt text. The Image alt text row appears only at 4 or more images and shows how many have alt text, such as 3 of 10.

Homepage copy

The Homepage copy row shows the word count, such as 142 words, counted from the page text without the navigation menu, the footer and code. The lead gets Thin homepage content under 200 words.

When a finding is unverified

The title and meta description sit in the page head, which is readable even on most JavaScript sites, so these findings are likely. They are unverified only when the site builds its pages with JavaScript and just the homepage could be read. The H1, images and word count are unverified whenever the site builds its pages with JavaScript: the Image alt text and Homepage copy rows then add (unverified), and a missing H1 shows as None seen (unverified). Unverified problems go into the Worth a look, not verified box and stay out of your emails, the proof page and the score.

After Google's PageSpeed check

Google loads the page in a real browser and runs its own SEO checks:

• If Google saw a title the homepage code did not have, the row reads Set by JavaScript (Google saw one) and no Weak title tag is flagged, because the keyword check cannot read it. A description Google saw reads Present (set by JavaScript) and is not flagged either.
• If Google finds no title or description, that finding is confirmed.
• If Google says the images have alt text, Images missing alt text is cleared.