If you’ve ever wondered whether your SEO efforts are actually doing anything, you’re not alone. Too many businesses stare at ranking reports and traffic graphs without knowing what’s good, what’s noise, and what actually impacts revenue.
Let’s cut through the confusion. Here’s how you know if SEO (and your SEO consultant) is doing its job.
1. Are You Getting Quality Organic Traffic?
It’s not just about more traffic. It’s about the right traffic. If your organic visitors are bouncing in seconds or never convert, something’s wrong.
Check:
- Landing page quality
- Bounce rate and time on page (GA4)
- Intent alignment: Are people finding what they came for?
2. Are Your Rankings Moving in the Right Direction?
No one ranks overnight. But over weeks and months, your rankings for priority keywords should trend upward—especially for pages you’re actively optimizing.
Track:
- Primary keywords
- Supporting semantic keywords
- Visibility across search features (like featured snippets or People Also Ask)
3. Are You Gaining Backlinks (Without Buying Them)?
Backlinks are a trust signal. If other sites are linking to you naturally, your content is resonating. If your backlink profile stays flat for a year, that’s a problem.
Use:
Ahrefs or SEMrush to track backlink growth and domain authority.
4. Are You Getting More Indexed Pages and Fewer Errors?
In Google Search Console, you should see steady indexing of valuable pages and a decline in crawl errors.
Look at:
- Index coverage
- Core Web Vitals performance
- Mobile usability
5. Are Organic Conversions Increasing?
SEO should lead to action. That might mean leads, purchases, form fills, demo bookings, or downloads. If traffic goes up and conversions don’t, your funnel has a leak.
Measure:
- Goal completions in GA4
- Funnel behavior (from landing to conversion)
- Assisted conversions in the attribution report
6. Are Your Content Pages Driving Sessions?
Not all pages are meant to convert immediately. Some are built to bring in top-of-funnel traffic. That’s fine—as long as they’re getting found.
Check:
- Which blog posts or resource pages drive most of your sessions
- Whether they lead users to deeper site engagement
FAQs
How long should I wait to see results?
3 to 6 months is standard for noticeable results. It depends on your competition, site history, and how much you’re investing.
Do I need a dashboard?
Yes. Even a basic one. It should track rankings, traffic, goals, and conversions. I build these for clients using Looker Studio (Data Studio).
Should I track branded and non-branded keywords separately?
Absolutely. Branded traffic shows existing brand strength. Non-branded shows how well your SEO is performing.
Conclusion
SEO is measurable. You just need the right metrics. Don’t settle for vanity stats or generic graphs. If you’re tired of reports that look pretty but say nothing, I can show you how real SEO performance is tracked and what to do about it.
