There are many search engines, but Google remains the undisputed leader in the worldwide
search industry (barring a few, such as Baidu in China and Yandex in Russia). Google is
the dominant engine, controlling more than 70% of the search market share. It is “batteries
included” and offers a suite of utilities that can boost your SEO processes. This chapter looks
at some of the most powerful Google tools that belong in the SEO expert’s arsenal:
• Google My Business
• Google AdWords Keyword Planner
• Google Trends
• PageSpeed Insights
• Google Analytics
• Google Search Console
Google My Business
Google My Business is a new portal for local and nonlocal businesses ( local businesses
are those present in the vicinity of the user or in the same geolocation). It is a complete
ecosystem for local business or brands. It replaces Google Local and Google Places, other
than mainstream integration with Google+ (a social networking site by Google).
Aimed at small- and medium-size enterprises that lack the budget of large-scale
organizations, Google My Business helps you reach out to consumers. It is a platform that
helps you connect to and interact with customers in addition to promoting your business.
You can add pictures of your businesses, post reviews, engage with users, share updates
and news, and help your business gain visibility in Google search results.
Figure 4-1 shows the business listings for steel companies in Toronto that resulted
from a search query. The boxed listings are prominent, and their location is marked on
the map. You also see the operating hours for some businesses and other information
such as websites and directions
Google My Business is a lucrative platform. To begin using it, the first thing you need
to do is verify your business. You can do so via a postcard, with a phone call, or by using
instant or bulk verification, if your website is verified by the Google Search Console utility
(previously called Google Webmaster Tools).
If you have registered your business in Google Places or Google+, it will
automatically be upgraded to Google My Business. You can update your business
details as well as indicate the opening and operating hours. You can fill in the business
description, post photos of your brand or website, and reach out to customers in several
ways. You can offer discounts, offers, deals, and other promotions to expand your user
base. You can interact with consumers by responding to their feeds. Integration with
Google+ and Google Hangout enables you to keep your customers in sync and address
any complaints as well as communicate with them on a regular basis. In addition, Google
Apps for Work can be integrated with this platform.
Google AdWords Keyword Planner
Google AdWords Keyword Planner is a good resource for coming up with keywords for a
new project or relevant terms for an existing campaign. You can use this utility to develop
terms and filter them for a specific country or region based on the geolocation. You can
determine the search volume for keywords and predict the bid for those terms, if you are
opting for a paid campaign.
Google AdWords Keyword Planner helps you choose multiple terms that can be
used in conjunction with another term, specifically long-tail terms that can drive the right
traffic to your website. You can also find alternate terms for your products or services that
have low competition and may require less effort to rank well in SERPs. Monthly global
and local monthly searches are handy because you can determine the keywords your
competitors are using to promote their products and services.
You can find the utility at the following link: https://adwords.google.com/
KeywordPlanner.
Google Trends
Google Trends is a utility that helps you compare the flow, trends, and popularity of
terms and phrases; you can see at a glance how terms and phrases fare. It spans several
categories, such as business, nature, sports, travel, and news. You can streamline your
keyword research by using Google Trends results along with the Google AdWords
Keyword Planner utility. You can even filter search trends by sorting terms geographically
or according to time span and categories. For example, you can determine the popularity
of terms in a particular country, region, or city.
In addition to finding regional trends, you can use Google Trends for content
creation and content development. For example, you can write blogs or include trendy
terms in forums and social bookmarking sites. Or you can base content on popular terms
or phrases in your new campaigns. You can gain insight into your competitors’ trends and
compare your business trends with those of your rivals.
You can access Google Trends at https://www.google.com/trends/ .
shows a snippet of the home page.
PageSpeed Insights
Google stresses the importance of web page performance, and its algorithms favor
websites with optimal site speed and user experience (UX) design . Optimal Page-loading
time counts toward an enhanced UX. Studies suggest that optimal page-load time leads
to more conversions, thereby affecting sales significantly. Page speed depends on several
factors ranging from web-hosting facility and website design to the hardware used for that
site. In particular, websites that take a lot of time to open on mobile devices are penalized,
because they result in a bad UX.
Google has its own tool that you can use, not only for site speed. You can access the PageSpeed tool at
https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/ .
