Don't Sleep on This SEO Tool: Make Sense of Search Console Data (FTF)

Welcome back to another Follow Through Friday on the Simple and Smart SEO Show! 🚀 

If you caught my conversation with Katie Stone, SEO lead at Lead Hub, you know we went deep on local SEO, Google Search Console Insights, and keyword strategy. 

(Missed it? No worries! Listen Here!)

Ready to make your SEO work for you? 

👇🏽 Let’s dive in. 👇🏽

💎 Key Takeaways:

1️⃣ Google Search Console = Your SEO Goldmine

🔍 Google Search Console (GSC) isn’t just a data hub—it’s your secret weapon for seeing exactly how people find your website. But did you know you can unlock even deeper insights with the Enhanced Analytics Chrome Extension? 😱

🚀 Pro Tip: Install the GSC Enhanced Analytics extension (Chrome-only!) to unlock advanced data views

💥 Action Step: Check your top-performing pages and compare their performance over time. Do any need a content update? 🤔

2️⃣ Keyword Research: Smarter, Not Harder

Instead of chasing broad, generic keywords (water heater 🔥😴), think action-based—like water heater installation (boom! 💥).

Why? These show intent to purchase. 🛍️

💥 Action Step: Use GSC filters to find high-intent keywords.

3️⃣ Competitor Research = Your Shortcut to SEO Wins

💡 Ever wonder what keywords your competitors are ranking for that you’re not? That’s where Keyword Gap Analysis comes in.

🔥 Crystal’s Favorite Tool: Dragon Metrics (but Semrush & Ahrefs work too!)

📊 How it works:
1️⃣ Run a Keyword Gap Analysis to see what your competitors rank for that you don’t.
2️⃣ Identify "easy win" topics
3️⃣ Create new blog posts, landing pages, or optimize existing pages 

🎯 Your Follow-Through Challenge 🚀

Pick just one of these action steps and implement it this week:
✅ Install the GSC Enhanced Analytics Extension & analyze your top pages
✅ Use intent-based keyword filters to refine your keyword strategy
✅ Run a Keyword Gap Analysis and find opportunities to steal some rankings

Then tell me how it goes! 📩 Need more help? Book an  SEO Power Hour with me at  or join my SEO Squad for weekly support.

📢 Share it with an entrepreneur friend who needs smarter SEO! 

Keep moving

Chapters

• 0:00 Hey there and welcome back to the Simple and Smart SEO show podcast.
• 0:24 Turning Insights into Action
• 0:37 Google Search Console Overview
• 0:58 Enhanced Analytics Chrome Extension
• 1:40 Installing the Extension
• 2:28 Analyzing Year-Over-Year Data
• 3:15 Visualizing Performance Metrics
• 5:05 Follow Through Action Steps
• 5:32 Simplifying Keyword Research
• 6:12 Competitor Research and Keyword Gap Analysis

Transcript

[00:00:00] 

Introduction and Recap

Crystal Waddell: Hey there and welcome back to the Simple and Smart SEO show podcast. This is follow through, not on a Friday with me, your host, crystal Waddell. If you missed the episode with Katie Stone, who is an SEO lead at Lead Hub, we were talking all things local SEO, Google Search Console Insights and optimizing keyword strategies.

I'll make sure to link to that episode in the show notes. 

Turning Insights into Action

Crystal Waddell: But today we're taking those insights and turning them into action. Because knowing is great, but doing is what drives results.

So if you're ready to implement some simple and smart SEO strategies let's dive in

Google Search Console Overview

Crystal Waddell: So first we're gonna talk about Google Search Console. 

And Google Search Console, also referred to by the acronym of GSC, is a gold mine of data that shows you exactly how people are finding your website. 

But did you know? And thank you, Katie, for helping us out with this. 

Did you know that you can unlock even deeper insights. 

Enhanced Analytics Chrome Extension

Crystal Waddell: With the enhanced [00:01:00] analytics Chrome extension for Google Search Console? 

I'm gonna actually show you on my computer, so if you're watching the YouTube video, you'll be able to check this out.

Okay, so first things first, you wanna just search for search console, enhanced analytics. 

And you have to be using the Chrome browser for this to be able to work. Okay? 

But if you go to the Chrome Web Store and you click on Google Search Console, enhanced analytics. It's gonna pull up this Chrome extension.

Now, I've already got it installed, so it for me, it says Remove from Chrome. But you can just click right here to install it. All right? 

Then the next thing we'll need to do is go to our Google search console so we can see this magic happen.

Installing the ExtensionUsing Enhanced Analytics

Crystal Waddell: If you're anything like me, you typically look at Google Search Console and it looks something like this. Okay? You've got your total clicks, your total impressions, your average click through rate, and your average position. And just a little side note, if you click that box when you scroll down, you'll actually be able to see.

The position of [00:02:00] the keywords, so you'll be able to see where you're ranking. 

