In this set up guide, we will go through how to set up Google Search Console, and the basics of using the platform.
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What is Google Search Console?
Google Search Console is a platform with tools and reports to help you measure your website’s performance and traffic.
What can you do with Google Search Console?
See you website’s performance on Google
You can see which queries bring users to your website from the search results. You can also see how many impressions and clicks your website gets, and what position your website ranks on Google for queries.
Submit content to Google
You can submit your website’s sitemaps and individual URLs for Google to crawl. Along with reviewing your website’s index coverage to make sure Google has the most up-to-date version of your website and content.
Get notified of issues
You can get alerts when Google identifies an issue on your website. You can see a report which shows which URLs on your website have an issue, and tell Google when you have fixed them.
Inspect pages of your website
Using Google’s inspect tool – you can see what Google crawl and index on your website.
How to set up Google Search Console
1. Sign in to Google Search Console
Go to Google Search Console and sign in with your Google account.
If you don’t have a Google account, you can set one up here.
2. Add your website
When you first login you will see this screen below ⬇
If you have one website you want to add, enter the full URL in the ‘URL prefix’ box, and click continue. Be sure to include the full URL prefix, this means the ‘https://www’ at the start and a ‘/’ at the end.
3. Verify ownership
Now you need to verify your website, there are 5 ways to do this, but the easiest by far is to verify with Google Analytics account.
If you have not set up Google Analytics, take a look at our Google Analytics Setup Guide.
Verify with Google Analytics
If you have your website tracking set up, with your Google Analytics Tracking ID, you can verify your website in Google Search Console. Be sure you are using the same Google account as you use for your Google Analytics.
Scroll down on the verify box and click to open the Google Analytics tab.
Now click verify and wait for the verification process to load.
You should see a success message, now your website has been verified!
Now that you have verified the ownership of your website, you can now start to use Google Search Console to monitor your website in the search results.
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