Enter a URL or web page address in the search box, and click Analyze. You will
see results for mobile and desktop versions. The results include two sections: Speed
and User Experience. Fixes as well as suggestions pertaining to speed and UX are
listed. Fixes include compression of JavaScript and CSS, avoiding plug-ins for platform
compatibility, using legible font sizes, and avoiding landing page redirects. Suggestions
are recommendations to further enhance the website for an optimal UX.
User satisfaction is a prime factor for any business, and it applies to SEO too. Good
site speed leads to backlinks, conversion optimization, and favorable reviews, thereby
streamlining the UX.
Google Analytics
If you have a website, then you want to know how many people are viewing or buying stuff
on that site. You also want to know the geographic location of your users and which content
is frequently accessed. Whether your campaigns lead to sales conversions and high traffic
can be a deciding factor, especially for an e-commerce site. Enter Google Analytics: an
enterprise-grade toolkit that helps you gain insight into your website traffic, history trends,
and site statistics. You can find out about pages that have poor traffic and bounce rates and
get information about the search query keywords used most often to reach your website.
You can learn whether you need a mobile site or, if you already have one, how to optimize
it to gain relevant traffic. Traffic trends and links from referral sites can be measured
for conversion optimization. You can set custom goals and events to get meaningful
information to streamlining your business processes. Tracking metrics and visitor
engagement can help you improve your marketing strategy. In short, Google Analytics is a
robust utility that helps you make data-driven decisions to enhance your web presence.
This section looks at how to install Google Analytics and incorporate it into your
website. First you need a Google account; for example, if you use Gmail, YouTube,
Google Drive or any Google primary service, you can use that account for Analytics.
However, always make sure you have complete access to and control over that account.
The business or website owner should be the only person who fully controls that primary
account so that they have access to it at any time from any location.
If you do not have a primary Google account, create one, and make sure you control
every aspect of that account. Sign in, and you are directed to the steps.
nce you receive a tracking code, depending on your content management system
(CMS), you need to incorporate the tracking code into your document. If you are using
Wordpress, you can use the Google Analytics by Yoast plug-in. If you built your site with
simple HTML markup, then you need to include the tracking code in the <head> section
of your HTML document, just before the closing </head> tag. The following post explains
the procedure for installing Google Analytics for different platforms: www.lizlockard.
com/installing-google-analytics-on-any-website/ .
Next, verify your account using the options in the Google Search Console (discussed
in the next section). Once you have set up Google Analytics, you can add users and set
permissions. You can define goals to understand when important actions occur on your site.
You can set up Site Search, which helps you gain insight about searches made on your
website. You can get an analysis in a day, provided your setup is implemented correctly.
Every time you log in to your account, go to the Reporting section to view the
Dashboards, Shortcuts, Audience, Acquisition, Behavior, and Conversion menu items.
Following are some common terms you will come across while viewing analyzing
these reports:
• Dimensions : An attribute of your site visitors that can have various
values. For example, gender, browser, city, and so on.
• Metrics : A measure of elements of a dimension. For example, new
users, bounce rate, sessions, and so on.
• Sessions : Period of user engagement with the website for a specific
date range. For example, time taken for page view during a certain
date range.
• Conversions : Count of the goals completed on your website. For
example, purchasing items on an e-commerce site can be a goal,
and conversions relate to users who have visited the site and
bought something.
• Bounce rate: Percentage of single visits where the site visitor
leaves the site without any other action. For example, a user may
just click the back button if they do not get relevant information
when they visit your site’s home page for the first time.
• Audience : Report items that provide statistics depending on traffic
and help you gain insight into a site visitor’s behavior on arrival
on your site.
• Acquisition : Report items that provide information about the
source of traffic, actions performed on the site, and whether
conversions occur during the sessions.
In addition to the Reporting menu items, you can create custom reports and custom
variables to get the most out of the Analytics data. A plethora of third-party utilities and
plug-ins are available, such as reporting tools and products that use the platform for
Analytics-based tracking. In addition, there is a Google Analytics premium platform that
enterprise-grade and large-scale organizations can use to obtain advanced results.
Google Search Console
Google Search Console (formerly known as Google Webmaster Tools [GWT]) is a free utility
to analyze your website’s indexing and manage and monitor your site’s Google Search
ranking. It helps you probe and gain insight into how your site appears to the Google search
engine. You can also get information related to hack attacks, penalties, and broken links,
along with suggestions that can help you improve and manage the presence of your website.
To use Google Search Console, you need to have a primary Google account. Once you
log in to the Search Console.
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