Whether you‘re a seasoned SEO expert or a marketing leader looking to brush up on your SEO skills, you‘ve likely asked yourself: "What SEO metrics should I be tracking?"
The options are endless. You have your classic metrics like organic traffic and keyword rankings, your more technical metrics like page speed and crawl errors, your user experience metrics like bounce rate and pages per session, and your off-page SEO metrics like backlinks.
But let‘s be real – tracking every single SEO metric is not only overwhelming, it‘s also not an effective use of your time. As a marketing leader, you need to focus on the metrics that truly impact your bottom line.
So, which metrics matter most? I interviewed Olga Andrienko, VP of Brand Marketing at leading SEO software platform Semrush, to get her expert insights.
Here are the top SEO metrics she says marketing leaders should pay attention to in 2023 and beyond, along with tips and tools for tracking and improving them.
Focus on Revenue-Related Metrics
When asked about the most important SEO metrics, Andrienko‘s answer was clear: "Focus on the metrics that tie directly back to revenue."
She elaborated, saying: "When we discuss quarterly goals at Semrush, we always look at new MRR (monthly recurring revenue). And, in that case, conversion is the only thing that matters. The metrics that matter are the ones that can tie back directly to revenue."
This might seem obvious, but it‘s a critical mindset shift many marketers still need to make. Too often, SEO reporting focuses on surface-level vanity metrics like rankings and traffic while glossing over the bottom-line metrics that really gauge SEO success.
As Andrienko put it: "Rankings don‘t matter much. People need to land on your website, and they need to buy or show they‘re interested."
Instead of obsessing over keyword positions alone, dig into your website analytics to uncover how organic traffic impacts conversions and revenue. Some metrics to track:
- Ecommerce transactions and revenue from organic search
- Leads, signups, and form submissions from organic landing pages
- Assisted conversions and revenue where organic played a role in the buyer journey
Use tools like Google Analytics, HubSpot, and Semrush to attribute conversions and sales back to organic search. This will help you make the case for SEO‘s impact on revenue.
Measure how organic traffic impacts key business metrics like signups and revenue. (Source: Semrush)
Another metric Andrienko recommends closely watching is your share of voice (SOV) compared to competitors.
"Organic SOV shows you how much of the overall search demand for your niche you‘re capturing compared to rivals," she explained. "It‘s an important leading indicator of your SEO progress and market presence."
To measure organic SOV, use a competitive analysis tool like Semrush Market Explorer or Ahrefs Site Explorer. These tools estimate the percentage of all searches in your niche that each competitor‘s website receives.
For example, the image below from Semrush shows the top websites in the project management niche, along with their estimated share of voice percentage.
Comparing competitors‘ organic share of voice using Semrush Market Explorer.
Tracking SOV over time helps you benchmark your organic search presence against direct competitors. If your SOV is steadily rising, it‘s a sign your SEO efforts are paying off.
Beyond SOV alone, also keep an eye on these competitor comparison metrics:
- Keywords you rank for vs competitors
- Competitors‘ estimated organic traffic
- Number and authority of referring domains
- Key content gaps and opportunities
The goal is to identify areas where you‘re being outranked and outperformed, then adjust your SEO strategy to win back that market share.
Monitor Branded Search Volume
"For me, being a brand marketing leader, I focus heavily on branded keyword search volume," said Andrienko. "Measuring how many searches our company‘s name is getting over time gives me an understanding of how good we are at strengthening our brand and growing awareness."
While ranking for non-branded industry keywords is critical for attracting new customers, don‘t neglect your branded search presence. Branded searches are often performed by searchers further along in the buyer journey who already know your company and are considering a purchase.
To measure branded search volume, use Google Search Console to see the queries driving traffic to your site. Filter the queries to just show phrases that include your brand or product name.
You can also use Google Trends or a keyword research tool like Semrush to compare search interest in your branded keywords over time or versus competitors‘ brands.
The chart below shows how search interest for project management tool "Asana" compares to competitor "Trello" over the past 5 years, for example.
Comparing interest in branded keywords "Asana" vs "Trello". (Source: Google Trends)
Growing your branded search volume is a valuable leading indicator of demand and brand authority. As your brand becomes more well-known through your PR, content, and larger marketing efforts, you should see a correlating increase in branded searches.
Don‘t Ignore User Engagement Metrics
While conversions and revenue are the end goals, user engagement metrics are still vital to track as leading indicators of your SEO success.
