Okay, so any of us in the online marketing world have been guilty of obsessing over rankings at one time or another. Well, in this week's Whiteboard Friday, Rand makes the case that Rank Tracking may not be the end all be all of SEO metrics, at least not by itself.
Take a look and see what else you need to be monitoring in order to make rank tracking truly worthwhile to your sites and those of your clients.
SEOmoz Whiteboard Friday - When to Track Rankings from Scott Willoughby on Vimeo.
By: Scott Willoughby
Whiteboard Friday - When to Track Rankings
Whiteboard Friday
The author's views are entirely his or her own (excluding the unlikely event of hypnosis) and may not always reflect the views of Moz.
Thanks for the hat-tip Rand. Always incredibly chuffed when I say something you think worth repeating.
Can I also say, on a more serious note......am I the only one who, when he hears the WBF theme music, has an unexplainable urge to do a 'party boy'
Ha! I totally agree about the 'party boy' thing. I always imagine getting up and doing a 'conan the raver' myself.
If you've been paying close attention, you'll notice that the WBF theme song the last couple of weeks is new for '09!
O yeah, I noticed that immediately...RAVE! Nice pick
Great post. I often find that I have clients who are obsessive over thier rank. Now I have some new ammo to let clents know what they should be worrying about. Thanks.
We once had a rather eccentric client who decided one day that all he cared about was PageRank. He wanted to know what it would take to earn a PR9 for his site. Helping clients determine the correct KPI's for their goals can be a big challenge when consulting.
Good topic, nice presentation. This also is my first post on the forum.
Another reason to track SERP placement is that a sustained drop is one of the first indications that the page content may require refreshing.
Excellent. It seems like no matter how hard you try to hammer this home, it never quite sinks in. Even more amazing is how polarized it seems... between the "rankings are everything" and the "we don't even look at rankings" crowds.
Rank tracking is an important tool if used in this way and if:
I'd also advise more sophisticated rank tracking.
Very good information Rand. In my previous job we didn't seem to focus on all the factors you mentioned. We seemed to just track the position in the search engines and would send those to the clients. In my next job I will be more inclined to focus on Analytics more than rankings as it seems to be a way more valuable tool.
Definitely a big help and a big eye-mind opener for some client (boss?) that are obsessed so much on that SERPs rankings. Hand salute for you Rand!
Great video Rand :-)
its so easy to get involved with ranking reports and positions etc and forget about the rationalising the data collected from analytics.
Some really good points noted....
Nice video rand. I definatley have been too obsessed with rankings and one time or another.
Loved it Rand.. Keep it coming!
This is exactly what I've been searching for recently. Thank you Rand!
Got several people I have been desperately trying to educate about SEO over the last few months - specifically trying to stop them from obsessing over rankings that fluctuate constantly. It's been incredibly frustrating and an uphill battle - but this could be the thing to help them understand and focus on the analytics instead.
Great post as usual.
I think using traffic reports is also time saver. Lately i found a good Analytics hack to track SEO ranking, you can find it on https://yoast.com/track-seo-rankings-google-analytics/
But also i would like to know what kind of rank tracking tools you guys use.
I think you missed one thing: long tail.
Tracking long tail traffic isn't that easy. They don't produce peaks as a standalone KW, but many them together bring a lot of traffic. And what is most important, very specific targeted traffic.
So the most valuable factor isn't trackable with the tactic presented. It could be just made with traffic sum vs. traffic from organic search.
May be, you correct this with a long tail special video. :)
I agree that search traffic is a better metric than ranking as a measure of performance, and also that rank tracking can still add value.
One of the biggest ways rank tracking can add value is for clients where you don't have access to their traffic analytics. Not an ideal situation by any means, but better to have some data to illustrate your value, than no data at all.
Every business has a motive..most of the times profit. more Profit comes from more revenue.. more revenue from more or better customers ....more customers means more traffic.. not high rankings...ranking may lead to more traffic but may not... so watch the traffic...
