Are you using Google Search Console?
In the first of a series of articles on improving the impact of your digital marketing Gareth Edwards, from longstanding Lewis Smith & Co. client Arrowsmith Marketing, wants to highlight this useful free tool from Google.
Less well known than Google Analytics, Google Search Console (previously known as Webmaster Tools) is a must have tool for anyone who gets sales or enquiries from a website. It is billed as a tool for webmasters, the people who look after content, SEO, security and hosting, but some of the detail is essential to anyone responsible for sales and marketing.
Essentially Search Console provides insights into what Google sees and thinks about your website. There is a lot of information available so I would like to focus in on just 5 of the most relevant to the non-techies amongst you.
- Security Issues – Google can detect if your site has been hacked or if there is any malware. It will send you an email alert too so you can sort the problem before customers see them.
- HTML Improvements – Problems with the code on your site will be flagged up. Especially useful are the reports on meta descriptions and title tags, which are key elements of SEO (more details in future articles).
- Crawl Errors – This highlights pages on your website that Google has a problem reading. If Google has a problem then so will people coming to your site, and it might effect your search ranking too.
- Links to Your Site – Having links from good quality sites is another must for high ranking in the search results. Search Console tells you where links are coming from and what your most popular pages are. Internal links are important too and so there is a report that features this too.
- Search Analytics provides details on which search queries are being used to find your site. It tells you both which queries result in a click and the queries where your site featured in the listings (an impression) but not clicked. When you know what people are looking and how the site current behaves then you can do something about. For instance changing meta descriptions so your listing stands out or creating a new web page to focus on a query.
If you go to the Google Search Console page there are instructions on how to set it up on your site. If you already have Google Analytics set up then it should be easy otherwise you may need to add a bit of code to your site. It’s an easy job (therefore free or cheap) for your website developer and straightforward if your site is built with a content management system such as WordPress.
The Lewis Smith & Co. website has Search Console implemented and I use it regularly to make sure the site is functioning correctly and help the digital marketing process. It’s an important part of understanding business performance.
If you need help understanding how your business is performing talk to Lewis Smith & Co. today about their management accounting services. Call 01384 235549 or email info@lewissmith.com to set up an initial discussion.
Lewis Smith & Co. – Accountants for Halesowen businesses
