Search Traffic
Traffic from organic search is like the ultimate truth when it comes to SEO. After all, rankings mean nothing if they don't drive relevant traffic (and/or conversions), and this can be what you're judged on when trying to justify future budgets or client spend.
So it can be worthwhile to investigate any potential issues that exist within the search traffic data. I say 'can be worthwhile' rather than 'is definitely worthwhile' because there is some element of subjectivity, and what is a bad signal on one site might actually represent a good signal on another site.
Bounce rate offers us a classic example. You could have a page that ranks for 'what is the weather today in Brazil', which would have an extremely high bounce rate (visitor comes on the page, gets the answer, bounces away), and this would not be considered a problem. But if you have a 1500 word blog post on an ecommerce site that ranks for 'best outdoor shoes for men', you would be alarmed/disappointed if the bounce rate was high.
Google Analytics and Google Search Analytics
Sitebulb is unique in that it actually combines Google Analytics and Google Search Console data (if both are connected) to make assumptions about the traffic. For example, if a page logs 0 visits in Search Console but 1 visit in Google Analytics, Sitebulb will not flag it as having 0 organic traffic.
This is by design, so that we can identify the very worst performing pages for you to focus your attention on, rather than marginal cases.
Search Traffic Issues
Around half of the Search Traffic Hints are Issues, with the other half merely being 'Potential Issues', which means they represent errors or problems that need to be fixed. They are additionally classified in terms of their importance - this should be taken into account when prioritizing implementation work, along with the number and type of URLs affected.
Importance: High
These Hints are very important, and definitely warrant attention.
- Orphan URL received search traffic
- Canonicalized URL received organic search traffic
- Redirect (3XX) URL received organic search traffic
- Disallowed URL received organic search traffic
- Forbidden (403) URL received search traffic
- Noindex URL received organic search traffic
- Not Found (4XX) URL received search traffic
Search Traffic Potential Issues
Hints marked 'Potential Issue' describe a situation that might be an issue, or might cause an issue. In the case of Search Traffic Hints, they typically highlight patterns which are worth investigating, as there may be an underlying issue there which needs exploring further.
Importance: Medium
These Hints are worth investigating further, and may warrant further attention depending on the type and quantity of URLs affected.
- URL received search traffic but 0 goal conversions
- Time on page less than 10 seconds
- Had bounce rate greater than or equal to 80%
- Only has desktop organic search traffic
- URL only received mobile organic search traffic
- URL only received tablet organic search traffic
- URL received no desktop organic search traffic
- URL received no mobile organic search traffic
- URL received no organic search traffic
- URL received no tablet organic search traffic