Free internet marketing tool – Google Webmaster

by on March 26, 2015

Google WebmasterThere are 2 basic free tools that I always recommend small business owners to have set up. The first is Google Analytics for monitoring your website’s activity and metrics. (Not familiar with Google Analytics? Head on over to my post about setting up Google Analytics.)

The next is Google Webmaster Tools. It offers up all kinds of valuable information about your site, as well as letting you know if Google has found any errors and if there are any actions you need to take to make your site more search and visitor friendly.

Once you have it linked up to your website, you can click through the different tabs to see how your site is doing. Along the way, Google provides plenty of links to explanations to help you better understand what they are talking about.

Here is some highlights of the information Webmaster gives you…

Search queries

Within Analytics, there is very limited data you can get around which keywords are sending you traffic. Webmaster gives you most insight in the “search queries” tab. You get much richer data around which terms are sending you traffic, the click rate and what position you are showing up in search rankings. Within this tab you can also see what your top landing pages are – the first page where someone enters your site.

Links to your site

This tabs tells you all about links to your site, which pages are most linked to and how they are linked.

Mobile usability

This tab lets you know about issues around visits accessing your site via their mobile devices. Google is placing increasing importance on mobile, so it’s important to ensure that your site is mobile friendly. They’ve announced that as of April 21st, 2015, they will be favouring sites that are mobile friendly.

Crawl errors

In this tab, you can see if Google is having any trouble accessing URLs. You don’t want broken links on your site and this can help highlight where you might have some faulty links.

Security issues

Having security issues on your site is a big red flag for Google. Webmaster allows you to keep on top of things and take action if required. Getting your site hacked or having a virus is one of the worst things that can affect your site. So it’s important to know when something may have happened. Not all hacks or viruses result in your site going down. Sometimes issues can lurk below the surface.

Resources

  • Head over to the Google Webmaster page https://www.google.com/webmasters/ to get signed up. There’s a Help Center with answers to any questions you may have.
  • For further detail on all the information Google Webmaster provides, check out this post from Kissmetrics 
  • For an in-depth dissection of all the features, check out this post from Lunametrics

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{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }

Mark Miller May 2, 2015 at 9:09 am

Hi Martina,

Thanks for show us how to use Google webmaster tools, I never thought they have so many functions/features. To be honest with you, I really don’t understand those features on Google webmaster tools due to lack of info on Google. Thanks to you, now I have a better understanding.

Cheers,
Mark
Mark Miller recently posted..Tips and Advice for Your Social Media Marketing

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Martina Iring May 4, 2015 at 10:00 am

Glad you found the post useful Mark! Cheers

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