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Which SEO KPIs You Should Measure (And Why)?


SEO Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are a great way of analyzing how well your SEO campaign performs. Simply put, the measurement of SEO KPIs gives you an overview of your website's performance for organic rankings.
SEO metrics analysis gives you a clear understanding of your website's search engine performance. It starts from helping you find the high-performing pages and top converting keywords to give an overview of the website areas requiring correction and optimization.
All in all, it wouldn't be wrong to say that the measurement of SEO KPIs gives you accurate information about whether your SEO campaign is moving forward or not. Let's take a look at various benefits of SEO KPIs analysis.

Advantages of Measuring SEO KPIs

  • It gives you a precise idea of how your SEO campaign currently performs and the areas that require improvement.
  • It is a great way of setting a benchmark for carrying out a comparative analysis of your past and future SEO campaigns.
  • With SEO KPIs analysis, you can steer clear of your SEO mistakes and become consistent in achieving your business goals.

Now, since you know what SEO KPIs are and how they can benefit your SEO campaign, the next thing is to know the various SEO KPIs you require to analyze. Remember, every business is different and so are their SEO metrics. Hence, it makes sense to gauge such SEO KPIs' performance that's relevant to your business.

Important SEO KPIs that You Must Track


Here are the important SEO metrics you should measure to understand how your SEO campaign shapes up.

1. Return on Investment (ROI)

It is an important KPI when it comes to an understanding of whether the time and money you invested in your SEO campaign have been worth it or not.

A positive ROI ensures that your SEO campaign is on the right path. However, a negative ROI is a warning sign that your SEO campaign is not up to the mark and needs correction before coming onboard again.
You can calculate the ROI of your SEO campaign by following a simple formula coined by Investopedia:
Current Value of Investment - Cost of Investment) / Cost of Investment = ROI
However, before you calculate the ROI, you need to determine the amount of investment you have made in your SEO campaign in a specific period. You can do so by tracking organic conversions through Google Analytics.
If you run an e-commerce business, you can take the help of the Google Analytics E-commerce tracking tutorial to find out your total online revenue. If you offer service-based business, you can track leads generated through form and inquiry submissions. It will give you a clear view of your conversion rates.

2. Organic Visibility

Measure your website's organic visibility as it can help you in a great way. It will help to track your SEO campaign's consistent growth and development. You can easily measure organic visibility by checking the growth in impressions from Google Search Console.
Impressions would give you a deep insight into the searches that made your website visible to visitors. It would be helpful even if it didn't result in clicks and conversions. It is a clear indication that your keywords' rank has increased but still is distant when driving website traffic.
However, whatever might be the case, the substantial increase in impressions indicates increased organic visibility. Thereby it proves that your SEO campaign shows consistency in its growth.

3. Conversions

The quality of the traffic that comes to your website can easily be analyzed by measuring the number of conversions it is leading to. You can easily track your conversions through Google Analytics. All you need to do is find and set up a relevant goal in Google Analytics.
Goals give you a precise idea about various activities that are taking place on your website.
These activities can include:

  • The number of purchases made by a visitor,
  • The frequency of phone calls a business receives, and more

Let's see the steps you need to follow for setting up goals in Google Analytics:

  • You can find various goals by clicking on the "Goals" option present on your admin page. The next step is to click on the "+New Goal" icon. It will help you choose the type of goal you wish to create.
  • There are options for choosing either a template goal or go for a custom goal. The custom goal comes in four different types, which are as follows:
A. Destination

Such goals perceive the number of page views and screen views done by a visitor as a conversion.

B. Events

If a prospective customer initiates communication with your website, this goal calls it a conversion.

C. Pages and Screen Views Per Session

It considers more than the usual number of views per page or screens done by a user as a conversion.

D. Duration

It analyzes user engagement as a conversion metric by considering the session duration.

4. Organic Sessions

An organic session is defined as a visit a prospective customer does on your website through search engines such as Google and Bing. The sessions are called organic because the prospective customers find your website through unpaid search results.
Such sessions also include:

  • The activities carried out by prospective customers during the website visitors
  • The time they surf and exit the website.

