Seeing as I have been in a ‘you need to blog kick’… let’s just keep it up for at least one more post. When I explain to folks why they need to blog, like I did in this Why Blog post, I mentioned that it provides more opportunities to show up in search. For example, you and your competitor each have a 10 page website and you blog 1/month or 1/week and they don’t blog at all, they have 10 pages, 10 chances to show up in search and you have 22 (if you blog monthly) or 62 (if you blog weekly) opportunities. You have taken each page and blog and used keywords that were used in that post to specifically explain a product or service that you offer. This is huge people
Take it to Google Analytics
So, let’s look at our Google Analytics and see. Log into your analytics, select your business and that should take you to Reporting, then scroll down the left and open Acquisition, then Search Engine Optimization and click on Landing Pages. If you aren’t seeing any data here it is likely that you aren’t completely set up with Google Webmaster Tools, also known as the Search Console.
Here is a quick video showing you how to find your landing pages in Google Analytics.
Linking Google Analytics to Google Webmaster Tools (Search Console)
I had to go to another client to see what screen you would get if you weren’t completely set up and went through the set up for that client so you could see how to do the linking. The following video is that how to.
Note, at the end, Google wasn’t cooperating but as soon as I turned off the video, I refreshed the screen and it was fixed. The end result would be for you to refresh, see this screen on Google Analytics and Save. Once you save, it will take you back to the Property Settings, scroll to the bottom and click save again and you should be good to go. Note that it will take a little time before you will begin to see your Landing pages.
Hopefully this has been helpful on why you need to link Google Analytics and Google Webmaster Tools so you can see where folks are landing within your website. Once you do, you will see that the majority of your traffic is going to blogs and hopefully you will blog more. If you aren’t blogging, check out my blog on why you should. If you are too busy, don’t know what to write or your grammar sucks, check out my other blog on your excuses, Busted!
Contact me with any questions as I would love to help you help yourself in search engine optimization.
~Kristen
This is incredibly helpful info for me, Kristen! All the SEO stuff is just by me. It boggles my brain. But THIS I can understand, and never knew, and will change how I do things! That blogging more often “provides more opportunities to show up in search.”
Wow! Info I can use! Thank You!
Thanks Susan, and that’s what I am here for, to help explain the difficult stuff of SEO! Glad I helped you to understand! Thanks!
Google tools can be so clunky to work with Kristen that many of my clients are very intimidated when trying to use them. Thanks for offering great videos showing how to fix major issues.
Yes Trish… Google can be a pain for sure.. not to mention changing Google Local, Maps, My Business, etc. Feel free to send them my way if they need help and you can’t offer assistance
I have looked at google analytics in the past and keep learning more ways to improve. Thank you for this great reminder today to have a look again and re-evaluate.
Yes Teresa, it can surely be overwhelming, glad to help.
Thank you for the information, I like the way you broke it down and explained how to use these tools.
Why thank you Krista, I try!
Your videos are the only ones I can ever follow. Our coach pays attention to our numbers so I never looked. You inspired me to & I hate looking at stuff like this but made myself cause I could follow your explanation & guide.
Awww, Roz, that makes my day, feel free to leave me a testimonial. 🙂
Thanks, Trish, this was very helpful. While I can see all my popular posts and pages under “Behavior, all pages” section, I noticed that I did not see anything except my main URL under the SEO section so I will need to figure this out. Any ideas?
It’s Kristen, but thank you Sabrina. Sounds like you might need to be sure everything is linked properly. If you need help, please let me know.
Thank you. I am in the process of transferring my blog to wp.org and I am having problems with google analytics. thanks for the help.
Oh great news Karen, you will love it! Glad to help
I’ve never looked at it this way before. I was never good at analytics especially from google. Thanks for the tutorial.
Hopefully this helps Liz, and maybe determine what folks are actually looking at.
Glad to help Liz and you are welcome!
Thanks for the tips! I’m happy to say I can see landing pages on Google Analytics. Phew, set up correctly. My daughter somehow memorized every grammar rule in the book. No excuses left not to blog with my chief editor just up the stairs. 🙂
YAY Brenda! So glad that you got that part taken care of!
Thank you for sharing. I went to my landing pages as soon as I started reading. Great information
Awesome, hope you learned from it Cynthia!
Quality content! – I’m sharing this to my clients! The videos are fab too,
Thanks so much Melanie, esp coming from a fellow expert such as yourself. Glad you liked the video. 🙂 Figured it would be easier to understand.
I have not had a chance to watch the video’s yet but I need to research how to do the following:….You have taken each page and blog and used keywords that were used in that post to specifically explain a product or service that you offer.
I love to see the peeks on my site when I put out a new blog:)
I revise each of my meta title and description for each page Kim. Let me know if you need any help.
Kristen, you know me, and you know I hate to look at these numbers! LOL Thanks to you though I am aware… and must so say happy you’re the one on top of this for me! Great article and so clearly explained!
