Your SEO is working if more people who don't already know your name find you in Google, and some of them become leads. To check, look at three things each month: non-branded clicks in Search Console, leads from organic search in GA4, and how both compare with the same month last year. Authority scores, a short list of tracked keywords and total traffic can all rise while the business gets nothing.
Is my SEO working? Most owners ask that the day the monthly report arrives. It’s a 20-page PDF: Domain Authority is up two points, eleven keywords “improved”, traffic is up. Then you look at the phone log and the contact form, and nothing has changed. Are you paying for results, or for a nice-looking report?
You can answer that yourself in about half an hour a month, with two free tools you probably already have: Google Search Console and Google Analytics 4. Here’s what we check when an owner asks us for a second opinion, and what we tell them to stop reading.
How do I know if my SEO is working?
Ask two questions, in this order. Are more people finding you who didn’t already know you? And are some of those people turning into leads or sales? If both are going up compared with the same month last year, the work is paying off, whatever the report’s charts show. If neither has moved after a fair amount of time, the report needs to explain why.
The four numbers in Search Console, and what each one means
Open Search Console, go to Performance, then Search results. You’ll see four numbers. Google defines them this way (Search Console Help):
- Impressions: how often a link to your site was shown, or could have been seen, in results.
- Clicks: how often someone clicked through from Google to your site.
- CTR: clicks divided by impressions.
- Average position: your highest position in the results for each search, averaged across all the searches you appeared for.
Impressions show whether Google is showing you more. Clicks show whether people choose you. If CTR on a page drops while its position holds, look at the title and description, or at what now sits above you on the results page.
Why average position misleads
Average position is the number owners worry about most. Because it’s an average across every search you appear for, it often gets worse when SEO is working. Say a new service page starts showing at position 40 for a few hundred new searches. That’s progress, since Google now sees the page as relevant. But those new searches pull your average down, even if clicks on your main pages went up the same month.
So read position for one group of pages at a time, next to impressions, and never as one sitewide number.
Split branded from non-branded searches
This is the most useful filter in Search Console. People who type your business name were going to find you anyway, through your reputation, your ads or a referral. SEO is mostly about the other searches: “emergency plumber near me”, “how much does a will cost”, “best CRM for contractors”.
If total clicks are up but all the growth is branded, your SEO didn’t do that. If non-branded clicks are up, it probably did.
Search Console added a built-in branded queries filter in November 2025, and Google later opened it to all eligible sites. It classifies queries automatically, including misspellings of your name. It isn’t available for sub-properties (such as a /blog/ property) or for sites with few impressions, and you can’t add your own brand terms (Search Engine Journal). If you see it, use it. If you don’t, a regex filter does the same job.
In the Performance report, click + Add filter, choose Queries, then Custom (regex). Search Console uses RE2 syntax, matches anywhere in the query unless you anchor it, and ignores case by default (Search Console Help). For a business called Northwind Dental, the pattern might be:
northwind|north wind|nortwindSet it to “Matches regex” to see branded searches, then switch to “Doesn’t match regex” to see everything else. Add misspellings you find in your query list, and check the non-branded view every month.
Count leads from organic search in GA4
Search Console stops at the click. To see what happens after, you need GA4, and you need it set up to count the things that matter. Google calls these key events: an event that “measures an action that’s particularly important to the success of your business” (Google Analytics Help). Any event can be marked as one. For most service businesses that means a form sent, a click on the phone number, a booking made or a quote requested.
Then open Reports, Acquisition, Traffic acquisition. Find the Organic Search row and look at its key events. That’s your monthly lead count from SEO. To see which pages bring those leads, open Reports, Engagement, Landing page, and add a filter for Session default channel group equals Organic Search.
If no key events are set up, your SEO can't be judged on results at all, only on activity. In audits we run, missing or broken form tracking is one of the most common reasons an owner can't tell whether SEO works. Test every form and phone link yourself and check that it shows up in GA4.
GA4 will never catch every lead, since some people find you on Google and call a week later. Watch the trend.
Track page groups, not single keywords
A ranking report for ten handpicked keywords is the easiest thing in SEO to make look good. Pick terms nobody searches, rank for them, and the report fills with green arrows. Even a list of real keywords misses the longer, more specific searches your pages also show up for, and together those can bring more visits than the list does.
Group your pages instead. Service pages, location pages, the blog, product categories. In the Performance report, filter Pages by “URLs containing” a folder like /services/ or /locations/, and note clicks and impressions for each group. When one group grows and another stalls, you know where the work is paying off and where it isn’t.
If you’d rather not build this by hand, our free GSC Data Interpreter reads a Search Console export, splits brand searches from new visitors, and shows what changed, which pages are close to page one and where clicks fell. It runs in your browser and doesn’t upload your file.
