Track SEO Success: Keep a Historical Log
The following tip was kindly provided by Matt Leonard, follow Matt on Twitter or watch his awesome contributions on SEJ!
As often as we discuss different search analytics and SEO tools to check rankings, it seems we overlook ways to keep track of exactly what individual components make up the ranking. I’m not referring to the ranking URL, but the actual elements of the page. Things like page titles, meta descriptions and more are associated with a page and its current ranking. Yet, they are often forgotten once changed.
To optimize a site effectively over time, begin the process by establishing a good, old-fashioned SEO log (I use Excel) to give you a historical view of exactly where the site is coming from. To establish the foundation for your log, begin by taking a ‘SEO snapshot’ of the site in its current state.
I suggest including the following:
- Date
- URL
- Current Ranking
- Page Title
- Meta Description
- External Links
- Internal Links
- Comments
Once these components are recorded, you can begin making SEO changes. Your historical data will be in place so you will be able to compare effectiveness. While one keyword referral may rise from your change, another may fall. Keeping a historical log will make finding the best combinations that much easier.
Do you have a method in place to track your changes? Do you have tips to keep a well organized SEO log? If so, please add them below. We’d love to put together a comprehensive list of ideas from ‘Daily SEO Tip’ readers in the future (we’ll credit you, of course).
Note: This particular log style is mainly for small to mid-size sites. Be on the lookout for future tips about handling logs for large sites (sectioning).
Ann Smarty
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26 Responses to “Track SEO Success: Keep a Historical Log”
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Reading: Track SEO Success: Keep a Historical Log | Daily SEO Tip http://tinyurl.com/l9rjww
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Thanks for the tip.Tracking seo success is really much needed.
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Short but great tip! SEO log is really good idea. Some simple old-fashioned solutions are the best.
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A really good tip and something I might have to try our or even suggest this to a colleague. It’s simple but would be a good thing to do to keep better track of how sites are performing.
With Google Analytics you can get better idea about the rank of specific keywords. Google Analytics allows you to create custom filters to track specific keywords. Give a Try if you are Analytics user.
So sad, but true, that Excel is such a big part of our jobs! Clients love this kind of data and this is the best way to deliver it. Damn you Microsoft!!!
Simple but effective tip! It’s always the basic stuff that will help you the most as an SEO.
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Sound advice… and it’s great when you are moving up in the rankings.
But the other side of the coin, is that it lets you know when you are going down.
Your tips will keep me going up… hopefully!
I use the same fashion but, i will keep as a separate excel for every major update and make upload them to the local server for security reasons.
Hmm really good.
Great Tips! Thanks for giving such a useful tips. These tips will help me a lot.
Well, to soon to say if it’s good, but at least it’s well designed.
I mean I thought I would be blocked after adding some interests, but the site helps you to add more.
Cheers
Thanks to a good site that has great ideas
i agree we must have a log for SEO history, i keep it but its very time consuming to track thousands of keywords (if you have many clients for whom u do SEO) so generally i prefer to keep the records for primary keywords only ,,
SEO monitoring is really crucial …..
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Good tips on getting the most out of bookmarklets – equally important is installing one of the many social bookmarking plugins on a WordPress blog. ‘Sociable’ from Yoast.com is great.
Good tips for keep historical log. Thanks for seo tools.
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Good content.
Information, experiencie and tests results are one of the most importants activities at SEO.
I think that since many other factors can influence your keywords ranking, this could be misleading.
I think it will be wise to keep as a separate excel for every major update and make upload them to the local server to check for security reasons.