Google Search Console is one of the best resources for webmasters out there — and it’s absolutely free. While many site owners and webmasters may currently use some of the tool’s features, they might not be taking full advantage of everything it offers. If you are in charge of your company’s website, you can maximize its marketing potential by becoming a Google Search Console expert.
What is the Google Search Console?
When your website is not working as it should, you risk losing potential clients and current customers. Identifying these issues quickly is key to ensuring your website ranks high in Google’s search rankings.
The Google Search Console helps identify certain technical issues that could impact your SEO rankings. will send you notifications by email whenever there is a problem with your website. You can also monitor Google SEO rankings to make certain your site is at or near the top of the list of search returns. You can learn about spider crawl issues that can drag down your search rankings. This resource allows you to monitor, in real time, problems that can make your website a liability instead of a marketing asset.
3 Important Features to Use in Google Search Console
Google Search Console offers a number of features that allow you to identify potential issues and correct them quickly. The following are just a few of these tools:
1. Keyword Reports
You will have access to a report that tells you how many keyword searches on Google brought people to your site. The report can be adjusted by month and the information allows you to refine your SEO strategy to target specific keywords that will generate more profitable traffic to your website. You can adjust the reports to see important metrics such as impressions, click-through rate (CTR) and the average position of your site’s ranking for specific keywords.
You can also filter your data by device (i.e. mobile, tablet and desktop) and country to see if any traffic patterns exist.
2. Total Website Pages Indexed by Google
This data displays the total number of indexed URLs (pages on your site) that Google has discovered and is showing in their search results. These pages could be any page on your site, including pages that you do not want to show in Google. If there are pages that are not indexed, a common problem with new content, the Google Search Console will provide options for site owners to add the URL to the Google search platform. The system will also allow you to remove URLs or identify URLs that are being blocked by tools such as robots.txt or the XML sitemap.
3. Site Errors/Problems
Sometimes there are technical issues in the server that are preventing Google from properly indexing your website. Google Search Console provides a “site error section” that alerts you to these technical issues and provides you with tips to correct the erros.. Google warns that a 100 percent error rate in any of the categories indicates your site is down or misconfigured. An error rate below 100 percent may indicate that the site is overloaded or not configured properly. In either case, the issues might be transient, but they will still require investigation. The Google Search Console helps you identify and address these issues quickly to minimize the impact on your client base.
The Google Search Console is an invaluable free tool that helps ensure your website’s success. Additionally, it makes your job much easier by continually providing the information you need to optimize your site’s search position