You can easily measure organic sessions through Google Analytics. If you see an increase in your organic session, it is a sign that there has been a surge in your branded searches. It is also a sign that your SEO and marketing campaign works in your favor and increases your brand awareness. Thereby it increases your business's name in search engine results.
You can further accelerate your organic sessions by creating a relevant and compelling title page along with a precise and crisp meta description.
Further, you should include an enticing call-to-action (CTA) in your meta description that encourages people to act, such as:

  • Clicking on a landing page
  • Buying a product, etc.

5. Branded Traffic

If you are receiving website traffic from such visitors who found out about your business through other sources such as word of mouth promotion from your existing customers, it will be termed as branded traffic.
Simply put, when a visitor types in such keywords in the search engine which has your business’s reference, it leads to branded website traffic. Such references can include your business’s brand name, domain name, searches regarding your products, and more.
You can track your website’s branded traffic through Google Search Console. Here’s how you can do it:

  • The first step is to find out how your domain is performing.
  • The next step is to select the kind of search along with the date range.
  • Further, you need to click on the New > Query option.
  • The final step is to filter the branded traffic. You can do so by typing your brand’s precise name as the keyword.

For example, if you run a restaurant with the name “Hemington Restaurant,” you should type “Hemington” as the keyword. The data you get will give you a clear overview of the click-through rates (CTR), rankings, and impressions arising from branded traffic. Further, you can also use Google Keyword Planner to analyze the number of searches for your branded keywords.
Is your business receiving a huge amount of branded traffic?
Then, it is a sign that your SEO campaign is helping your business grow considerably.

6. Non-Branded Traffic

Such traffic where the visitors do not intentionally search for your brand is called non-branded traffic. In other words, when visitors end up on your website while searching for a product or service that you offer, the traffic is termed as non-branded. This traffic includes the queries related to the intent of the user.
For instance, Let’s suppose a prospective customer is having cravings for a burger.
Then, he/she might type “burger shops near me” and land up to your burger joint’s website through the search engine results.
All in all, non-branded traffic not only increases your brand’s visibility but also leads to optimum sales and conversions. Therefore, it is important to optimize your SEO campaign for non-branded keywords.

7. Keyword Rankings

You can easily comprehend the positive and negative effects of your SEO campaign by analyzing keyword rankings. It is an important KPI that measures how your targeted keywords are ranking in the search engine.
Do you know websites garner 53% of their website traffic through an organic search? 60% of the entire Google search is dedicated to less than 1% of the most popular keywords. No wonder a robust keyword strategy is a great way of staying ahead in the competitive Google rankings!
A simple way of excelling in keyword rankings is by opting for long-tail keywords. Create relevant content that resonates with your targeted customer base. You should also optimize your website content for Google's featured snippet.
You can track your keyword rankings by entering your targeted keyword in the search engine and finding your website in the search results. However, such a manual search can turn out to be tedious.
An easier way of tracking keywords is using the Google Search Console. It is a free tool that will help you understand how your keywords are performing. You can also use some paid tools such as SEMrush, Ahrefs, and more which work effectively in the keyword search.

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8. Backlinks

The links of your website that are available on other websites are known as backlinks. Such links are a great way of proving your website's authority and quality to Google. Simply put, the more the number of backlinks you manage to have on high-end and reputable websites, the higher will be your chance of ranking better in the SERPs.
Thorough backlink analysis is an important aspect of improving your SEO campaign. It gives you an idea about the kind of links Google accepts and lets you understand the nitty-gritty of ranking well in the search engine.
Further, the analysis will also give you an overview of the bad links, such as spam links existing on your website. These links can severely damage your business's reputation and become a leading cause of Google penalties. You can easily find these bad links through backlink analysis and remove them to maintain your website's reputation.
Further, you should also consider doing a backlink analysis of your competitor's website. It will give you an understanding of your competitor's site ranking and the measures you need to take to outperform them. It can also bring to your notice the prospective link opportunities that you might have left unnoticed and can be used in creating a robust link-building strategy.
Now, let's take a step by step look at various ways of doing a backlink analysis:

Select the Websites That You Need to Analyze for Backlinks

You should begin by analyzing your business's website. After that, you can go ahead and review your competitor's website. You can find out your competitor's website by typing your targeted keywords in the search engine.
The websites that rank for these keywords are your main competitors. In other words, these are the websites that you require to do a backlink analysis of.
You can also use tools like SEMrush to find out your organic competitors. This tool provides you with a list of your close competitors by reviewing the number of organic keywords that respective sites rank.

