Never underestimate the power that Google holds in attracting users to your website. In fact, over 90% of searches worldwide happen on Google[1] and at the same time, over 90% of pages never get organic traffic[2].
With all the competition, how can you make sure that your website ranks higher in search results? Search engine optimisation – or ‘SEO’ – is one of the key strategies for improving your rankings with Google Search.
It can involve a wide range of techniques, such as keyword optimisation, content creation, link building, and site performance.
While there are countless tools out there to expand your SEO efforts, Google Analytics is one of the core tools for identifying new opportunities for optimisation and boosting conversions.
In this guide, we’ll explain what Google Analytics is and how it can bolster your SEO strategy.
What is Google Analytics?
If you’re not familiar with Google Analytics (GA4), is a powerful web analytics service offered by Google that allows you to track and analyse various aspects of your website’s performance. With GA4, you can gather data about user behaviour, traffic sources, and conversions, which are crucial for understanding how visitors interact with your site.
It can be used for both SEO and other marketing methods to gather performance metrics and statistics from your website. For example, it can track how users landed on your website, and how long they were active on the site. This in all can expand and improve your site’s performance and search potential.
Here are six ways, in particular, where GA4 can enhance your SEO efforts:
1. Identify your audience
In the online world, there’s only so much we can learn about a user. It’s not like in the real world where you can see a person and engage with them directly. Instead, GA4 provides valuable insights into your audience’s demographics.
This can include a user’s:
- Age
- Gender
- The city or country where a user is located.
- Interests based on their online activity.
- Pages they visit on your site.
- The devices they use, such as mobile, desktop, and tablet.
This data can be used to tailor your content and SEO strategies to meet the needs and preferences of your target audience. For instance, if you discover that a large portion of your visitors are from a specific age group or location, you can optimise content and keywords to tap into that demographic.
It also allows you to understand the devices your audience uses, which can help you ensure your site is optimised across all platforms.
Note: Age, gender, and interests are not available by default in GA4. You need to enable Google Signals to access this data.
2. Track user behaviour
It’s one thing to find your user audience, it’s another to understand how they browse your website. Google Analytics provides detailed insights into behaviour, allowing you to track metrics such as page views, bounce rates, and the average time spent on each page.
This is key for identifying which of your pages are losing traffic or have low engagement. From there you can pinpoint areas that need improvement.
For example, if a page has a high bounce rate, it may indicate that the content isn’t engaging enough, or it isn’t relevant to the user’s search intent. GA4 helps to identify these pages so you can adjust your content strategy accordingly — whether that means rewriting page content, updating information, or going after more relevant keywords.
It may be a case that users are clicking on your website for an outdated page or a title that doesn’t accurately reflect the content. Because of this, users may leave your website within a matter of seconds.
3. Monitor traffic sources
An influx of traffic is always a good thing, but what’s even better is being able to understand where that traffic is coming from and what is responsible. GA4 allows you to track the different sources of traffic, whether it be organic search, direct visits, referrals, or social media.
By analyzing this data, you can identify which areas of your website are performing well and which ones need improvement. If you notice a significant amount of organic search traffic, but minimal conversions, it may indicate that while your website is attracting visitors, it lacks a selling point to turn page views into conversions.
It can also be helpful in adapting your marketing strategy. If certain social media platforms (for example, Facebook) are driving traffic, you might want to allocate more attention towards improving your presence on such platforms.
4. Improve high-ranking Content
Just because a page is ranking high, doesn’t mean it can’t be improved. With Google Analytics, you can identify your top performing pages which are attracting the most traffic and engaging users effectively.
Sometimes all a page needs is a little push. For example, you may have a page currently ranked 6th in search, while this page could be bringing in traffic, it’s usually the top 3 positions in Google that receive the majority of clicks.
It might even be a case of high traffic levels, but users are quickly leaving the page, indicating that while the content is being discovered, it may not be resonating with visitors.
All you have to do is use GA to find these particular pages and optimise them further to potentially reach the top positions. This could be done by targeting more relevant keywords, adding additional links, or expanding on information.
5. Goal tracking
SEO isn’t just about raising traffic, while that is one of the main goals, there are other areas you may be looking to improve. Everyone’s goals can differ — be it a certain number of transactions per month or an increased average session duration — you can use GA to track your performance against these goals.
For instance, if your goal is to increase the number of newsletter sign-ups, you can create a specific event that tracks when users complete this action. You can then measure how well your SEO strategies are contributing towards achieving these objectives, making adjustments where needed.
GA4 data, along with Google Search Console can also be used in reporting, providing metrics that demonstrate how well your website is performing concerning your goals.
6. Analyse conversion rates
GA4 provides detailed insights into conversion rates (“key events”) across different segments of traffic.
If you’re an e-commerce site, it could mean highlighting where a user added a product to their cart but did not complete the purchase. This can help identify any barriers such as pricing issues, complicated checkout processes, or incorrect product information.
Likewise, it can show you when users made a purchase, and the journey they took to get there, allowing you to pinpoint which channels are most effective in converting leads into customers. This knowledge could also help create targeted Google Ads campaigns that focus on these high-converting items, thereby boosting your sales further.
You can also identify users based on their behaviour — such as new vs. returning visitors — and you can tailor your marketing efforts to better meet the needs of each audience segment.
Take your search performance to the next level
Google Analytics is just one part of the SEO toolkit. At Blaze Concepts, our search engine marketing services include three levels of development to enhance your website’s performance. This includes SEO, pay-per-click advertising (PPC), and copywriting to reinvigorate your search presence and strengthen your brand. Contact us today to learn more about our services and how we can help.