Most search
experts rely on Google Webmaster Tools (GWT) to analyze the technical aspects
of a website. These experts focus on data like crawl stats, page errors and
rich snippets.
In addition
to technical analysis, I recommend using GWT for basic on-page SEO
improvements. Here are 6 easy ways to use Webmaster Tools to improve your
on-page SEO.
1. HTML
Improvements
Under Search
Appearance, you will find HTML Improvements. This report provides a snapshot of
any issues with your site’s meta descriptions and title tags, along with a
record of any content that isn’t indexable.
In the SEO
world, we know that it’s important to have unique meta descriptions and
optimized title tags. This report allows you to easily identify title tag/meta
description issues and prioritize your efforts.
For example,
in the screenshot above, you can see that 634 pages have a duplicate title tag.
If I were to click on the “Duplicate title tags” link, I’d be taken to a screen
listing all 634 pages, giving me a quick and easy way to identify page titles
that need to be updated.
2. Content
Keywords
Under Google
Index, you’ll find Content Keywords. This tool allows you to determine not what
youthink your site is about, but how Google sees it.
It shows the
keywords that are used on your site, along with keyword variations and
significance. These data help you quickly determine if you need more content
created around certain keywords, themes and topics. It also shows which pages
the keywords appear on. Very helpful! (See the examples below; keywords were
shaded out due to confidentiality.)
3.
Structured Data
Structured
data is a helpful way to explain the content of your website to the search
engines — which can, in some cases, can help with rankings and traffic. If you
have structured data on your site, GWT has a feature that shows the type of
structured data that Google was able to detect on your site, along with the
URLs containing each type. You can find this report under Search Appearance
> Structured Data.
4. Data
Markup Helper
Under Other
Resources, the Structured Data Markup Helper allows you to tag the data fields
for events, products and more on your site.
If you
aren’t sure where to begin with structured markup, this is an easy to use
point-and-click tool. The nice part about this is that HTML changes are not
required. Your mouse highlights and tags each key piece of data on the
appropriate page of your website.
5. Sitemaps
The Sitemaps
section allows you to view all the sitemaps that you’ve added (or Google found)
along with statistics such as the last date it was processed and the number of
pages submitted and indexed. These stats
can be viewed by content-type, meaning Web, video, images and news.
Another
great feature is the sitemap test option; you provide the URL of a sitemap, and
Google scans it, quickly detecting any errors that need to be fixed.
6. Removing
URLs
If you need
to remove a URL from Google’s index, you can use the Remove URLs feature in
Webmaster Tools. This can be a very powerful tool, but use with caution! Only
use this tool if you want to permanently remove a URL (as opposed to
redirecting it).
Google gives
a great example in their help section — if you have accidentally displayed
confidential information such as a credit card number and you need to have a
page removed, you can request expedited removal of the URLs. You will find this
tool under “Google Index” in the left-hand navigation.
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