Did you ever wonder where you could track the website SEO metrics? Like what are the top keywords that are performing for your website, the landing page performance, website usability, and other on-page parameters? These are all done through Google Webmaster Tools. We will be talking all about what is Google Webmaster Tools?
The Google Webmaster tool is the best platform when it comes to analyzing the website performance on a search engine. It hosts a range of SEO tools that helps you to track and get you to the recommendations and fixes that need to be done for your website.
Especially for SEO professionals, they need to mandatorily register their website on Google Webmaster Tools. Because they will be getting valuable insights when they want to analyze the SEO performance of their website.
In this blog post, we will be talking about what is Google Webmaster Tools and its functions.
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What is Google Webmaster Tools?
Google Webmaster Tools is the former name that has been transformed now. It is known as the Google search console and Google search central. This platform was developed by Google to help people to analyze their content whether it is crawlable by Google search engine or not.
The website owners can get complete insights. Some of the major parameters can be found in the errors of your website and the optimization scope that is suggested by Google Webmaster Tools. It also lets you know whether there are any security vulnerabilities for your website. These all data are crucial for SEO professionals to keep track of the website performance so that they don’t lose organic traction.
The Google Webmaster tool hosts multiple features that are beneficial for developers, website owners, and SEO professionals. It is a simple platform where anyone can register and monitor the website traffic and stay up to date on the search performance.
What are the benefits and features of using Google Webmaster Tools?
There are endless benefits when it comes to using Google Webmaster Tools for the website. This is one of the most primary platforms that alert the website owner whenever there is an issue. It makes the platform more desirable and hard to resist from people registering themselves.
Here are some of the key benefits that you will be achieving for your website when you use Google Webmaster Tools.
1. Insightful dashboard
The Google Webmaster tool offers a dashboard for SEO professionals and website owners to understand the overview parameters of the website. This dashboard will have all the basic elements which will be covered. It is like all in one platform where you can instantly get the results of your entire website.
Some of the major parameters that you can access through the dashboard are the performance of your website, coverage details, website experience, and enhancement. Through these categories, you can access the issues individually and sort out if any discrepancy is found.
Tracking website performance on search engine
This is one of the most popularly utilized features from Google Webmaster Tools. Because you get complete insights on the performance of your website on search engines. Some of the major parameters that you can analyze through this method are as below.
Total clicks
Total click is an indicator where you can track how many people have clicked your website from the search engine listing. This metric helps in determining whether the page title and meta description that you have used is engaging for the search visitors or not. It also gives you an overview of how many people are coming to your website through the search engine.
Total Impressions
The total impression is known as how many times your website has appeared on a search engine listing when a user has typed the search term. This section gives insights for what are the keywords that your web pages are ranking on the search engine results. Based on that, you can determine and optimize the keywords so that you can rank better.
The average click-through rate
This metric is also known as average CTR. It is a metric where you can determine the number of people who have clicked your search engine listing based on the total number of impressions you received. You get complete data of low or high click-through rate pages. This is a metric that SEO professionals need to take an active interest in so that they don’t lose potential traffic for their website.
Average position
This is a metric to determine the average keyword ranking position for your website. It is basically a ranking factor that is devised by the search engine crawler that gives you data for what keywords are the ranking positions for the website. This helps you to measure your SEO activities performed based on the off-page or on-page optimizations that you undertake.
Other metrics that you can perform
You can check on an individual level where you can track the keyword queries for your web pages. This helps you to get insights into whether the blog of the website is receiving clicks, impressions, ranking, and CTR. In the same way, you can perform similar functions for pages on an individual level.
You will also find the appearance of your website based on geographical conditions. It is a metric where you can analyze the people coming from which country and the clicks and impressions received respectively.
One of the popular features that you can track in terms of performance is the device from which users are coming. It gives you an overview of how many people are coming from a mobile devices, tablets, and desktops.
You can also track the productivity of your website on a particular date. Like how many clicks and Impressions you have received in a day. And the search appearance that your website has made.
The best part about Google Webmaster Tools is you can export the data in the form of Google sheets and Microsoft Excel format. One of the most essential features when it comes to maintaining reports and track success.
