What should a useful SEO report show & which numbers can you ignore?
A useful SEO report fits on a page or two. It shows what was done, what changed in Google's own data, which inquiries came from search and what happens next. Long lists of keyword rankings, authority scores and total traffic mostly fill space.
Many SEO reports are long. There are twenty pages of charts, a table of keyword rankings and a score out of 100. It's easy to read one and still not know whether the money is working.
A useful report is shorter. It answers four questions, in the order below, and leaves out the numbers that only fill space.
A useful report starts with the work done.
The first page should list what was done that month, with links so you can check it:
- Pages published or rewritten, with their addresses
- Technical fixes made, and why
- Links earned, and where from
- Changes to your Google Business Profile
- Anything that was planned and didn't happen, and why
Google's guide to hiring an SEO suggests asking whether an SEO will share every change they make to your site, with the reasoning behind it. The report is where that happens.
Google's own numbers show what changed.
The numbers should come from Search Console, Google's free report on your site. Search Console is Google's own count. Figures from other SEO tools are estimates, and Google's guidance on third-party SEO tools says those tools don't have access to its internal ranking data.
The numbers worth seeing each month:
| Number | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| Clicks from searches without your company name | Buyers who found you through your work |
| Impressions for searches about your services | The first sign that new pages are being seen |
| Which service and project pages get impressions | Shows which pages are starting to work |
| Your important pages indexed | A page Google hasn't indexed can't be found |
Each should be compared with the month before and, once you have a year of data, the same month last year. We explain these numbers in what a business owner should check in Search Console.
Inquiries belong in the report too.
You're paying for SEO to bring in work, so the report should say how many inquiries came from search and which pages they came through.
That needs analytics set up to count what matters, such as form submissions and clicks on your phone number or email address. In Google Analytics these are set up as key events. Ask your sales team as well. A buyer who says they found you on Google is worth writing down.
Referrals blur the picture. Someone who hears your name may search for it before they call, so some of your search traffic is really referral work. That's another reason to separate searches that include your name from searches that don't.
Some numbers look impressive and tell you little.
| Number | Why it tells you little |
|---|---|
| Rankings for hundreds of keywords | Many are searches no buyer makes, and positions change with the searcher's place and device |
| Authority scores | They're made by tool companies, which don't have access to Google's ranking data |
| Total traffic | It mixes in readers from other countries, job seekers and your own staff |
| Average position across all searches | New pages start low, so it can fall while you're being seen more often |
| Number of backlinks | A count says nothing about where the links come from |
| A site health score out of 100 | It's the tool's own scoring, and what matters is the state of your important pages |
| Impressions on their own | They can rise on searches that will never bring you work |
Average position needs a word of its own. Google defines it as the average position of your topmost result. When new pages start showing up for new searches, they often start low, which pulls the average down while you're being seen more. Always read it next to impressions.
Rankings still have a place if the list is short. Twenty or thirty searches that match the work you want, tracked as a trend, tell you something. Google says search results are customized for each person's search history, location and other things, so no single position is the whole story.
AI answers need a separate check.
Google counts its AI Overviews and AI Mode in the Search Console Performance report. ChatGPT, Claude and Perplexity aren't in it. If buyers in your trade use those tools, a separate check is worth having. We explain how that works in what an AI visibility report shows, and our AI visibility page covers the rest.
The report ends with next month's plan.
The last part should say what happens next and why. That means which pages will be written or fixed, which searches they're for and what this month's numbers changed about the plan. If a page has had impressions for three months and almost no clicks, the plan might be to rewrite its title and opening lines. If one service is bringing in inquiries, the plan might be to add more projects to its page.
Next month's report should then start by showing whether that plan happened.
Questions to ask about any SEO report.
- What did you do this month, and where can I see it?
- How many inquiries came from search, and through which pages?
- How did clicks from searches without our name change?
- Which new pages are getting impressions?
- What didn't work, and what will you change?
- What's planned for next month?
If a report can't answer those, ask for one that can. What the plan should include in the first place is in what a monthly SEO plan should include.
This is how we'd want to be judged.
Our SEO Growth Program reports this way, on a live results page you can open any time and a monthly call to go through it. It starts from $1,499 a month, and that report is how we'd want you to judge it. To talk it through, book a call.