How to use Google Search Console

Search Console is free and shows how your site is doing in search. From setup to the performance report, here are the most useful features for businesses.

What is Search Console?

Google Search Console is a free tool showing your site's performance in Google Search. It shows which searches you appear for, how many clicks you get and any technical problems. It is one of the first tools every business with a website should set up.

How do you set it up?

Setup takes a few steps:

Sign in to Search Console with your Google account.
Add your domain or site address.
Verify ownership through a DNS record or another offered method.
Submit your sitemap.xml address in the sitemaps section.

Data starts to appear within a few days. Be patient, as it begins to build after setup.

Read the performance report

The performance report is the section you will use most. It shows four core measures:

Clicks: People who reached your site from results.
Impressions: How often your site appeared in results.
Click-through rate: The share of impressions that became clicks.
Average position: Your average place in results.

The queries tab shows which words people use to find you. Improving titles and descriptions on pages with many impressions but few clicks can bring quick gains.

Track indexing problems

The pages report shows which addresses are indexed and why others are not. Not every notice is a problem, but if an important page is missing, investigate. The URL inspection tool shows the status of a single page.

A regular review habit

Once a month, ask: are clicks rising, which pages are moving up or down, is there a new error? Search Console shows what works, so you can plan your next content with data rather than guesses.