15/07/2021 8 min readContents:
Projects that appear in the TOP-10 results of search engines can count on continuous traffic gains. Moreover, the traffic is convertible into subsequent campaigns that, in turn, can lead to a further increase in target audiences. This is about website rankings built by search engines via unique algorithms.
What is the main effect of search engine rankings? The number of visitors to your website depends directly on the ranking position it occupies among similar resources on the internet. The higher your website’s position, the bigger audience can choose you instead of your rivals staying lower in the rankings.
Hence, making all possible measures to lift a website up as high as possible in the search engine rankings is broadly accepted as the main objective of all SEO services. But before, it is worth being aware of how to monitor search engine rankings. Forewarned is forearmed, right?
Practical marketing shows that not every business owner understands what the website ranking is and how impactful it can be in terms of project profitability. Even fewer ones know how to monitor search engine rankings effectively. The present post is aimed at filling up those knowledge gaps.
The “website ranking” term implies the position of a website in search results. Every search engine delivers a certain list of available web resources in response to users’ queries. The order in the list is built upon the degree of correspondence between the queries and the info on websites. Hence, search engines have to review the data of all websites to find relevance. How a website “introduces” itself seems to be the prime clue for search engines. Tags and keywords appear crucial there, but more on that later.
The majority of professional marketers agree that the most efficient and reliable method of driving visitors to a website is making it appear in the TOP-10 of search engine results. The projects incapable of doing so have to reach their target audiences with different approaches: multiplication of income links, PPC advertising, and the like. But strengthening website ranking on Google works much better in terms of traffic gains and project development.
About a decade ago, you had to monitor web page rankings manually after each indexation: no special software was available. Time has changed, and today we can automate the process with web-scraping services and special parsers that collect relevant data in a real-time mode. However, the requirements of search engines keep changing very frequently. That’s why the TOP-10 websites have to work hard all the time, holding their place in the sun.
The ranking list of search-engine results is formed by the actually working algorithms of search engines. Meanwhile, almost all pages appearing in the TOP-10 revolve around the keywords that have been put into the search bar by internet users. Google checks both the frequency and distribution of the query keywords in the textual part of your website. After that, it starts comparing your results with the ones of your possible competitors. Over the analysis, all websites get certain marks determining their positions in the resulting list.
Monitoring of search engine rankings helps realize where your website stays against other resources that have been indexed with the same keyword. This is where SEO optimization starts in most cases. The so-called White Hat SEO practices are no exception.
The creators of search engines are reluctant to disclose all the criteria having effects on the list of search results. That’s why the majority of SEO specs are holding the view that the basis of successful promotion implies finding appropriate keywords. The checking algorithm of Google’s bots presumably includes the following:
This is crucial to remember that different search engines use their own ranking algorithms. Monitoring of search engine rankings can reveal wrong approaches that affect the position of a website in one or another ranking list built upon one or another keyword query. Changing just one keyword can either improve or worsen the ranking position of a website significantly.
What data do we mean speaking about monitoring search engine rankings? The very procedure of data collection can include the following, inter alia:
This is about the duties of SEO specs engaged in ranking optimization. They all ought to follow the results of continuous monitoring of search engine rankings of targeted websites since such monitoring allows to:
Parsing services allow assessing a particular web project against a set of criteria. The latter belongs to the very modus operandi of search engine bots. What do the criteria allow to realize?
At the same time, you should be aware of the difference between search engine algorithms of ranking. It means the results received with Google will not necessarily be relevant to Yahoo and vice versa. It seems you will have to apply an individual approach to every search engine. The good news here is that monitoring methods along with parsing software can be the same in each case.
The available parsing software provides automated monitoring of search engine rankings today. Besides, parsers can update the results in a real-time mode. The parsers’ web scraping helps SEO specs improve the ranking position of a targeted website in general. But what in particular can they do with the monitored info?
Although web-scraping software capable of monitoring search engine rankings occupies quite a narrow niche in terms of a user audience, there are dozens of rank monitoring tools on the market. Finding numerous reviews of such software can deliver little to no trouble to anyone interested. The tools can be free and fee-based, SaaS and on-premise, domain-specific and all-in-one general. By way of example, we are going to mention just the three projects that keep gaining popularity among SEO specs throughout the world.
This is a set of 40+ tools that assist in building various digital marketing campaigns. The project can be considered all-in-one universal and professional at the same time. The Semrush Company is famous for its perfect keyword research software that provides a variety of useful metrics for SEO specs. The functionality of Semrush is wisely divided into different sections dedicated to various digital marketing activities. There are three special SERP tracking tools in the related section. Pricing starts from $ 119.95/month for marketing newbies and ends up with $ 449.95/month for enterprise-level professionals.
Another all-in-one SEO toolset refers to such business giants as Facebook, Netflix, Uber, and Linkedin to prove the impressive marketing capabilities inherent in the software. Ahrefs focuses on the automation of marketing practices with the provided tools. The SERP tracking features are abundant. Besides, the monitoring results can be conveniently visualized. There is a free trial option for beginners. Instead of formal tutorials on the SERP functionality, a blog post from Ahrefs CMO discloses the most exciting functions of the toolset with a vivid discourse.
Just like both above-mentioned toolsets, this subscription-based product covers almost everything that SEO specs might ever need for their activities. SERP tracking features are no exception. Comparing mobile vs desktop visibility, for instance, reflects the zeitgeist that the project is following. The available 30-day trial period adds value to MOZ Pro, especially in the eyes of those SEOs who are still hesitating in their choice of appropriate software.
Knowledge on how to monitor search engine rankings is critical for any SEO optimization specialist. It is legitimate to claim that little else is more critical than SERP tracking skills in making any website highly visible for a broad user audience. That’s why business owners should have a general vision of the process at least. We believe the present post delivers such a vision.
Nonetheless, the topic remains quite specific in the context of both the available SERP tracking software and applicable monitoring techniques. Consultations with SEO professionals can never hurt in such a case. Contact us today to get all possible assistance in SERP monitoring in which our experts have rubbed a lot of elbows.