Choose an Appropriate Tool for Analysis

After deciding the sites, you need to select a tool to initiate the analysis—some of the tools you can choose from, including SEMrush and Ahrefs.

Start by Putting the Domain Name in the Analysis Tool

In this step, you need to type your preferred site's domain name into your chosen analysis tool.
The tool will provide you with extensive information regarding any of the many metrics, such as:

  • A number of unique links and domains
  • Top pages with similar keywords.

9. Click-Through Rate

It is a KPI that analyzes the ratio of visitors who click on a specific link within your website to the number of visitors who view your website. You can easily measure the click-through rate of your website by applying the following formula:
Source.
Organic click-through rate plays a vital role in the success of your SEO campaign. Simply put, the click-through rates are linked with organic rankings. According to a study done by WordStream, if a website gets ahead of the expected CTR, its chances of ranking in a better position become higher.

10. Bounce Rate

When a prospective customer lands on your website but leaves it midway without any interaction, a bounce occurs. Simply put, a bounce rate gives you a clear picture of the number of prospective customers who didn't go ahead with their browsing and bounced off your website.
Bounce rate is the 4th most critical ranking factor in SERPs. So, you must analyze it properly and work towards decreasing it. Here's how you can calculate it:

Page Bounce Rate

You can find out the total number of bounces that occur on your website's particular page by dividing it by the total number of views on the first page. Make sure the date range for both sections is the same.

Website Bounce Rate

Finding out the total number of bounces throughout all the pages on your website is easy when you divide it by the total number of views that took place across all the pages in the same date range.

Segment Bounce Rate

It gives you an overview of the number of bounces that happen across the particular segment of all the pages on your website. All you need to do is divide it by the total number of views across all the pages on your website's particular segment within the same date range.
Now, since you know how to calculate your bounce rate, you must know how to decrease it and improve your SEO campaign. Take a look.

  • Format your website content in a way that makes it easy for the visitor to understand and navigate through your website. Keep your paragraphs short and use white space in abundance.
  • Avoid including unnecessary ads and offers in the sidebar of your website. If you wish to include ads, give space to only high authority and credible sources that provide some value to the visitor.
  • Relevancy is the key. When you optimize your website content for a keyword, ensure that your page content is relevant to the prospective customer's query.
  • Make way for a single and strong call-to-action that compels the visitor to go ahead. Adding multiple CTAs can turn out to be confusing and overwhelming for the visitor.
  • Work on optimizing your website’s product pages.
  • Optimize your website for mobile and offer a seamless site navigation experience to your visitors.

11. Average Page Time

The amount of time a webpage takes to load is known as average page time. It is made up of two elements.
While the first element consists of network and server time, the second element considers browser time, i.e., the browser's time in parsing and executing the JavaScript and rendering the page.
Google perceives average page time as a critical component for search ranking algorithms. The site's speed serves as a clear indicator of how quickly a website responds to a visitor's request. So, to rank well, improve user experience. To make your SEO campaign successful, reviewing and increasing your average page time is important.
Let's first look at a few of the many tools you can use to analyze this important metric.

PageSpeed

It works as an open-source Firefox/Firebug plugin and analyzes your web page's performance while giving relevant suggestions for taking corrective measures to improve page load time.

WebPagetest

Apart from providing you with a waterfall view of your webpage's load time, it also provides you with a checklist for optimizing your website.

YSlow

You can use this free tool from Yahoo and leverage various ways to speed up your website's page load time.
You can improve your website's average page time using:

  • A Content Delivery Network (CDN),
  • Switching to a faster host,
  • Compressing images on your website,
  • Enabling browser cache, and
  • Minimizing HTTP requests

12. Pages Per Session

This SEO KPI gives you an overview of the total number of pages a prospective customer views on your website in a session. Analyzing pages per session helps you understand how engaging your website content is.
You can easily calculate this metric by dividing the total number of page views by the total number of pages per session.
Further, you can also use Google Analytics to track the average pages per session of your website. You can do so by looking at the acquisition overview report present at the left sidebar. It will give you a clear overview of all pages per session of the entire website.
From understanding your target audience better to making your website more interactive and engaging, you can easily increase your pages per session. You can also include strong call to action (CTAs) and enticing headlines to keep your prospective customer hooked to your website.