2. Checking indexability
Another popular reason for using Google Webmaster Tools is it helps you in understanding indexability. For instance, what are the pages that are getting indexed on search engines? And which pages are missing out from the list. This is one of the most important factors for your website to appear on search engines. Because the web pages are not getting indexed, then your website can’t appear on the search engine results page.
Indexing errors
It highlights whether there are any errors in indexing your website. Get the details for which are the pages that are indexed, the pages that are on the pipeline, and the pages that have warning signs. You also get details on the basis of how many pages are getting indexed on a particular date. Helps to export the entire indexability status in the form of a documented report.
Sitemap submission
Sitemap submission is one of the important steps for a new website to undertake. Because when you submit a sitemap on the Google Webmaster tool, the search engine crawler starts to scan your website. This is a primary step that needs to be taken in case your website is new. If your website is old, even then you need to check whether the website sitemap has been submitted to the search console or not.
Page removal
If you have any outdated content or pages that shouldn’t have been indexed on the search engine, you can use this feature. This function provides you a platform where you can submit pages that need to be removed from the Google search engine. You can also track the status of whether the page has been removed or not.
URL inspection
One of the most popular features when it comes to checking indexability. This feature helps you to check whether the page has been indexed on search engines not. When you find that the page is not indexed on a search engine, you can submit it for indexing. It also helps in giving out information on whether there are any errors found in the URL of the specific page.
Related: Website crawlability issues and solutions
3. Checking website experience
This is one of the trending factors that Google is updating its search engine algorithm. Google wants the website to be user-friendly so that online web visitors can access the website easily. For this constraint, Google has introduced the experience factor.
Analyzing page experience
This metric helps in analyzing whether the webpage has been designed as per standard norms. This can be the design elements and the usability factor which influences heavily while determining the scope for page experience.
Examining Core web vitals
This is a recent update that is released by the Google search engine algorithm. It is a metric that analyzes the performance of a website on a desktop browser and mobile devices. Basically, it is a platform where you can track the performance of website page speed. If you find the website score loading under 3 seconds then that means you have passed the core web vitals.
Mobile usability
Mobile usability is also an update that was released a few years back by the Google search engine algorithm. This update focuses on whether a user can access it conveniently when they are browsing from a mobile device. It can be the design of and size of the font which is used for developing the mobile version of the website.
Learn: What is Mobile-Friendly Website?
Enhancements
Here you can check whether the breadcrumbs of your website are performing fine. As the breadcrumbs help in guiding the website visitor to navigate around the web pages. You can also check whether there are any sitelinks search boxes that have been integrated into your web page. This segment helps the user to access the required information quickly from the search engine.
4. Security and Manual actions
This section is dedicated to analyzing whether there are any security concerns for the website. If you find any notices from the sections, there are high chances for the website to be penalized by search engines.
Security issues
If you have implemented any Black hat practices for the website, the google search engine notifies you that you are not complying with the guidelines. And if there are any such malpractices that you have done, you will get notified in the security issues section.
Manual action
In this manual action function, you can check the weather if there are any issues that are preventing your website from appearing on the Google search engine result page.
5. Legacy tools and reports
In this section, you will find various features such as International targeting, manual messages, URL parameters, and website tools. These all functions help in positioning your website and other optimization techniques which you can implement. Some of the key activities that you can undertake within this section are:
- Restricting your target audience of the website to a particular country.
- Setting up URL parameters for advanced tracking.
- You can perform structured data testing tools and also utilize structured data markup helpers.
- Get notifications or any messages received from the Google Webmaster tool for any discrepancies in your website experience.
- You can also check the top linked web pages internally and also the top linking websites externally.
Concluding thoughts
The Google Webmaster tool a.k.a. Google search console is one of the important platforms where every website owner needs to get registered. If your objective is to grow organically, you need to be active on this platform.
The functionality that you can see in this is most similar to Google Analytics. But there are major differences when it comes to getting to know about the indexability, security actions, and influence of algorithm update. Only the search console gives you a complete analysis that lets you track every attribute of your website.
Many successful website owners and SEO professionals have used Google search console to scale growth organically on search engines. Now it’s your turn to apply the technique to your website.
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