Fix Website Errors and Boost Your Search Rankings with Google Search Console

Want to Outrank Competitors?

Google Search Console Holds the Key

Want to know how your website is performing in Google Search and how to improve your rankings? Google Search Console (GSC) is your inside source. This powerful (and free!) tool unveils the mysteries of search traffic, potential website errors, and hidden optimization opportunities that can boost your business.

What is Google Search Console & Why It Matters

Think of GSC as your website's health monitor, communication hub with Google, and secret weapon for:

• Performance Analysis: Dive deep into clicks, impressions, average search position, and which keywords trigger your website's appearances in search results.

• Troubleshooting: Diagnose indexing issues, broken links, crawl errors, mobile-friendliness problems, and even manual penalties that can hinder your search performance.

• Google Communication: Receive alerts for serious issues, submit sitemaps to help Google discover your pages, and request re-indexing for urgent updates.

• Optimization Insights: Identify which pages bring in the most traffic, opportunities to improve your click-through-rate (CTR) in search results, internal linking analysis, and more.

Setting Up Google Search Console: Step-by-Step

1. Visit https://search.google.com/search-console/about and log in with your Google Account.

2. Add a Property: Enter your website URL and select a verification method (DNS record, HTML file upload, etc.).

3. Explore the Interface: Familiarize yourself with the key sections: Overview, Performance, Index Coverage, Enhancements (mobile usability, Core Web Vitals), Security & Manual Actions.

Key Google Search Console Reports & Their Uses

• Performance Report:

  • Track clicks, impressions, CTR, and average positions over time.

  • Compare performance across different time periods.

  • Filter by query (keyword), page, country, device, and search appearance type (web, image, video, etc.).

  • Action: Identify high-potential keywords, find low CTR opportunities, track progress from SEO improvements.

• Index Coverage Report:

  • View indexing status of URLs – valid, excluded, warnings, errors

  • Diagnose crawling issues, identify pages blocked by robots.txt, spot "noindex" tags preventing inclusion.

  • Action: Fix errors, submit URLs for re-indexing, optimize your crawl budget

• Mobile Usability Report:

  • Find and fix errors impacting the mobile version of your site (unplayable content, text too small, viewport issues).

  • Action: Ensure a seamless mobile experience to avoid search penalties

• Core Web Vitals:

  • Assess website speed and responsiveness with metrics like Largest Contentful Paint (LCP), First Input Delay (FID), and Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS).

  • Action: Optimize for good page experience which impacts SEO rankings

• Links Report:

  • See which external websites link to you most frequently (backlinks).

  • Discover your most linked pages.

  • Check anchor text used for internal and external links.

Pro-Tips:

• Submit Sitemaps: Ensure timely crawling of your important pages.

• Fetch as Google: Check how Google renders your pages for potential issues.

• URL Inspection Tool: Analyze specific pages for indexing status, mobile-friendliness, and AMP validity.

• Connect with Google Analytics: Integrate with your Analytics account for even richer data

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Don't leave your online success to chance! Set up Google Search Console today for a data-driven approach to your website's health and growth.

Feeling overwhelmed? Let Store Rapport help you navigate the GSC landscape and optimize your website for search engine success. Contact us for a free consultation!