SiteCheck 2 min read

Website health check before client handoff

Before you hand a site to a client, run a plain-English inspection, fix what you will fix, then baseline links so new 404s do not become their first ticket.

A handoff fails when the client's first week is a list of broken menu links and a certificate warning you already knew about. Run a full inspection on the live URL, fix what is in scope, give them the report, then leave a quiet link baseline if you still watch the site.

Day of handoff (or the day before)

  1. Open the live hostname in a private window — not staging.
  2. Run SiteCheck. Free: one-off report, up to 25 pages, no account, no card. Starter ($9/month) or Pro ($19/month) if the site needs a larger crawl or you want scheduled re-scans for a retainer.
  3. Walk the report in this order: broken links and HTTP errors → redirect chains/loops → TLS and mixed content → robots.txt / sitemap / noindex → titles, meta descriptions, H1s.
  4. Fix what your contract covers. Note what you are leaving (legacy 404s, third-party widgets) in the handoff email so it is not a surprise.

How to run the scan: how to inspect a website for health problems. What each finding means: what a website health report covers. Pre-launch overlap: website launch checklist.

What to send the client

  • The SiteCheck report (or Agency-tier client-ready export if you are on that plan).
  • A short note: what you fixed, what you deferred, and how to re-run a free scan themselves later.
  • Login and DNS details separately — the health report is not the credentials dump.

After handoff, if you retain the site

Inspection answers "what is wrong now?" It will list the same old 404s every week. For ongoing care, verify the site in Mortise, take a silent baseline, and alert only when a previously working link newly fails twice as 404 or 410. Free: 1 site, 200 pages, manual daily check, no card. Pro ($12/month or $79/year) adds schedule, email, webhook, CSV.

That pairing is website inspection vs new-break alerts.

Optional: put their pricing or homepage on SignalWatch so an accidental CMS edit pings you — how to watch your own website for unexpected edits.

Checklist

  • Live URL scanned; staging not confused with production.
  • Critical defects fixed or written down.
  • Report attached to the handoff mail.
  • Mortise baseline taken if you are on the hook for regressions.
  • Free SiteCheck tried first; upgrade only if 25 pages is too small a sample.