Some engagement metrics Andrienko recommends monitoring:
- Pages per session – how many pages the average organic visitor views before leaving your site
- Average session duration – how long the typical organic visit lasts
- Bounce rate – the percentage of organic visitors that leave after viewing just one page
- Dwell time – how long a visitor spends on your page before clicking back to search results
"Engagement metrics are especially important for informational searches," explained Andrienko. "They help you understand if your content is meeting the searcher‘s intent and providing value. If organic visitors are bouncing quickly or not going beyond the first page, that‘s a red flag."
Compare your organic engagement metrics to your site-wide benchmarks. If a page‘s bounce rate or time on page is significantly worse than your site average, revisit that content. How could it be improved or expanded to better fulfill the searcher‘s needs?
Diagnose Declining Click-Through Rates
Even if your rankings are steady, a declining organic click-through rate (CTR) is cause for concern.
Andrienko shared an example of noticing the organic CTR dropping for one of Semrush‘s target keywords, even though rankings were stable. After some digging, she discovered Google had started showing a featured snippet and more ads for that term, pushing their organic result further down the page.
To compensate, Andrienko‘s team bid on PPC ads for that keyword to recapture the lost organic clicks. By monitoring CTR and adapting their strategy, they were able to maintain search visibility.
To find your own CTR opportunities, compare the organic CTRs of your pages in Google Search Console to their average positions.
According to a 2022 study of 5.2 million search queries by Semrush, you can expect the #1 organic result to earn around 28% of clicks on average. If your top ranking pages are getting significantly less than that, they may be underperforming.
| Google Position | Average Organic CTR |
|---|---|
| 1 | 28.5% |
| 2 | 15.7% |
| 3 | 11% |
| 4 | 8% |
| 5 | 7.2% |
Average organic click-through rate by Google position. (Source: Semrush)
Some tactics to improve a low organic CTR include:
- Optimizing your titles and meta descriptions to be more compelling
- Earning rich snippets like review stars to make your result stand out
- Adding numbers, power words, and emotional triggers to your SEO titles
- Refreshing outdated content to be more up-to-date and authoritative
The Metrics That Matter Depend on Your Goals
Ultimately, the SEO metrics you track and optimize for should align with your specific business goals and audience.
For example, the content team at Semrush pays particularly close attention to user engagement signals, since their goal is increasing brand authority and thought leadership.
"For an SEO and content marketing platform like ours, expertise and trust are crucial," said Andrienko. "We look closely at metrics like organic traffic to our blog, time on page, newsletter signups, and repeat visitors to gauge how well we‘re building authority with our audience."
An ecommerce brand, on the other hand, would weight transactional metrics like organic revenue and ROAS more heavily.
A local business might prioritize organic traffic from searchers in their geographic area, as well as local pack rankings, review generation, and foot traffic to their stores.
The key is choosing the 5-6 metrics that best reflect your unique SEO goals, then monitoring them consistently to make data-driven decisions. This custom SEO dashboard is a good starting point:
Create a custom SEO reporting dashboard in Google Data Studio, Semrush, or your preferred tool.
Communicate SEO Metrics to the C-Suite
Finally, don‘t forget to share your hard-earned SEO wins with company leadership and other departments. Communicating SEO results in terms of business value is key for earning buy-in and resources.
Some tips for effectively reporting on SEO performance:
- Focus on the metrics that matter to your executives, like leads, revenue, and market share
- Show SEO metrics alongside their impact on overall marketing and business KPIs
- Include customer case studies and testimonials from organic leads
- Visualize data using clear charts and dashboards
- Provide competitive benchmarks to show how you stack up to rivals
- Share projections of the potential future impact of scaling SEO investment
The better you can connect SEO metrics to business outcomes, the more your leaders will value SEO as a critical marketing channel worthy of serious investment.
Takeaways for Tracking SEO Success
While there‘s no shortage of SEO data you could track, not all metrics are created equal. For busy marketing leaders, the SEO metrics that matter most are the ones that tangibly impact your business goals.
Based on insights from Semrush‘s VP of Brand Marketing and other SEO experts, here‘s a quick summary of the key SEO metrics to focus on:
- Bottom-line metrics that tie to revenue, like leads, signups, and sales from organic search
- Competitive metrics like share of voice and keyword gap analysis
- Brand awareness metrics like branded search volume and social mentions
- User engagement metrics like organic bounce rate, time on page, and pages per session
- Technical SEO health metrics like crawl errors, site speed, and indexation
Beyond these universal SEO metrics, choose the unique KPIs that best reflect your goals. Incorporate those into a custom reporting dashboard, monitor trends over time, and make data-informed optimizations.
By focusing your analysis on the metrics that matter, you can make smarter SEO decisions, impress your company leaders, and maximize the business impact of your organic search strategy.
