It was a very different world when the phrase “search engine optimization” was first uttered. In 1997, Google was just a baby, AOL was everyone’s internet launch point and Geocities was cooler than the Backstreet Boys. Yep, that cool.

Why the walk down memory lane? To know which metrics are important, today, to search engine optimization, it’s important to think about the big picture, see where we’ve come from and to remember exactly why we’re here.

Visitors and Organic Traffic

Search engines drive billions of pageviews each month and are the starting point for most web users. A quick look at your website’s analytics will likely show you that more than half of your site’s traffic comes from this source.

Search engine optimization is simply making your website as attractive as possible to those search engines so your content appears at the top of search results for the right search terms.

The goal of any SEO effort should be to get more visitors—or an increase in organic search traffic. Even better, you’ll see an increase in converting organic search traffic. The important metrics that indicate you will be successful, however, have changed as the search engines change.

Clicks and Engagement

If our ultimate goal is to get more traffic, how do we do that? Logically, showing up in search results is good. So is getting a lot of clicks. Since 1997, there have been many different ways of trying to do this. From solid tactics like descriptive metadata and friendly URLs, to sneaky black hat tricks like keyword stuffing and link farms, an entire industry has grown up trying to game the system.

The search engines, however, are too smart for that. They push algorithm updates frequently to prevent the tricks from working and to honor well maintained, content rich, relevant websites that web users are really looking for.

Each algorithm change is like a change to the rule book of which websites appear first on the list for any keyword search. So how can we keep up with the rule changes and get our sites on the top?

Quality to Build Authority

We focus on quality. Here are the reports that we find are the best indicators of overall search engine optimization success.

Quality Websites:

Error Report (Moz or Webmaster Tools): See where search engines are having trouble crawling your website and get those things fixed!

Quality Links

Link Analysis (Moz or Webmaster Tools): The sites that link to you act as votes in search engine speak, endorsing your site as legitimate. A metrics like Domain Authority is made up of the number of links coming to your site and the quality of those links (CNN.com is worth more than BeckyVardaman.com).

Better Quality Than the Competition

Competitive Analysis (Moz, SEM Rush): SEO is, after all, a competition. There is only one #1 spot for each search and if your competitor has camped out there, it can change your SEO strategy.

Quality Traffic

Organic Search Traffic and Converting Organic Traffic (Google Analytics): This is the big one, why we’re here. The whole reason you mess around with SEO is to get more traffic to your site, and ideally, more qualified traffic. Looking at your Google Analytics you can easily track your organic search traffic over time. Look carefully at the Goal Conversions over time as well. You want those new website visitors to be prospective students who visit your site to inquire, apply, visit and enroll. (Don’t have goals set up? We can help.)

SEO in 2016 and Beyond

While 1997 was a glorious time, more sophisticated search engines are good for everyone. We no longer need to worry about single keyword targeting or spammy guest blogging. We’re free to focus on creating amazing quality websites with great structure, content and outreach strategies. Use these metrics to help you pinpoint your growth opportunities and build a search engine optimization strategy for 2016.

Ready to take your website to the next level? Learn more about our Search Engine Optimization services.