I didn't know that when I first started using Google Search Console. So just in case you never knew that, make sure you tick that box of average position so you can actually see where you're ranking.

But anyway, what we're here to talk about is this super cool, enhanced analytics Chrome extension that Katie told us about. 

So you'll have a little G up here, or you can click on the puzzle and you'll see all of your. Chrome extensions and the dropdown. 

And I like to pin things that I use a lot to my Chrome browser.

Analyzing Year-Over-Year Data

Crystal Waddell: So I've got this G right here, and what you can do is you can choose the period and apply the date range and maybe even set a comparison period to see, what was happening this year versus last year. 

For me, year over year is more relevant than, let's say, comparing February to January.

They're similar, in who's buying. 

But what's more applicable to me in terms of data that I feel like I can use is February of 2025 versus February of 2024. 

So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna go over here and choose [00:03:00] February of 2025. 

Then select the comparison period of the previous year. 

And I want to click this box, generate percentage changes. 

And when I click that, then I can click compare date range.

Visualizing Performance Metrics

Crystal Waddell: So now you can see I actually have a comparison graph, year over year.

My total clicks, you can see that they have gone down significantly. 

And I will say that my revenue has dropped a little bit, but what I think is I was ranking for a lot of informational queries, and that's totally fine. Part of it is Google updates. The other part of it is just better SEO on my part where I'm getting better queries and, ranking for better stuff and not getting so many clicks for things that don't actually make me money.

So this is, just the comparison year over year, which is really cool. The other thing I love is that you can see the clicks data and the impressions. 

And one thing that Katie pointed out is you could see the clicks difference and the impression. 

And the position [00:04:00] difference, and you can start to compare do I have content that's really performing negatively? 

And so I, I also wanted to go over here to my pages and, if I look at these pages.

One of my number one blogs is, experiencing a really a big drop in clicks. And so for the first time I'm like, you know what, maybe I should actually update that blog besides just updating the year. 

And so I did go back and do that based on what I learned from Katie. 

Crystal Waddell: I just love the visual of this though, where you can see the comparison. 

And so if your business is behaving a little differently this year online. This kind of gives you some really great insights into why.

So one of my new favorite tools, the Google Enhanced Analytics. 

Why am I having such a hard time saying this? The Google Search console, enhanced analytics Chrome extension. 

Wow. It is a mouthful. But yeah, super fun tool to compare your [00:05:00] site's performance over time. So many thanks to you, Katie, for sharing that with us.

Follow Through Action Steps

Crystal Waddell: So here's the follow through action: you wanna open up your queries report and look at the specific search terms that people are using to find your site. 

And then you wanna identify patterns and see what topics you already have topical authority in, and then take that data and create content that directly answers those queries. 

Google will love you for it and so will your audience and the people you're trying to attract. 

So that was number one. 

The enhanced analytics Chrome extension for Google Search Console. All right. 

Simplifying Keyword Research

Crystal Waddell: Number two, simplifying keyword research. Katie talked about this and she explained that keyword research is all about understanding search intent, like what people actually want when they type in a query. 

So instead of going after generic terms like water heater, she suggested that we focus on action-based keywords like water heater installation. 

And this reminded me of another really great tip that I got from Zoe Ashbridge last year on the podcast. 

And she said to [00:06:00] filter with words like "buy" and "where to buy" and that type of thing in Google Search Console. 

So if you use those filters, that will indicate the people who are ready to take action and the type of content that they're looking for.

All right. 

Competitor Research and Keyword Gap Analysis

Crystal Waddell: Number three, competitor research with keyword gap analysis. This one was super fun. I did this for one of my clients. And if you're not sure what content opportunities you're missing. 

A keyword gap analysis can help and it can help quickly when you use an SEO tool. 

 So I love Dragon Metrics. 

And that keyword gap analysis shows you keywords that your competitors rank for, but you don't.

So then you can close the gap and gain more visibility. So the follow through action for this is to run a keyword gap in your favorite SEO tool. 

It could be SemRush. Ahrefs or Dragon Metrics, then take a look at those words and try to group them into like easy win topics. 

Where maybe your competitors outrank you, but you have content or you have content ideas that you can do better than they did on their site. 

And then you can create [00:07:00] new content or optimize existing pages to fill those content gaps and outperform the competition. 

All right, so here's your challenge for this week. Pick just one of these actions and implement it, and don't try to do everything at once.

Just start with one small, meaningful step. 

And if you're working through these strategies and you have questions, I'd love to hear from you. 

You could always book a Power Hour with me on my website at Simple and smart seo.com. 

Or if you want weekly ongoing support in a small group, you can join my SEO squad.

We meet weekly to troubleshoot and grow our websites together. So if you found this episode helpful, please share it with a fellow entrepreneur who's trying to get smarter with their SEO. And don't forget to subscribe so that you never miss an episode. I'll see you next time for more simple and smart SEO strategies.

And remember, keep moving forward.