How to do Full Site Audit when Shopify has Bot Protection

How to do Full Site Audit when Shopify has Bot Protection

Shopify’s Bot Protection may limit the ability for Site Audit tool to identify SEO and GEO errors across all pages on your site. Crawler Access is the Shopify authorization that lets Site Audit reach all of them.

When Crawler Access is on, pages are not skipped because of blocked requests.

Why it is needed

Shopify protects every store with a security system that watches for unknown bots. When Site Audit checks hundreds or thousands of pages in a row, the system can mistake it for a suspicious bot. Two things can happen:

  • Blocked pages: some pages return an error and are skipped, so errors on those pages go unreported.

  • Slowed scans: requests are throttled, so your audit takes much longer.

Is it safe? Yes. The pass only lets Tapita read the pages any visitor can already see in your store. It never touches checkout, carts, customer information or finances. Each pass is valid for 90 days, following Shopify's security standard.

Where to find it

Open Site Audit in the Tapita app. The Crawler Access badge sits in the title bar at the top of the page. Click it any time to check or manage your connection.

What each badge means


Badge

Status

What to do

Crawler active (90d)

Active (green)

Nothing. More than 14 days remain and your scans run normally.

Crawler expiring soon

Expiring soon (yellow)

Less than 14 days left. Click Reconnect to add another 90 days.

Crawler expired

Expired (red)

90 days have passed. Click Reconnect.

Crawler disconnected

Not connected (gray)

Crawler Access is off. Click Connect to turn it on for faster, complete scans.

Domain changed

Domain changed (yellow)

Your primary domain changed, for example after adding a custom domain. Click Reconnect to update it.

This takes about 5 seconds.

  1. Click the Crawler access badge in the Site Audit title bar.

  2. Click Connect (or Reconnect) in the window that opens.

  3. Wait for the green Active label. You are done.

What the buttons do:

  1. Reconnect: use it when your domain changes or your pass is about to expire. It refreshes your access for another 90 days.
  2. Disconnect: use it if you want to stop giving Tapita access.
  3. Manual configuration: opens the manual setup, explained below. Click on it to extend.

Method 2: Manual configuration

Use this if you cannot click Connect, or if you want to check the Signature-Input, Signature and Signature-Agent values yourself before turning access on.

Step 1. Open Preferences in Shopify

Go to Shopify Admin > Online Store > Preferences. You can also click the blue Shopify Preferences link inside the Tapita notice.

Step 2. Create your signature

Scroll down to Crawler access. If there is no signature yet, click Create signature. A new line appears with the status Active.

Step 3. Copy 3 values from Shopify

On your signature line (for example, "Tapita SEO Audit"), click the Copy icon for each of these:

  1. Signature-Input

  2. Signature (starts with sig1=:)

  3. Signature-Agent (by default "https://shopify.com")

Step 4. Paste them into Tapita

Back in Tapita, click Manual configuration to expand it, then:

  1. Paste the first value into the Signature-Input box.

  2. Paste the second value into the Signature box.

  3. Leave Signature-Agent as it is. The default "https://shopify.com" is correct.

  4. Click Save and verify at the bottom right.

Tapita runs a quick test with your store. When it passes, the badge turns green and shows Active for 90 days.

Troubleshooting

What you see

Why it happens

Quick fix

Domain mismatch or Domain changed

You recently changed your primary domain, such as adding a custom .com.

Open Crawler Access and click Reconnect.

Signature expired

Your 90 days are over.

Click Reconnect in Tapita to renew for another 90 days.

Test failed (manual setup)

A character was missed at the start or end when copying, or the values were pasted into the wrong boxes.

Use Shopify's Copy icon instead of selecting text by hand. Check that Signature starts with sig1=: and Signature-Input starts with sig1=("@authority".

Quick tip: check the badge each time you open Site Audit. If it is green, your audit is seeing every page, and the errors it reports are the full list.



Now you know how to allow Tapita SEO Audit check to find all SEO errors on your store safely. If you have any questions, please contact us via support@tapita.io