Google Search Console: A Guide to Website Analysis

By selecting the “Performance” menu item, you can immediately see some fundamental information regarding your website’s presence on Google:

– the number of times users clicked to access your site from Google search results (Total clicks);
– the number of times your site appeared in Google search results (Total impressions);
– the average click-through rate (CTR), which is the ratio of clicks received to the number of times your site appeared in Google results (Total clicks / Total impressions)
– the average position of your site in search results (1-10 = first page of Google results; 11-20 = second page; 21-30 = third page, and so on).

Through the line chart, you can see the trend of these metrics over time. The default time range covers the last 3 months, but you can modify the reference period by clicking on the “Date” option at the beginning of the page.

Access the “Performance” section of Google Search Console, and you’ll see a table immediately below the line chart. By selecting the “Query” option, you can view the list of searches for which your site appeared in Google results.
You can choose what information to display for each keyword by clicking on the labels above the chart (Total clicks, Total impressions, Average CTR, and Average position).
By clicking on the column headers, you can change the table order and discover, for example:

– which user searches brought the most traffic to your website (sorting by decreasing clicks);
– which searches have the highest number of appearances of your site in Google results (sorting by decreasing impressions).

If you select the “Pages” option above the table, you can find out which pages of your site have greater visibility on Google and which bring more traffic to your website.

It’s possible that your site is on the second page of Google results for highly searched keywords. Through targeted SEO optimization, you could potentially move your site to the first page of results for these searches, increasing traffic from Google to your site.
To discover keywords with this potential:

– access the “Performance” section of Search Console;
– ensure that the labels “Total impressions” and “Average position” are selected;
– click on the “Query” option in the table;
– identify keywords that have both a high number of impressions and an average position between 10 and 20.

The “Performance” section of Google Search Console also helps you discover whether certain pages of your website that had good Google rankings have experienced a decline over time.
To retrieve this information:

– click on “Date” (above the labels with the main metrics) and then on “Compare”;
– select “Compare the last 3 months with the previous period” or “Compare the last 6 months with the previous period,” based on your needs;
– ensure that the “Total clicks” label is selected;
– click on the “Pages” option in the table;
– sort the table by click difference (ascending).

The top pages on the list are the ones that have experienced the greatest drop in traffic from Google and may require optimization or updates.

Have you added a new page to your site or updated an existing page? You can request Google to index it using the “URL Inspection” tool in Search Console.
By selecting the “URL Inspection” menu item, you’ll be prompted to enter the URL of the page, and you can find out whether the page has been properly scanned and indexed by Google. To request indexing, simply click the “Request indexing” option.

To help Google properly scan and index your website, you can create a sitemap and upload the XML file to your website.
Once the sitemap is uploaded, access Google Search Console and select the “Sitemap” menu item. Here, you can input the sitemap’s URL and submit it.

Thanks to the “Coverage” page of Search Console (within the “Index” section), you can ensure that Google can correctly access all pages of the website and explore any issues encountered during site indexing.
Specifically, Google Search Console lists:

– Pages with Errors, meaning those that could not be indexed;
– Valid pages with warnings, meaning those that have been indexed but present problems;
– Valid pages, meaning those that have been correctly indexed;
– Excluded pages, meaning those intentionally not indexed.

You can consult Google’s official guide to learn more about the various warning messages you’ll find in this section.

User Experience is an increasingly important factor in the ranking of a website on Google. For this reason, within the “Experience” section, Google Search Console provides a series of tools that can help you optimize the user experience on your website.
For instance, the reports within the “Core Web Vitals” page evaluate the speed, interactivity, and visual stability of pages during their loading, allowing you to identify any URLs with poor performance.

Through the reports in the “Security & Manual Actions” section of Google Search Console, you have the ability to find out:

– if there are any manual actions (reports of violations of quality guidelines) on your site;
– if Google has detected security issues on your site, such as dangerous or compromised content.

In both pages, you can view details of the detected problems and receive guidance on how to resolve them. You’ll also have the option to request a review once the problem is resolved.

The “Links” section of Google Search Console allows you to analyze the backlinks to your website.
For example, to discover which pages of your site receive the most backlinks:

– select the “Links” menu item;
– go to the “External links” > “Top linked pages” section and click on “More”.

This way, you will see the list of your site’s pages ordered by the number of incoming links.