Now That You’ve Optimized Your Site - Measure It
SEO Tips Part II
Now that you've published and optimized your website, it's time to submit your sitemap for indexing and to track your site's traffic. Once search engines index your site, you'll start learning how visitors found your site and which keywords and search queries are driving traffic to it. You'll also know whether you have errors on your site, which can ding your search engine ranking, and be able to address them proactively.
Search Engine Analytics
At a minimum, make sure that you have verified your domain property on Google Search Console and then set up a website profile on Google Analytics, which is part of Google’s Marketing Platform. (Be sure to create an association with your Google Search Console account.) In Analytics, set up Google’s new ‘GA4’ property, which combines mobile app and website usage data reporting, for your domain.
Next, verify your domain with Microsoft’s Bing Webmaster Tools, which offers a very simple Google Search Console import process for your domain and the property data you just set up with Google Search Console. Verifying ownership of your domain on search engines helps to improve your presence in search results.
Both Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools are search engine-focused tools rather than visitor-focused tools (like Google Analytics). Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools reporting help you troubleshoot website errors and improve visibility in search engine results.
Any time you add or change a URL on your website, you also need to resubmit your sitemap to Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools for indexing to ensure the search engines have the 'freshest' view of your website.
Directory Listings
Last, but not least, be sure to set up a profile and verify your company on Google My Business, Microsoft's Bing Places for Business, and Yelp for Business. This will help your company website become searchable not only on search engines like Google and Bing, but also on Google Maps and Yelp, and provide desirable backlinks (or inbound links) to your website.
Furthermore, Google Maps serves as a convenient source of Google reviews for your website and provides additional analytics on site views and traffic (no pun intended). Yelp may also be a good source of reviews for your business – some more than others, depending on your industry. The more people talk about and engage with your brand, hopefully, in a positive manner, the higher the probability of traffic to your website.
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