Rand mentioned a (made-up) Google data center's IP address ending in .721. Are we beyond .255?
I have found that clients are most impressed with the analytical data that you can present them with. You can design a fantastic website but show them some analytics and they are happy as a pig in &*@%.
Good Post Rand but action is missing. It would be of great help if some shares monitoring formats or client reporting system for an SEO Project. What I stress most is Search Traffic and conversions but looking to improve reporting formats.
i still feel it is important, but no point tracking brand terms that drive 1-2 visits/month...
Takes me back to when i used to study AwStats :)
Imagine a world now without G Analytics?
I find it interesting what comes up when you search for a topic like rankings = traffic in Google. There is even a YouTube video.
Interesting video, I agree that day to day rankings are not worth pulling your hair out over, but aggregate data overtime is very handy.
At the end you hint at SEOmoz maybe looking at Serp tracking...Just saw this post today https://smackdown.blogsblogsblogs.com/2009/01/30/google-web-search-goes-completely-ajax where it seems Google is bucket testing Ajax serps...what are your thoughts and would that keep anyone from getting tools to check ranks?
anytime seomoz covers web analytics in one of your articles, i feel all warm inside! keep up the good work!
Great video Rand!!
This is my first comment on SEOmoz. I've been a fan for some time, especially White Board Friday's because I'm such a visual learner. I love this site keep up the good work.
I have a question though. What happens if you get a consistent traffic but your ranking still fluctuates?
Thanks,
Adam
ps: hope to meet a lot of new friends !
Adam - we're thrilled to have you! Congrats on your first comment - hope it's the first of many to come :-)
Regarding your question - that sounds like a case where rankings are varying somewhat consistently, which produces the consistent traffic. For example, you query datacenter 1 where you're in position 6, then datacenter 2 and you're in position 10, etc. The variance in rankings across datacenters, geographies, personalized results, etc. means that you're actually seeing similar traffic volumes, but very different rankings.
The latter reason of justifying changes in organic traffic are the main things that explain why I find rank tracking so useful. For a minute I thought you weren't going to bring it up Rand ;)
It's important to normalise organic traffic against a ranking metric. If your rankings plateau for three months but organic traffic consistently rises over the same period, you're probably looking at seasonality or demand shift. Conversely, if your organic traffic plateaus but your rankings fall, you're missing out on growth in your market.
This is particularly important at the moment as, in addition to normal seasonal trends, we have the backdrop of an even larger macro variable, apparently it's called the credit crunch or something?
Good vid Rand, cheers.
I find myself more and more tracking rankings in the background and referring to them only when I want to:
a) get a general gist of performance
b) identify a spike, drop etc.
c) watch my competitors for getting smarter
d) give ranking reports to clients
e) identify a 2nd page position that is sending me decent traffic - my logic is that it'll work even better on page 1.
f) establishing how realistic my chances of pushing a quality PPC keyword in the natural rankings.
But yeah, I wholeheartedly agree that traffic, conversions and revenue are much more important metrics.
this really gives us something to take with us to clients obsessed with position and explain to them that, with universal search, it's not all about positioning, and that looking at the search traffic metrics is a better way to monitor seo progress. I suposse that a search analytics tool like Enquisite can really add value to illustrating the points that Rand is making, as it focuses on search analytics as opposed to overall web analytics.
Nice WBF, Rand I enjoyed it
I have always been under the impression that monitoring rankings is leads to inconsistent results and unneeded stress : )
However like you say Rand I do like to check the fluctuations in my ranking in monthly periods to check it against the traffic I receive.
Just a couple of days ago I was receiving traffic on a highly competitive keyword, however when I checked Google.com I was way back on the 5th page. I was baffled to be quite honest until one of my readers from the US send me an email congratulating me on getting to number 3 for the same keyword.
It was a geographical issue and made me realise I needed to rely on my traffic stats for consistent data. Who cares where you rank if you are getting 5000 visitors on a particular keyword. :)
Very Good Video!