8 Key Google Search Console Metrics to Monitor Every Month

If you’re serious about SEO, Google Search Console (GSC) is an essential tool in your arsenal. GSC provides valuable guidance on how Google Search perceives your content and how to enhance your SEO strategy. By keeping a close watch on some key metrics in GSC, you’ll be able to identify and strengthen your site’s opportunities for increased visibility, feeling guided and supported in your efforts.

This guide will unpack the most important Google Search Console metrics or things you should be checking on a monthly basis to keep checking that your site is healthy, your pages are found and engaging in the search results, and that your users are happy with their experiences with your site.

Table of Contents

• Performance Report: Clicks, Impressions, CTR, and Average Position
• Coverage Report: Search Console Indexing Status
• Sitemaps Report
• URL Inspection Tool: Page Indexing and AMP Status
• Core Web Vitals Report
• Mobile Usability Report
• Links Report: Internal and External Links
• Manual Actions Report
• Key Takeaways

1. Performance Report: Clicks, Impressions, CTR, and Average Position

The Performance report is arguably one of the most important views. This shows how the website is doing as a whole in Google Search, giving information about different metrics like clicks, impressions, click-through rate (CTR), and average position.

a. Clicks

• What It Means: The number of times visitors clicked on your website in the search results.
• Why It Matters: Clicks tell you how much direct traffic to your site has come from Google Search. When you start tracking this metric monthly, you get a sense of how your content and meta tags perform in sending users your way.

b. Impressions

• What It Is: Whether or not anyone clicked.
• What It Means: If you have a high number of impressions with a low number of clicks, it could indicate that your site is showing up but is not enticing people to click on it. Perhaps you need to work on better meta descriptions or titles.

c. Click-Through Rate (CTR)

• What It Is: The percentage of impressions that resulted in a click.
• What it means: A low CTR could indicate that either your titles or your meta descriptions don’t match up with user intent, and can be improved to make your traffic go through the roof.

d. Average Position

• What It Is: The average rank of your website for the selected queries.
• What It Tells You: This is a good high-level look at your SEO performance. A downturn in average position can suggest increased competition or ranking issues.

Tips for Monitoring:

• Compare metrics month-on-month to identify trends and changes.
• Analyse data at the page level to see which content performs best.
• Use filtering options to focus on specific queries, pages, or countries.

2. Coverage Report: Search Console Indexing Status

The Coverage report shows the indexing status of your pages. It helps you understand which pages are successfully indexed and which have errors or warnings.

a. Valid Pages

• What It Is: Pages successfully indexed and available in search.
• Why It’s Important:  Ensuring key pages are indexed is crucial for visibility. A drop in valid pages could mean indexing issues or penalties.

b. Errors

• What It Is: Pages that Google tried to index but encountered an error.
• Why It’s Important: Errors could prevent pages from appearing in search results. Common issues include 404 errors, server errors, and redirect errors. Fixing these should be a priority.

c. Excluded Pages

• What It Is: Pages that were intentionally not indexed.
• Why It’s Important: This could include pages with a noindex tag or those blocked by robots.txt. Ensure that important pages are not mistakenly excluded.

Tips for Monitoring:

• Regularly check for any new errors or significant changes in indexing status.
• Address errors promptly to ensure all critical pages are indexed.
• Use the URL Inspection tool to investigate specific pages with issues.

3. Sitemaps Report

The Sitemaps report allows you to submit your sitemaps to Google and see the indexing status of your submitted URLs.

a. Submitted URLs

• What It Is: The number of URLs you’ve submitted via your sitemap.
• Why It’s Important: Ensures that Google is aware of all your site’s important pages. Missing URLs could indicate issues with your sitemap.

b. Indexed URLs

• What It Is: The number of URLs from your sitemap that are indexed.
• Why It’s Important: Helps you verify that Google has indexed all your key pages. Discrepancies between submitted and indexed URLs may highlight issues.

Tips for Monitoring:

• Submit updated sitemaps whenever new content is added.
• Check that all critical pages are in the sitemap.
• Ensure the sitemap is free from errors or broken links.

4. URL Inspection Tool: Page Indexing and AMP Status

The Search Console URL Inspection Tool provides detailed insights into how Google views a specific page. It’s essential for diagnosing indexing and crawling issues.

 a. Page Indexing Status

• What It Is: Information about whether a page is indexed or not.
• Why It’s Important: Understanding why a page is not indexed can help you make necessary corrections, such as fixing crawl errors or removing noindex tags.

b. AMP Status

• What It Is: Information on whether AMP (Accelerated Mobile Pages) pages are valid.
• Why It’s Important: If you use AMP, this tool can help identify issues preventing your pages from appearing in AMP format, which can impact mobile performance.

Tips for Monitoring:

• Regularly check high-priority URLs, especially new or recently updated ones.
• Use the “Test Live URL” feature to see real-time data.
• Keep track of any changes in indexing status and investigate promptly.

