Any business that wants to be successful in today’s digital world must have a solid online presence. Search engine optimization (SEO) is vital in increasing visibility and traffic to your website. 

But how will you come to know whether your SEO plan is working or not? What metrics should you focus on to track your SEO strategy’s growth and all the related queries?

Hence, you need not be worried about it. In this extensive guide, we will discover the best metrics to determine the effectiveness of your SEO strategies. 

No matter which position you hold, whether a small business owner or an experienced marker, these key metrics will help you make better decisions for your next step to website success.

What exactly are website metrics?

“Website metrics refers to the data which provides the essential details about the performance and user engagement of sites that you manage.”

These metrics showcase the behavior of the visitors, what brings them to your site, and how well the content is performing. Metrics are not only restricted to telling us about these but also demonstrate where the visitors come from and where they go.

If such data from the website metrics is monitored and utilized correctly, it will lead your business to astonishing success. By looking closely at them, you can figure out the current status of your website, improve the user experience, and create a content plan that would lead your business toward more success.

Top 10 best metrics to optimize website performance

Many metrics measure website performance, but here, we will deal with the 10 Best SEO Metrics to Measure The Success of Your Business

1. Organic Traffic:

“The visitors that visit your website through unpaid search results are known as organic traffic.”

It is one of the most important SEO metrics that measures SEO success because it indicates how well your website performs in search engine rankings.

Analyzing organic traffic over time, you can determine whether keywords and content resonate with your target audience.

You can use tools like Google Analytics to track organic traffic. Just focus on the pages receiving the most organic traffic through the keyword. You can then check the keywords and behavior of the visitor on the page and match them with the purpose of the page’s content. 

2. Keyword ranking:

“Keyword rankings indicate the performance of your website in search engine result pages (SERPs) for specific targeted keywords.”

These rankings measure how well your website is positioned in search results, offering crucial information about its visibility and relevance within the online landscape.

• It shows your visibility in SERPS.
• It indicates how far the website resonates with a crawler’s query.
• It enhances conversion rates.

The higher you rank in the SERP for targeted keywords, the higher you will likely get more traffic. Keyword ranking changes often. It’s because of the Google algorithm change, backlinks changes, or your competitor activity. 

It would help if you stayed updated with Google’s algorithm, used the white hat SEO technique, got backlinks continuously, and focused on your competitor’s activities to enhance your ranking. 

The following tools can be used to analyze keyword ranking:

• Google search console
• Google Analytics

3. Click Through Rate: 

“Click Through Rate refers to the number of clicks you get to your website from the SERP.”

It ensures the title and meta description can bring users to the specific page of your website.

It is measured by dividing the total number of impressions of your website by the total number of clicks made to your website on a particular keyword. 

Google Search Console shows it. 

4. Bounce Rate:

“The bounce rate is the percentage of users who leave your website without taking any action.”

The higher the bounce rate, the more the negative impact on SEO. It indicates that the visitor needed help finding what he was searching for or may have needed a better user experience on your site. 

Conclusively, it shows that the website needs to deliver the results as expected.

Ensure your website provides valuable and engaging content to reduce the bounce rate. 

It should be easy to navigate and have a fast loading speed. Identify pages with a high bounce rate and check the gaps in the range that take the visitors away.

You can analyze the bounce rate using Google Analytics.

5. Average time on page: 

“The time a user spends on a webpage is the average time on the page.”

It is abbreviated as TOP (Time on page). 

TOP is a critical metric for keeping visitors on your site. 

To maintain this metric, we need clear and compelling headings throughout the page; the content must be visually appealing; the tone must be conversational storytelling; the format must be user-friendly; the information must be relevant and valuable; and the CTA must be easy to locate. 

“Time passes in the blink of an eye, but the best and engaging content stops time and increases time on the website page.”

We can analyze TOP using Google Analytics. 

6. Website Authority Over Time: 

“Website authority refers to the website’s credibility, trustworthiness, and strength in the eyes of search engine and SEO experts.”

Website authority is developed over time. To build the power of a website, you must publish quality content that resonates with your users and get quality backlinks and organic traffic. 

Overall, website authority refers to your dominance in the digital world. 

There are various ways to measure website authority, but Moz’s domain authority score is the most commonly used. 

The domain authority score shown ranges from 1 to 100. The higher the score, the higher the domain authority. 

7. Backlinks: 

Backlinks refer to the number of websites that link to your website. 

Backlinks are one of the crucial factors that affect your ranking in Google. Here, quality comes over quantity. That means getting fewer links from authoritative websites wins over getting more links from low-quality websites.

You should regularly monitor your backlink profile to maintain your SEO success. Always opt for natural ways of getting backlinks. 

You can monitor your existing backlink profile using Google Search Console. You need to access Links in the search console to check your backlinks. It will give you detailed information about the links to your website. 

To get notifications whenever a new page or website links to your website, you can use Google Alerts. 

8. Page Speed: 

Page speed refers to the website’s loading time in different browsers or devices. 

It’s related to user experience and is considered an essential ranking factor in Google. 

Users and search engines like a fast-loading website. 

You can run a Google page speed insight to see and improve the page speed status. 

9. Conversion Rate: 

“The rate of gaining goals by the webpage is the Conversion Rate.”

Every website has a specific purpose, like selling goods, collecting forms, etc. The number of visitors who complete the purpose of the website is conversion. 

The conversion rate is calculated by dividing the total number of people who fulfill the website’s objective by the total number of people who visit the website. 

The conversion rate of the website shows the success of SEO. More conversions on a website indicate the success of your SEO. 

You can set up the conversion goal in Google Analytics to measure the conversion rate.

Read also Best Tips To Follow For Conversion Rate Optimization Of Website

10. CLS (Cumulative Layout Shift)

“It is an important metric that is user-centric and responsible for measuring visual stability because it helps quantify how often users experience unusual layout shifts.”

Sometimes, you visit a site, and suddenly, it rearranges itself before you click. It’s nothing else but CLS.

We are all well aware of the term choreography. Similarly, you can take CLS as the choreography of a website.

You need to take care of three main things to resolve CLS issues.

• Images optimization
• Lazy loading
• CSS animation with care

You can analyze CLS using the Google page speed insight.

Conclusive view:

Conclusively, our remarks would be that knowing the right metrics to measure website performance is necessary in the digital world.

These metrics not only provide a snapshot of your site’s current condition but also provide you with the best insight for a credible user experience. So, constantly update yourself with emerging trends and refine and evaluate your website performance daily.

If you want any digital agency to handle all these, you can contact a digital marketing agency in Nepal. We are SEO experts in Nepal with over a decade of experience working on different websites.