Girl I know you for sure.. and glad you trust me, thank you for that. Glad this helps you understand though.
Not to brag or anything — OK, what the hell…why not? The traffic to my site this month (please note it’s only Feb. 4) jumped 218%. Completely and solely to my blog. Which means I need to get busy with some nice CTAs, offers, etc. But your point is so right on the money…you need to blog to drive traffic to your website. Your website is where you sell yourself as an expert and, if you’re doing it right, sell goods and services, too. I love your writing style, Kristen. Such good stuff. It sounds like you’re in the same room with me!
Glad that you got more traffic, likely some spam, but you work your butt off. Thanks so much Jackie, I appreciate it.
This is a good reminder for me to keep checking my Google Analytics. I also have a website that I built for a potential business that my husband started and ended. It is nestled UNDER my own website in the “tree” so it brings in lots of hits still because of the keywords! So i get false readings in “general” and I haven’t changed the sight to let it just be my own website in GA. Good reading and a great reminder to BLOG regularly too! Tx.
Yes Cheryl… I have a lot ‘nested” under me too. If you click on yours directly you will only see yours. Let me know if you need help.
I rarely check my google analytics… I admit it. I will now make sure that my search console is linked to my google analytics account thanks to your post. 🙂 When I have looked, it always amazed me to see that I was getting more traffic than I would have imagined and much of that, I would guess, is because I now put more of my blogs on my site first, vs. on the Huffington Post. Also, more people find me from other social media sites now as well. Will definitely make sure that I have this feature synced. Thanks Kristen for the easy to understand videos. I seem to be doing more than I would like to do, or know, when it comes to tech stuff with my site.
Well Bev, you can see where people are going and the type of traffic you are getting and from where, likely some spam, but you can also see which sites are coming back to your site also!
I always get frustrated. There’s one more thing to learn. So, this weekend I’ll buckle down and make sure I know how to connect and be able to follow my Google Analytics. Thanks for making us aware of how important this is.
There is ALWAYS more (too much) to learn with owning a biz, right Joyce! Hope this helps
This stuff makes my head explode!! Thanks for the videos to clarify w/step-by-step approach.
Well, that is why you have me Deb. You are welcome!
I got lost at the very beginning. When I went to Google Analytics, it said I had to set up Search Console data sharing. I did, but I still had no data showing.
Sorry you got lost Carol, you know you can reach out any time! It’s likely not completely linked.
I’m not sure if I have the two connected. I am going to go check it out. Thanks for the heads up!
Yes, please do Stacey, let me know if you need any help.
Good to see that someone else has pointed out the importance of Google Analytics and linking it to the Google Search Console. I have been doing it for quite some time now. It is actually a very well written article with quite good videos. I’d definitely like to see more posts from you Kristen.
Why thank you Charles, for the comment and the compliment. You are welcome to check out any of my 50 some blogs. 🙂
This is so helpful! Thank you!
You are welcome Sherisa, let me know if I can help.
Great info and easy to follow. I will be sharing with my team. Thanks!
Glad to hear Vicky and thank you for sharing!
Thanks for the information. I will definitely look into doing this with my own website.
You are quite welcome Heather!
it wasn’t until I started trying to figure it out on my own that I realized why so many people would rather pay to have it done, lol.. it has truly been a challenge area for me, but this was a helpful post 😉
Yep Lily and we aren’t meant to do it all. Let me know if you need help
Thank you for helping us with Google Analytics. Being able to measure our results is really important.
I have analytics set up but I know there is more that I can be doing with it.
Glad to help Stacey! Let me know if you need any help.
This is very helpful. I am still learning all about the google analytic stuff. I finally added a plugin to help track impressions for businesses.
It is great Rebecca that you have the analytics plugin but be sure you are using Google Analytics and Webmaster Tools!
Adding this to my bookmarks. In the 8+ years I’ve been blogging…I haven’t linked these. THANK YOU!
GA and GWT linking is often missed. Folks haven’t caught onto the value of Google Webmaster Tools, but they will.
Thanks for these tips! As a blogger I completely agree re: value of a blog. Blogging helps a company in so many ways, including establishing you as an expert. This will also help you stand out in Google searches.
Going to check out your other tips now. You make them so easy to follow!
Thanks so much Migdalia, I really work to make SEO and my services easy to understand. Let me know if I can help
There is SO much in Google Analytics to be viewed. I need to get this set up and start tracking it better.
Yes Laura, you do! Thank you for stopping by
Hi Kristen,
Thank you for this helpful post, I’ve been using Google Analytics but didn’t know that it can be used with GWT for better tracking.
You are quite welcome Joseph.. let me know if you want to know more about GWT
Kristen, I agree it’s so important to link analytics and search console it makes things simpler and specially the search query report in WMT is so good.
Thanks so much Mike.. if you need any help, let me know.