Compare with the same month last year
Month-over-month numbers are noisy. A landscaper’s traffic falls in December every year. A tax preparer’s peaks before April. February has fewer days than March. Comparing with last month will tell you SEO failed in December and worked in March, and neither is true.
In Search Console, open the date picker, choose Compare, and set this period against the same period last year. Google suggests weekly or monthly views for date comparisons, so day-of-the-week swings don’t distort the result (Search Console Help). Do the same comparison in GA4 for organic key events.
How long before SEO shows results?
It depends on the work. Technical fixes, like pages that were blocked or not indexed, can show within weeks of Google recrawling them. Better titles on pages that already rank can lift CTR quickly. New pages and new topics take months, longer in competitive markets.
A fair test: after a few months, you should at least see impressions rising for the page groups being worked on. Clicks follow impressions. Leads follow clicks. If impressions haven’t moved for the pages your SEO team says it’s improving, ask what they changed and why they expect it to work.
What to ignore, or treat with care
Third-party authority scores. Domain Authority (Moz) and Domain Rating (Ahrefs) are estimates each tool builds from its own crawl of links. They aren’t Google numbers, and nobody pays you for them. A rising score with flat non-branded clicks means nothing has changed for the business.
Total traffic. A blog post that ranks for a broad question can bring lots of visits from people who will never hire you. Awareness has some value, but traffic that never reaches a key event shouldn’t be the headline.
If the report you get is long on these numbers and short on clicks and leads, our guide on why most SEO audits don’t lead to results explains how to ask for something better. To make sense of a technical audit itself, see how to read a technical SEO audit report.
The newer signal: showing up in AI answers
More searches now end with an AI answer at the top of the page. You may see impressions holding steady while clicks fall. If average position for those pages hasn’t moved, you didn’t lose rankings. People got their answer on the results page.
In a Pew Research Center study of 900 US adults' browsing in March 2025, people clicked a regular search result in 8% of visits when Google showed an AI summary, and in 15% of visits when it didn't (Pew Research Center).
Google counts an AI Overview as a single position in the results, and every link inside it shares that position (Search Console Help). Search Console also has a Generative AI performance report, announced in June 2026 and rolled out to websites worldwide by August 31, 2026. At rollout it showed impressions from AI Overviews and AI Mode by page, country and date, with no clicks or search terms (Google Search Central, Search Engine Journal). Add those impressions to your monthly check. If you don’t see the report, your site may not have enough data for it yet.
Outside Google, ask ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini or Claude the questions your customers ask, and see whether you’re named. Our AI Visibility Checker runs a free readiness check, and with the monthly credits of a free account it asks ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Claude your questions and shows who they recommend instead. Our guide to answer engine optimization covers how to become one of those sources.
Your monthly check
For that last step, our free Content Refresh Planner ranks pages by the clicks within reach and lists what to change on each. Our guide to content pruning and refreshes explains when to update a page and when to merge it.
FAQs
What is a good click-through rate in Google Search Console?
There’s no single good number. CTR depends on your position, the type of search and what else is on the results page, such as maps, ads or an AI Overview. Compare a page with itself over time at the same position. A drop in CTR while position holds is the signal worth acting on.
Why are my impressions going up but clicks going down?
Usually one of two reasons. You’re showing for many new searches at low positions, which raises impressions without many clicks, or an AI Overview or other feature is answering the search before people reach your link. Check average position for the same pages: if it held steady, the results page changed, not your ranking.
How do I see organic leads in Google Analytics 4?
First mark the actions that matter, such as form sends, phone clicks and bookings, as key events. Then open Reports, Acquisition, Traffic acquisition, and read the key events column for the Organic Search row. Add a comparison with the same period last year to see the trend.
Does Domain Authority affect Google rankings?
Not directly. Domain Authority is a score Moz calculates from its own link data, and Domain Rating is Ahrefs’ version. Neither is a Google metric. They can help you compare sites at a glance, but a higher score doesn’t mean more clicks or leads.
How often should I check my SEO results?
Once a month is enough for most businesses, always compared with the same month last year. Check sooner only if something breaks, like a sudden drop in clicks or leads.
Sources
- What are impressions, position, and clicks?, Search Console Help
- Performance report (Search results): Advanced filtering and comparison, Search Console Help
- Google answers questions about Search Console’s branded queries filter, Search Engine Journal
- [GA4] About key events, Google Analytics Help
- Introducing Search Generative AI performance reports in Search Console, Google Search Central, June 2026
- Google Search Console AI reports rolled out worldwide, Search Engine Journal, August 2026
- Google users are less likely to click on links when an AI summary appears in the results, Pew Research Center, July 2025
