When Google first launched its Webmaster Tools panel, some years ago now, it was met with a decidedly lackluster response. Though Webmaster Tools was fine in theory—providing information about particular keywords and connecting them to real leads—it never actually panned out the way it was supposed to. Simply put, the keyword research Google provided was never particularly good, and there were much better tools on the market that did the same thing more effectively.

But Webmaster Tools has evolved considerably since then; in fact, it’s not even called Webmaster Tools anymore. Today Google calls it Google Search Console, and it’s become an essential tool for marketers—though probably not in the way Google initially intended.

Specifically: It’s still not a particularly reliable or effective tool for connecting keywords to specific leads—but it can provide structure for a content marketing campaign.

The question, of course, is how. We’re going to answer that question over a two-part series of blog posts. Today we’ll provide just a little introduction, and in the second installment we’ll dive into some specific strategies for implementing Google Search Console.

A Crash Course in Google Search Analytics

For starters, what exactly are we talking about here? Hopefully you’ve visited Google Search Console to take a look at the analytic data on offer. What we’re interested in today is something called the Search Analytics Report, which basically shows how frequently a website shows up on the Google Search Engine Results Page. You can see that information and filter it according to various categories—among them date, search term, and even the kind of device on which the site was accessed.

The default setting—what you first see when you access the report—is a list of your top keywords over a four-week span. That’s mildly useful, perhaps, but what really makes the data compelling is when you shape it with a few additional variables and components.

A few recommendations for really making this information actionable include:

• Glean all possible information from this data—not just keywords, but clicks, impressions, position, click-through rate, and more.
• Try filtering the data based on the search type.
• Get into the habit of downloading all current information, as Google only keeps the last 90 days’ worth on hand. It never hurts to provide yourself with a really big data set to pull from.

Where to Go From There?

Regularly exporting as much data as you can will position you to really dig into some useful insights for your content marketing campaign. There are three particular strategies we can recommend. Again, we’ll look at them in more detail in the follow-up to this post—but for now, here’s a quick rundown:

• Look for patterns that show higher-than-average click-through rates, and build on that success.
• Look for new, competitive themes and see what you can do with them.
• Find topics that have worked well for you and augment them with complementary content.

Check the concluding part of this series for the details of how you can make these strategies happen—or, to start a conversation about your own content marketing strategies, give us a call at enCOMPASS today.