13. Leading Exit Pages

The last page a prospective customer visits on your website is known as an exit page. In other words, this KPI lets you know how many people visited a particular webpage on your website. You can calculate the exit page rate in Google Analytics.
All you need to do is log in to your Google Analytics account and go to the menu panel. The next step is to select the option of behavior, click on the site content, and finally choose the exit page option.
Getting hold of your leading exit pages will give you an idea about the percentage of the people who are last in a session of viewing a particular webpage.
Your product page's increased exit rate can be a matter of concern as your prospective customer left without buying. But a high exit rate for a thank you web page is a good sign that a customer made a purchase.
You can use the exit rate to improve your SEO campaign and increase your business manifold by:

  • Understanding your consumer's behavior
  • Further optimizing your conversion funnel

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14. Crawl Anomalies

Crawling and indexing is an important aspect of SEO. Therefore, it is important to ensure that Google can crawl and index the content on your website. However, crawl errors prevent search engines from reaching your website.
An increased rate of crawl anomalies makes it difficult for Google to access your website's content. This, in turn, prevents Google from ranking your website, thereby negatively affecting your SEO campaign. Therefore, it is important to keep a check on your website's crawl anomalies and take the necessary steps to minimize them.
Google specifies crawl anomalies into two categories:

Site Errors

Such crawl errors prevent Google from accessing your entire website. These errors occur because of DNS issues, server problems, and robots.txt file issues. You can take the help of Google Search Console help to fix site errors pertaining to server problems.
Fetch as Google tool present in the search console can give you an idea about how Google crawls your webpage. You can check with your DNS provider for DNS issues and ensure that your server displays an error code related to the 404 or 500 status code. You can fix the robots.txt file issues by ensuring that they are properly configured.

URL Errors

Such errors prevent search engines from crawling a particular page of your website. The different types of URL errors include 404 error and soft 404 error. A 404 error happens when the server cannot locate the requested page and sends a 404 Not Found status code to the browser informing that the page cannot be located.
You can fix a 404 error by publishing your web page through your content management system. Also, ensuring that the 404 error URL is on the correct web page can help you fix this issue.
A soft 404 error occurs when the server returns a 200 HTTP status code instead of a 404-status code. Pages with a soft 404 error exist technically but are mostly devoid of any content. A good amount of content on your webpage can fix soft 404 errors.

15. Ranking of Competitors

Keeping a check on your competitor's ranking in search engines can help you discover ways to outrank them for your target keywords. You can begin with competitor analysis by researching the businesses you are competing with. Further, it is also important to analyze the keywords your competitors are using.
For instance, if you sell ice creams and are trying to rank for "best ice cream," apart from businesses in the same field, your competitors might be food bloggers too. Sure, they are not competing with you for your customers, but for ranking better in the context of SEO.
Some of the tools that you can use for competitor's analysis include Ahrefs, SEMrush, Google, On-page tools, and more. Amidst all these, Ahrefs is the most popular one, with 40% of businesses using it for competitor analysis.
Source.
With Ahrefs, you can get hold of your competitor's top-ranking pages. All you need to do is put your competitor's domain name in Ahrefs and look at their top pages option present on the left side.
The top pages will give you an overview of such competitor's pages which garners the highest traffic. The results will be accompanied by top keywords based on the traffic value and volume per month.
You can choose any of the top keywords relevant to your business, create high-quality content out of it and rank better than your competitors. Going for long-form content with short paragraphs and easy flow can help you do the needful increase in SERPS.

