Google Search Console is a free tool that provides data about how your website appears in Google search and what search traffic it receives. Most business owners either do not have it set up or have it set up but never look at it. These six reports contain the most actionable information.
First: set it up if you have not
If your website is not verified in Google Search Console, this is the first step. Go to search.google.com/search-console, add your property (your website URL), and verify ownership using one of the provided methods (the HTML tag method is easiest if you have access to add code to your website's head).
Verification tells Google you own the website and gives you access to data they collect about it. Data starts accumulating from the day you verify.
Report 1: Performance (Overview)
This is the most-used report. It shows clicks, impressions, click-through rate (CTR), and average position for your website in Google Search over a time period you specify.
What to look for:
Total clicks over the last 12 months compared to the 12 months before. Is organic search traffic growing, flat, or declining?
Click-through rate trends. If impressions are high but CTR is low, your page titles and meta descriptions may not be compelling enough to earn clicks even when you rank.
Average position trends. If your average position is improving, your rankings are improving even if traffic has not caught up yet.
Changes after specific dates. If you published new content or made site changes on a specific date, you can see whether those changes corresponded to traffic movements.
Report 2: Performance (Top Queries)
Within the Performance report, click "Queries" to see which search queries are generating impressions and clicks.
What to look for:
High impression, low click queries. When a query generates many impressions but few clicks, your ranking is high enough to be seen but the search result (title, description) is not compelling enough to earn clicks. These are optimization opportunities.
Queries you did not know about. Users often search for things you did not explicitly target. Queries you rank for that you did not intend to rank for reveal what topics Google associates with your content. Some of these may be worth creating dedicated content for.
Branded vs. non-branded traffic split. Knowing what portion of your traffic is people searching for your name versus people searching for the problem you solve tells you something about your brand awareness vs. organic search effectiveness.
Report 3: Performance (Top Pages)
Within Performance, click "Pages" to see which pages are generating clicks.
What to look for:
Your highest-traffic pages. These are the pages with the most SEO value. Ensure they are properly optimized (strong CTAs, good user experience, loading fast).
Pages with declining traffic. If a page that used to get traffic is declining, there may be a competitive issue, an indexation issue, or a content relevance issue.
Pages with no traffic. Pages that receive no organic traffic are either not indexed, not ranking for anything, or ranking for terms with no search volume.
Report 4: Coverage (Index Coverage)
This report shows which pages Google has indexed and which have errors.
What to look for:
Pages with errors. Any pages in the "Error" category should be investigated. Common errors include 404 pages that have inbound links (fix the URL or set up redirects), server errors, and pages blocked by robots.txt unintentionally.
Valid with warnings. Pages that are indexed but have issues worth investigating (noindex tags on pages that should be indexed, for example).
Excluded pages. Some exclusions are expected (duplicate pages, pages you deliberately exclude). Review the excluded list to ensure no important pages are being excluded unintentionally.
Report 5: Core Web Vitals
Core Web Vitals measure user experience metrics that Google uses as ranking signals: Largest Contentful Paint (loading speed), Cumulative Layout Shift (visual stability), and Interaction to Next Paint (responsiveness).
What to look for:
Pages rated "Poor." These have performance issues that may be affecting rankings. Click through to see specific URLs with problems.
The distribution between "Good," "Needs Improvement," and "Poor" on mobile versus desktop. Mobile performance is weighted heavily in ranking.
Trends over time after any site changes.
Report 6: Links
Google Search Console shows you which external websites link to yours and which of your pages have the most internal links.
What to look for:
Top linking sites. Knowing who links to you helps you understand your link profile and identify relationships to nurture.
Top linked pages. Your most-linked pages are often your strongest pages for ranking. Understanding which content earns links helps you create more of that type of content.
Internal links distribution. Pages with more internal links receive more "link equity" from within your site. If an important page has few internal links, add more from relevant pages.
Review cadence
Monthly reviews are sufficient for most small businesses. Set a recurring calendar reminder to spend 30 minutes reviewing these six reports and noting any significant changes.
Notable changes worth investigating immediately: large sudden drops in clicks or impressions (may indicate an algorithm update or technical problem), large numbers of new indexing errors, and significant changes in top queries.
Contact us to discuss what your Search Console data is telling you about your site's current organic search health, or see our SEO services for ongoing search optimization support.