Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a critical aspect of online marketing that aims to improve the visibility of a website or web page on search engines such as Google, Bing, and Yahoo. SEO can help businesses reach their target audience and achieve their marketing goals by making their websites easier to find and understand for search engines. To effectively measure the success of SEO efforts, it’s essential to monitor a set of metrics that can help track the performance of your organic search efforts.
Instead of discussing all the analytics at once, in this blog, we will look at nine crucial SEO analytics to monitor your organic search performance.
9 Essential SEO metrics to track
Organic Traffic
The first important SEO metric many people are familiar with is organic traffic. Organic traffic refers to the visitors who visit your website through unpaid search results on search engines such as Google, Bing, and Yahoo. It is an important metric to track because it provides insight into how well your website performs in search engine results pages (SERPs) and how effective your SEO efforts are at attracting potential customers to your site.
To increase organic traffic, it’s important to have a well-structured and optimized website that is easy for search engines to understand and navigate. This includes having a clear and concise site structure, using relevant keywords in your content, and ensuring that your website is mobile-friendly and has a fast loading speed. You can also focus on creating high-quality, relevant content that answers user queries and provides value to your audience.
To obtain organic search traffic data from your Google Analytics account, login to your analytics account. From the dashboard, navigate to the Audience > Overview in the left sidebar and select “Add Segment.”
Next, select “Organic Traffic” and hit “Apply.”
You should be able to view organic traffic as a percentage of your total traffic.
Clickthrough Rate (CTR)
The second important SEO metric to look at is your organic clickthrough rate, in other words, CTR. This measures the number of clicks a website receives divided by the number of impressions or views. CTR is an important metric to monitor for SEO because it provides insight into how well your website’s content is performing in search engine results pages (SERPs) and how effectively it attracts clicks from users.
A high CTR means that your website’s content is relevant and appealing to users and appears in the right place in the search engine results pages (SERPs). On the other hand, a low CTR could indicate that your website’s content could be more relevant and appealing to users or that it is not appearing in a prominent position in the search results.
To improve your website’s CTR, you can focus on creating high-quality, relevant content that matches the user’s search query and provides value to them. You can also optimize your website’s Meta descriptions and title tags to make sure they are clear, concise, and accurately reflect the content on your site.
Exit Rate
As the name says, the exit rate measures the percentage of website visitors who leave after viewing only one page. It is an important metric to monitor because it provides insight into how well your website retains visitors and keeps them engaged with your content.
A high exit rate can indicate that your website’s content needs to be more relevant and valuable to users or be more user-friendly and easier to navigate. On the other hand, a low exit rate could mean that your website is providing a positive user experience and that visitors are finding the content they are looking for and engaging with it.
You can track the exit rate in Google Analytics by following these steps:
- Log in to your Google Analytics account.
- Select the website you want to view data for
- Go to the “Behavior” section and click “Site Content.”
- Click on “All Pages” to view exit rate data for each page on your website.
In the “All Pages” report, look for the “Exit Rate” column to see the percentage of visitors who left your site after viewing only one page for each page.
You can also view exit rate data for specific pages or sections of your website by selecting them from the “Site Content” drop-down menu. This can help you identify which pages are performing well and which are experiencing high exit rates.
Pages Per Session
Pages per session are the average number of pages a user visits during a single session on your website. This metric provides valuable insight into how engaged users are with your content and how well your website can retain their attention.
Load Time Of Your Page
Page load time is the time it takes for a webpage to fully display on a user’s browser after a request is made.
A slow page load time can cause users to abandon your website, resulting in a high bounce rate, low conversion rate, and reduced search engine visibility. On the other hand, a fast page load time can provide a positive user experience, improve engagement, and increase the likelihood of a user visiting additional pages on your website.
Backlinks
Backlinks are links from other websites that point to your website. Search engines consider backlinks an essential ranking factor and can significantly impact your website’s visibility on search results pages.
Always keep in mind that the quality of backlinks matters more than quantity. For example, 10 Backlinks from high Domain Authority websites are more valuable than 100 backlinks from low-quality domains. Ahref and Semrush are tremendous SEO tools for checking your backlinks.
Keyword Rankings
Keyword rankings are a critical SEO metric that measures the position of a website’s pages on search engine results pages (SERPs) for specific keywords or phrases. Knowing where your pages rank for important keywords can help you understand how well your SEO efforts are paying off and identify areas for improvement.
Mobile Traffic
Mobile traffic refers to the percentage of visitors who access your website from a mobile device. With more and more people using smartphones and tablets to search the web, ensuring that your website is mobile-friendly and optimized for mobile devices is essential. To monitor mobile traffic, you can use tools like Google Analytics, which provides detailed information on the proportion of your website traffic coming from mobile devices.
Start tracking your SEO Analytics now.
Tracking your SEO analytics is essential to optimizing your website and improving its performance in search engine results. By monitoring above mentioned key metrics, you can gain valuable insights into how your website is performing and identify areas for improvement.