16. Featured Snippets

Google selects featured snippets and displays them on the top of the organic search results in a box. The snippet makes it easier for the users to find relevant answers to their search queries.
Google considers detailed information present in each web page's title and meta tags for choosing a featured snippet. They also consider rich results for selecting a featured snippet.
A featured snippet can help your business stay ahead in SERPs, thereby improving your SEO campaign considerably. No wonder featured snippets receive 8% of the total click-through rates!
If you already have a high ranking in the search results queries, your web page’s chance of being selected for a featured snippet becomes high.https://searchengineland.com/another-featured-snippet-study-shows-steal-significant-traffic-first-organic-result-275967
A study by Ahrefs says that pages with top 10 rankings in Google get selected for featured snippets 99.58% of the time. Here is a list of popular topics that frequently occur in featured snippets:
You can leverage the following strategies to get into Google’s featured snippets:

  • Work and research on long-tail keywords. Many studies have proved that typing more words in the search engine box increases the probability of having a featured snippet.
  • You should also go through the “People also ask” section of Google in search results. It will give you a clear insight into the kind of questions Google finds relevant to a particular topic.

17. Number of New and Recurring Visitors

As the name itself suggests, new visitors are those who are browsing through your website for the first time from a particular device. As far as recurring visitors are concerned, they are those people who have browsed your website before and are back again.
You can find the statistics related to these metrics on Google Analytics.

  • Click on the “audience” option present on the left side of your Google Analytics dashboard.
  • Select the “behavior” icon from the drop-down menu and choose the “new vs. recurring” option.

You will see extensive data related to sessions, objectives, and behavior of new and recurring visitors.
Analyze the data related to new and recurring visitors. It will give you a thorough insight into how your website content is perceived by your prospective and repeat customers. It will also help you frame strategies that you can opt to provide more value to your visitors.
For instance, if you have an e-commerce website and witness new visitors spending more time on your website, you can use coupon codes to entice them to buy your products or services and return. For recurring visitors, loyalty coupons in the form of discounts can do the needful.

18. On-Site Search

Understanding your customer’s expectations can boost your SEO campaign effectively. On-site search data is a critical SEO metric that gives you a clear insight into your prospective customer’s behavior.
On-site search KPI gives you a complete overview of what people are searching for when visiting your website. It starts from your prospective customers' words to find your products to various product and services-related questions that your website visitors might have.
Simply put, getting a precise picture of your business’s image in the customer’s mind becomes easy through on-site search data. This, in turn, can help you optimize your SEO campaign in accordance with the customer’s needs and wants.
For instance, if the on-site search data indicates that your website visitors are using a keyword for finding a product, you can go ahead and optimize those product pages with the right keywords. It will not help you categorize your products in a better way but will also considerably increase your sales and conversions.
You can easily analyze on-site search data through Google Analytics. Here are the steps you need to take:

  • Once you log in to your Google Analytics, enter the name of your website and click on the ‘admin’ link. It will provide you access to the configuration of your Google Analytics account. Further, you need to click on ‘view settings’ present on the column's right side.
  • The next step is to go on the ‘view settings’ options and switch on the ‘site search tracking’ option. You will find a query parameter field where you can type the parameter you need to analyze. Now, save the setting, and you will be good to go.

19. Referring Domains

It is important to maintain the quality and quantity of referring domains for a successful SEO campaign. Referring domains are links present on an external website. It brings prospective customers and visitors to your business by directing them towards your website.
These domains consist of a plethora of backlinks that can help you drive more traffic to various web pages of your website.
You can check this SEO KPI with the help of Ahrefs dashboard. All you need to do is go to the site explorer, mention your domain name, and click on the referring domain option.
According to Ahrefs, 90.88 percent of web pages lack organic search traffic if they do not have any referring domain. So, to rank higher in search engines, it becomes imperative to get high authority referring domains for linking to your business's specific web pages. It will increase your website's traffic and help you accelerate your website’s engagement and sales.
Create high-quality content that resonates with your prospective customer base. By doing that, you can acquire high authority referring domains and make your SEO campaign a huge success.
You can also opt for guest blogging and share your content expertise on other businesses' websites. Thereby you can get hold of impeccable referring domains.
Further, you can also work towards finding out such referring domains that are not only popular but can also help you drive more traffic to your website.
You can do so by:

  • Selecting domains belonging to your specific business
  • Segmenting them based on your website's expertise

In this context, you can take reference from a study by SEMrush. It shows how the law firms in the U.S have popular referral domains in University portals, general directories, press releases, and more where they can:

  • Upload their content of links
  • Drive exorbitant web traffic to their business

