In this day and age, most of us are having a hard time constantly revising our SEO strategies and keeping up with the highs and lows of Google’s ever-changing algorithms.
What most people fail to realise is that it takes more than top-notch content and on-point analytics to ace your website or blog’s search engine optimisation.
When it comes to search engine optimisation, most of us focus on the aim of increasing our rankings on Google but whilst doing that, we can often fail to utilise the potential of Google’s own services and tools which will not only ensure that you’re going in the right direction but be the one help that you’ve been searching for.
From tracking down the right keywords to running ads seamlessly without any unwanted interruptions, Google offers some of the Internet’s best set of tools that are no more than a godsend for internet marketers like us.
In this article, we introduce to you, four of Google’s most powerful SEO tools and products that will be the helping hand you’ve always been looking for, to manage your search engine optimisation strategy.
Google Analytics
No matter how strategically your campaigns have been set, no matter how rigorous and consistent your inputs are, if you do not use Google Analytics for devising and maintaining your digital data, you’re always going to lag behind.
Google Analytics is Google’s strongest SEO tool for tracking metrics and gathering in-depth data which can provide you with a foundation of which your entire search engine strategy can be based upon. Thanks to its accuracy and on-point features, Google Analytics is the one tool that every marketer needs to use necessarily.
One of the many SEO-helping features Google Analytics brings is; the ability to track which pages are performing well and which are lacking — helping you to understand which of these to optimise further.
Google Search Console
Google Search Console, also known as Google Webmasters is a platform for website owners to submit and track data of their websites in Google.
Submitting sitemaps
Sitemaps are often XML files hosted on your website (see our sitemap). These links tell Google different data about your website links including; where their location is, which priority they take over other pages for search-robots to crawl and also the time that they were last updated. All of this data is then used to tell Google’s search bot (along with other search engines) where and when to index your website’s pages.
If you’re using a WordPress website, you can automatically generate sitemaps by using the Yoast SEO plugin.
Tracking searches
Tracking search queries can help you decide on which keywords to target as you already have SEO value built-up for them according to your Search Console’s data. This can be extremely useful if you’re looking to generate new pages specifically for SEO opportunities.
Tracking errors
Tracking errors can be extremely useful to check if your website is being crawled incorrectly by Google.
The most common error you’ll find is Error-404. Meaning a page has been visited, but the content on that page was missing.
404-errors often occur if you’ve either renamed an existing page’s URL, deleted a page or have an external link pointing to your website which has been indexed by Google, but not ever established on your website — most likely linking to your domain’s previous owner’s website content.
Google Trends
Can’t figure out what your next post should be about? Give Google Trends a try and know what your audiences are talking about. No matter which niche your blog belongs to, this tool can go a long way by providing you with up-to-date data about what your readers and consumers are talking about.
Search engines such as Google seem to often work with the power of trends. Therefore, using Google Trends can help you in understanding the same.
The next time when you want to understand what your audience likes to read at a particular time, Google Trends will save you a lot of time and effort. This is especially great if you’re a news-based website.
Google Ads (if your SEO fails)
The next time Google rankings give you a hard time, seek help from Google’s own Ad platform for instant results. Google Ads is Google’s signature tool which lets you run advertisements on Google.
This tool allows you to devise an Ad campaign based on your daily budget, targeted keywords and locations and so much more. In a way, it brings your website in front of people who are actually searching for websites like yours.