5. Core Web Vitals Report

Core Web Vitals are critical user experience metrics that Google uses as part of its ranking algorithm. They focus on three aspects: loading, interactivity, and visual stability.

a. Largest Contentful Paint (LCP)

• What It Is: Measures the time it takes for the largest content element to become visible.
• Why It’s Important: A slow LCP can hurt user experience and rankings. The ideal is 2.5 seconds or less.

b. First Input Delay (FID)

• What It Is: Measures the time it takes for the page to become interactive.
• Why It’s Important: A high FID means users experience delays when trying to interact with your site. The ideal is 100 milliseconds or less.

c. Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS)

• What It Is: Measures visual stability. It tracks how much the page layout shifts unexpectedly.
• Why It’s Important: High CLS can lead to a poor user experience, especially on mobile devices. The ideal is less than 0.1.

Tips for Monitoring:

• Check monthly to track improvements or declines in user experience.
• Use the report to identify specific URLs with issues.
• Implement fixes like optimising images, reducing JavaScript, or improving server response times.

6. Mobile Usability Report

The Search Console Mobile Usability report highlights issues that affect your site’s usability on mobile devices. Since mobile-friendliness is a significant ranking factor, it’s essential to monitor this report closely.

a. Error-Free Pages

• What It Is: Pages that pass Google’s mobile usability tests.
• Why It’s Important: A higher number of error-free pages indicates a good mobile experience.

b. Errors

• What It Is: Issues like text too small to read, clickable elements too close together, or content wider than the screen.
• Why It’s Important: Such errors can negatively impact your rankings and user experience. Fixing them can lead to better performance in mobile search results.

Tips for Monitoring:

• Regularly review new errors and fix them promptly.
• Test pages on multiple devices to ensure good usability.
• Prioritise fixing pages with high traffic or strategic importance.

7. Links Report: Internal and External Links

The Links report provides data on internal and external links pointing to your site, which are vital for SEO.

a. Top Linked Pages (External)

• What It Is: Pages with the most backlinks from other websites.
• Why It’s Important: High-quality backlinks are crucial for SEO. Knowing which pages attract the most links can guide your content strategy.

b. Top Linked Pages (Internal)

• What It Is: Pages with the most internal links from within your site.
• Why It’s Important: Internal linking helps distribute link equity and improve page rankings. Ensure key pages are well-linked internally.

c. Top Linking Sites

• What It Is: Websites that link to your content the most.
• Why It’s Important: Building relationships with these sites can lead to more backlinks. Monitoring this helps you understand your site’s link profile.

d. Top Linking Text

• What It Is: The anchor text used by external sites to link to your pages.
• Why It’s Important: Anchor text influences how Google understands the linked page’s relevance. Ensure the anchor text is diverse and relevant.

Tips for Monitoring:

• Monitor changes in backlinks to spot potential negative SEO attacks or lost links.
• Use internal linking strategically to boost the SEO of key pages.
• Regularly audit anchor texts to ensure relevance and diversity.

8. Manual Actions Report

The Manual Actions report notifies you if your site has been penalised by Google for violating its guidelines. While hopefully, you never see this, it’s crucial to monitor.

a. Manual Actions

• What It Is: Lists any penalties or manual actions applied to your site.
• Why It’s Important: Penalties can severely affect your rankings. Immediate action is required to resolve them.

Tips for Monitoring:

• Check this report even if you haven’t noticed any traffic drops.
• If penalised, follow Google’s guidelines

Key Takeaways

By monitoring key metrics in Google Search Console (GSC) monthly, you gain a powerful tool for effective SEO strategy and site optimisation. The Performance Report, with its insights into clicks, impressions, click-through rate (CTR), and average position, offers a comprehensive view of your site’s performance in Google Search. High impressions but low CTRs? You now have the knowledge to improve meta descriptions or titles.

The Coverage Report is your ally in the battle for visibility. It shows the indexing status of your pages, highlighting errors or excluded pages that could affect visibility. Addressing these issues brings relief, ensuring all critical pages are available in search results.

Submitting and verifying sitemaps is essential for Google to index all key pages. The URL Inspection Tool provides insights into specific page issues, such as indexing problems or AMP (Accelerated Mobile Pages) status, enabling you to troubleshoot barriers to search visibility.

Core Web Vitals focus on user experience metrics like loading speed and visual stability, which influence rankings. Monitoring these metrics helps you address performance issues that affect user experience and search rankings.

The Mobile Usability Report is vital for ensuring a seamless mobile experience. It identifies issues that may hinder usability on mobile devices, such as small text or closely placed clickable elements, which are crucial for improving mobile search performance.

The Links Report offers insights into the quality and quantity of internal and external links, essential for SEO. Regularly reviewing this report helps you identify opportunities to strengthen your link profile.

Finally, the Manual Actions Report is your safety net. It alerts you to any penalties affecting your site, giving you the reassurance that you can take prompt action to resolve issues and restore rankings. Regularly monitoring these GSC metrics helps you identify trends, resolve issues, and maintain optimal site health and performance.