20. Website Security

Research by HubSpot revealed that 82% of consumers leave a website if they do not find it secure. Well, the statistics speak volumes about why website security is important. And, if that's not enough, even Google considers website security as a top priority and makes it a factor for SERPs.
If you want to rank better, garner more traffic to your website, and improve your overall SEO campaign, having a website with high-end security is the key.
You can make your website security top-notch by moving from Hypertext Markup Language (HTTP) and opting for Hypertext Markup Language Secure (HTTPS). In other words, having HTTPS on your website makes browsing safe for your visitors. It safeguards the personal data that they share on your website.
For instance, if you have an e-commerce website, you must make your payment gateway secure for your customers by implementing HTTPS.
You can easily move forward with HTTPS by installing a Secure Socket Layer (SSL) certificate on your website. The moment SSL is installed on your website, the connection between your browser and the webserver will be deemed secure.
Simply put, the SSL will ensure that your customer's critical data remains decrypted even if a cyber-attacker or hacker intercepts it.

21. Content-Length

According to a study by Backlinko, a web page appearing on the first page of Google has 1447 words. However, it doesn't mean that the content length is the sole factor in ranking better and improving your overall SEO campaign. Sure, there is a correlation between this metric and your SEO campaign, but the quality of the content matters more than the length.
Simply put, the content should be such that it helps the user get relevant answers to their queries.
Let's take a look at the kind of content that can help you deliver the best SEO results:

  • The content should be focused on the topic you choose to write and should contain relevant key terms. For instance, if you are writing an article for " benefits of managed services providers (MSPs) in the IT industry," you must include terms such as types of MSPs, their compliance support, cybersecurity, and more.
  • You should also focus on making the content comprehensive. It means that your article should consist of the related topics pertaining to your article. For instance, if you are writing on "B2B marketing strategy", the related topics can include digital marketing and creating brand awareness.
  • The keyword you select for your topic should appear multiple times in your article. From the title and subtitle to paragraphs in the article, you must include keywords in a relevant way. Planning it will help you avoid keyword stuffing.

22. Website Health

It is important to optimize your website properly. A well-optimized website is one of the main criteria that Google considers while ranking and indexing websites. This is where analyzing your website's health score can come in handy. Here's how you can do it:

Begin with Auditing Your Website

A proper site audit will give you a concrete idea about the many errors existing on your website. Such errors lead to your visitors' bad browsing experience and why your website gets banned from search engine results.

Go for Score Calculation

The next step is to find your website's health score. You can calculate the score by analyzing those parts of your website's URL that have errors. The errors are of two types. The first one is the internal URLs with errors, and the second one is the crawled internal URLs. Once you find these errors, you can find the score through the following formula:
(1 - (internal URLs with errors / total internal URLs)) x 100
Once you get hold of your website health score, you can take the necessary measures to correct the errors and optimize your website. It will improve your organic search result ranking while giving your visitors a good user experience.

23. Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR)

Investing in an SEO campaign can be fruitful only when you get an ample amount of monthly recurring revenue out of it.
In other words, if your MRR is high, it is a clear indication that your SEO strategy is working in the right direction. However, if this KPI is low, you would need to change your strategy immediately while making informed business decisions.
MRR gives you an idea about the revenue that's expected to be generated by a business every month. Here's a simple formula from HubSpot for calculating MRR:
Source
Now, let's take a look at various types of MRR that you must consider:

New MRR

New MRR is the monthly recurring profit that a business receives from its new customers, as the name itself suggests.

Churn MRR

This MRR comes in the scene when customers cancel, stop, and downgrade their shopping patterns or subscriptions.

Expansion MRR

It depicts the extended recurring revenue you receive from your existing customer base.

Net New MRR

You can find out the net new MRR with the help of the above three MRR. Here's formula for the same:
Net New MRR = New MRR + Expansion MRR – Churned MRR

24. Cost Per Acquisition (CPA)

Analyzing cost per acquisition lets you know if your SEO campaign is producing the desired result or not. This KPI gives you an insight into the effectiveness of your SEO strategy. To put it in other words, this metric paves avenues for analyzing current SEO strategies and taking corrective measures if needed. Also, it helps you create SEO campaigns that provide impeccable results.
You can calculate the CPA easily.
Divide the total expenditure on the SEO campaign by the total number of customers acquired through the campaign. Remember, the lower is your CPA, the higher are your chances of making your SEO campaign and business profitable.

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25. Cart Abandonment Rate

Do you know the cart abandonment rate of online shopping orders was a huge 88.05% in March 2020? Imagine losing a critical amount of your profit because of cart abandonment. It is going to have an intense negative impact on your business's growth and development. It is even going to affect your SEO strategy.
After all, you spend a considerable amount on creating a high-end SEO campaign that brings visitors and traffic to your website. However, if those visitors do not convert, purchase, and abandon their shopping carts, all your SEO efforts will be useless.
You can calculate the cart abandonment rate by considering the total number of completed purchases and dividing it by the total number of shopping carts created by prospective customers.
Once you find this value, all you need to do is subtract this value from one and get a percentage by multiplying it by 100. Here's a visual representation of this formula:
Source
You can reduce your website's cart abandonment rate by sending re-engagement emails to the abandoned cart customers.
Few other strategies for reducing cart abandonment rate include:

  • Reducing the website load time,
  • Easy cart saving options,
  • Seamless payment process,
  • Clear shipping costs, and more.

26. Customer Lifetime Value (CLV)

One of the most important metrics for measuring your SEO campaign and business's success is the customer lifetime value.
From good content to top ranking in SERPS, your SEO efforts will be worth only when you get a loyal customer base out of it. That's why calculating CLV is important.
Analyzing this KPI doesn't only give you a deep insight into your customer's buying behavior but also helps you improve your SEO campaign and deliver better results.
The total profit expected to be generated through a customer over their entire period of remaining a customer is CLV. You can calculate this KPI by using the below-mentioned formula:
CLV = Average Purchase Value X Average Purchase Frequency Rate X Average Customer Lifespan
Once you find out the CLV, you can take the following necessary steps to improve it:

Work on Content Segmentation

CLV tells you about your loyal customer base and how profitable they are for your business. You should begin by segmenting your most profitable customer base and create content that resonates with them.
For instance, if you run a restaurant, you can segment your customer vase into family, singles, couples, and so on. Further, if the CLV of your family segment is the highest, you can target this segment by creating content that revolves around recipes that families can relish together.

Provide Impeccable Customer Service

You must stand out amidst your competition regarding customer service.
You can do it by:

  • Providing round-the-clock customer support
  • Giving a seamless user experience and more.
Send Relevant Emails

Start by sending personalized welcome emails to each customer that comes on board. It will help you create a good first impression. Also, make it a point to send thank you for an email, confirmation email, shipping email, and keep the customer informed throughout. It is a great way of creating a long-lasting and trustworthy relationship with your customer base while increasing the CLV, thereby helping your business garner more revenue.

27. Scroll Time and Depth

Another important SEO KPI is the scroll time and depth. Analyzing this metric lets, you know how much your visitors are scrolling your content for reading and the time they are spending while engaging with the content.
For instance, if you find out that your visitors are reading only 50% of your website content, you can modify your content in a way that entices them to read it till the end. Thereby it improves your scroll time and depth rate.
Similarly, if your scroll and depth rate is 90%, it is a sign that you are creating content that's resonating with your customer base. So, you should continue delivering the same quality of content in the long run.
You can analyze your scroll time and depth rate by setting up its plugin through Google Analytics. Once the plugin is installed, click on "content analytics module” and begin by making a record of your campaign.
The next step is to wait for the visitors to come to your website and go through the content. The plugin will record all the visitors' scroll time and depth and give you the needed report.
With this report, you can seamlessly increase your visitor's engagement through high-end and quality content.

28. Meta Title

A meta title is an HTML element that denotes the title of a webpage. They appear in the form of a blue headline in the SERPS and are clickable. Simply put, it is a precise and to-the-point description of your webpage's content.
The optimum length of a meta title should range between 60-70 words. In other words, keep it short, simple, and relevant as this is the first piece of information a prospective customer looks at while searching for an answer. Therefore, a well-written meta title can significantly improve the click-through rate of your website. Here are a few tips that can help you create a good meta title:

  • Include meta title for every webpage of your website.
  • As already mentioned, create such meta titles short and give an accurate description of your web page.
  • The meta title for each of your webpage should be unique and different from each other.
  • Put important keywords at the beginning of the meta title and avoid keyword stuffing.

29. Link Velocity

The rate or speed at which backlinking takes place for your website is known as link velocity.
While a high link velocity indicates that your website is doing well, it should be accompanied by quality content. Also, the backlinks should come organically and naturally. Simply put, the content on your website and the backlinks should be in proportion to each other.
You can analyze the link velocity of your website and how it is progressing over time. Some of the tools you can use for analysis are Google Search Console, Ahrefs, SEMrush, and Majestic SEO.
Remember, if your link velocity is consistent, Google will perceive it as good. However, if your link velocity is unnecessarily high because of useless backlinks, your website might face Google's penalization.
Let's take a look at various ways that can help you build proper backlinks and maintain a consistent link velocity:

Make Way for Guest Blogging

Start by contacting reputable websites of your niches that accept guest blogs. Pitch them and offer to write a free article for them in return for a backlink to your website.

Come up with Better Content

Create impeccable content that beats your competitors. You can do so by researching content in your niche that is already on the top rank. Take some cues from it, write a more insightful and valuable version of that content, and try getting it linked to high-authority websites.

Opt for Local Citations

You should also list your business address on Yelp, Google, Yellow pages, and a few other businesses linking websites. They don't only count as backlinks but also make it easier for prospective customers to find your business.

30. Domain Authority

Created by the SEO software company Moz, domain authority works as a search engine ranking KPI. It predicts how well a website will rank in the SERPs. The domain authority score varies between 1-100. A higher domain authority rank facilitates better ranking in the SERPs.
A few of the factors that MOZ considers for a website's domain authority score include the total number of inbound links, root domains, and more.
Domain authority works more like a competitive KPI. When analyzing what a good domain authority score is, Moz considers your competitors' domain authority score. Therefore, rather than concentrating on having the highest domain authority score, your aim should be to have a domain authority score better than your competitors.
You can measure your domain authority score through the free chrome extension called MozBar. Further, you can also improve your domain authority score through the following ways:

Work Towards Link Profile Auditing

The backlinks of your website should be present on high authority websites. Backlinks on high-quality websites are a sign that your website is not only authentic and trustworthy but authoritative too.
You can audit your website for backlinks through tools such as SEMrush Backlink Checker and Link Explorer from Moz.

Acquire High Authority Links

You can improve your domain authority score through high-quality inbound links. Backlinko's skyscraper method can help you do the needful. In this method, you need to find out such website content that ranks well for the keyword you want to improve your ranking.
Once you find it out, you need to create better content than those already on the top.
Further, with SEO tools' help, you must get hold of such sites that have linked your competitor's content. The final step is to ask the relevant websites in your niche to replace your competitor's content link with your new and improved content link.

31. Search Volume

It is an important SEO metric that depicts how many prospective customers are searching for a specific query. Hence, when you create content for your website, it becomes imperative to consider search volume KPI. It will help you gauge the popularity of the query and find keywords relevant to the query.
You can then create targeted content for your prospective customers based on those keywords and improve your overall SEO campaign.
You can find the search volume of particular keywords with the help of Google keyword planner. From specific keywords to a whole list of keywords, Google keyword planner can give you an insight into the search volume of all the keywords.
While a keyword with high search volume has more chances of generating ample traffic, it is known as short-tail keywords and intense competition from competitors. However, with low search volume keywords, which are called long-tail keywords, the competition is low. So, capturing a high chunk of search traffic becomes easy.
For a good SEO strategy, a combination of both the search volume keywords is advisable. So, make sure you optimize your website for both short-tail and long-tail keywords.

Wrap Up

Proper and regular SEO metrics analysis will enable you to focus on improving your SEO performance.
Analyzing the above-mentioned KPIs would help you keep track of your SEO campaign's growth. Also, it lets you amplify your website's strengths while correcting the weaknesses. Just ensure that the SEO KPIs you decide to measure are in sync with your business's goal and objectives.
Do you need any help in measuring these SEO KPIs for your website? Drop your details here to get help from our SEO experts.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Joseph Schneider

He has spent more than 12 Years in strategising and executing SEO campaigns. He is interested to writing Digital-marketing, PPC and Social Media Marketing related topics.