So you just hired a copywriter for your SaaS agency and you’re churning out some high-quality content. You can sense some improvement, but you’re not actually sure how much you’re improving.
If that’s the case, don’t leave it up to guesswork. Instead, take some time to track some SaaS SEO KPIs to get accurate insights on your progress. From there, you can make a plan to address areas of improvement.
But what sorts of KPIs should you measure? In this article, we’ll tell you everything you need to know about SEO KPIs for your SaaS agency!
SaaS SEO KPIs, or key performance indicators, act as valuable tools for quantifying the performance of your SaaS organization. They serve as an evaluation method for your company’s SEO and marketing strategies, making them integral for progress tracking.
Here’s an overview of SaaS SEO KPIs:
Ultimately, SaaS SEO KPIs can enhance your comprehension of what’s working and what needs adjustment in your SEO strategy. This will allow you to formulate potent plans for business growth.
SEO KPIs are very many, so tracking all of them can actually be counterproductive. Instead, we recommend focusing on a select few SaaS SEO KPIs. Below we break down the top 10 KPIs you can use, and we show you how you can actually measure some of them.
Keyword SERP rankings illustrate your website’s organic position in search results for specific keywords. Here’s a systematic guide to help monitor your SaaS company’s keyword SERP ranking:
4. Analyze the results: Assess the ranking of each keyword. Prioritize keywords that rank in the top three positions on Google since they attract the most traffic.
5. Monitor and adjust: Consistently check your keyword rankings and modify your SEO strategy as required.
To further improve your CTR, you can watch this video:
By following this routine, you’ll be better equipped to optimize your SEO techniques. This will help boost your visibility on Google, and ultimately draw more organic traffic to your SaaS company.
Want to up your SaaS SEO game? Pay attention to conversion tracking! This handy KPI tracks actions like demo requests and free trial sign-ups. This means it can show you the effectiveness and profitability of your organic SEO strategy. Google Analytics 4 (GA-4) identifies 3 types of conversions:
Now that we’ve covered the types of conversions, here’s a step-by-step guide on how to track your conversions:
2. Track your conversions: After marking events as conversions, navigate ‘Admin’, then ‘Conversions’. There you’ll find a detailed list enumerating the quality and quantity of conversions happening on your SaaS website.
For more information on conversion tracking and creating events, you can refer to the following video:
Consider the scenario where your e-commerce store doubles its sales overnight. Without conversion tracking, you would have no insight into what caused this surge. Therefore, keeping track of conversions is key to understanding and optimizing your performance.
Additionally, remember to consider the role of qualified leads (MQLs, SQLs, and PQLs) during conversion tracking. These leads indicate the level of interest or potential in prospective clients, highlighting the probability of conversion.
Understanding and tracking the behaviors of these leads are key to shaping your SaaS SEO strategy. Keeping an eye on these leads and conversion metrics can lead to more data-driven decisions, improved marketing strategies, and ultimately, increased profitability for your SaaS business.
Organic traffic is a critical KPI providing insights into the number of users, their session duration, and average engagement period.
To track organic traffic in Google Search Console, go to Reports > Acquisitions > Traffic Acquisitions.
You’ll see two charts displaying the users by session default channel group over time and by session default channel group.
With this data, you can derive the following information:
According to DashThis, more than 75% of overall website traffic comes from organic searches, making it a key thing to monitor!
The quality and quantity of backlinks constitute another critical SaaS KPI metric in your SEO strategy. Conventional wisdom states that a higher number of backlinks to your site will cause Google to consider your website authoritative.
But the truth is, if your backlinks originate from websites with low domain authority, they might actually diminish your SEO performance.
So, it’s crucial to evaluate the health profile of your backlinks when seeking to enhance your SaaS website’s ranking. Here’s a classification of backlinks based on their health profile:
Similarly, backlinks can be categorized based on their status:
You can monitor the status of your backlinks and referring domains using Google Search Console or Semrush. While Google Search Console provides the number of backlinks and linked websites, it lacks detailed information about the health status of these backlinks. That’s where Semrush comes in handy.
Here’s how you can use Semrush to analyze backlink health:
2. Check your website’s Overall Toxicity Score. If it’s low, you’re on track. If it’s high, concentrate on enhancing the quality of your backlinks.
3. Eliminate toxic or potentially toxic backlinks even if your toxicity score is low. This will help you improve your rankings even further.
If you want to clean up your site from toxic links, follow these steps:
2. Click on the number next to toxic or potentially toxic backlinks and find the full list of harmful links.
Once there, you have a couple of options: either Whitewash or Disavow the links.
If the administrator doesn’t respond to your request, export the Disavow list and upload the file to Google’s Disavow tool. From there, rest assured that Google will exclude these toxic websites from consideration in future SEO value assessments of your site.
Another KPI closely related to backlinks is referring domains. The number and quality of referring domains is another critical SEO KPI, particularly for SaaS companies. In SEO terms, ‘referring domains’ denotes unique websites that are linked back to your site. The goal isn’t merely quantity, but diversity.
Imagine your site receives 200 links from 200 different websites. Search engines perceive this as a more potent sign of authority than if you had 200 links originating from one site. So when crafting your comprehensive SEO strategy, referring domains should be at the forefront.
Just as with backlinks, the quality of the referring domain significantly contributes to your website’s SEO.
Bounce rate refers to the percentage of people who visit your website and leave after viewing just one page. Imagine someone entering a store, looking around, but walking out without making a purchase — that’s a bounce.
To add and monitor your website’s bounce rate:
3. Find and add the Bounce Rate metric from the ‘Add Metric’ section.
4. Click on ‘Save’.
5. Adjust the pages with a higher bounce rate to encourage users to stay on them longer.
Bear in mind, an average bounce rate falls between 26-70%. Anything higher warrants your attention. Begin strategizing to improve user experience, boost page engagement, and reduce bounces.
For further guidance on using Google Analytics to track Bounce Rate, you can watch the following video:
In the SEO realm for SaaS businesses, Return on Investment gauges the financial efficiency of your SEO endeavors. It tells you whether your investment positively impacts your bottom line.
You can track your SEO efforts’ ROI with the following steps:
If your SaaS product isn’t listed in your e-commerce store, you might not be able to use the method above. So, if purchases are made directly from your website, you should implement a ‘Thank You’ page that pops up post-purchase. This will help you determine your ROI. Here’s how:
2. Give your event a name, then select your parameter, operator, and value.
3. Mark this new event as a conversion.
4. Head to the ‘Conversions’ section. For your newly created event, click ‘Add Modification’ in the ‘Parameter Configuration’ section.
5. Go to the parameters field and add the currency type and the new value as the quantity of currency.
6. Click on ‘Save’.
Let’s say your SaaS product is priced at $90. In that case, input the parameter as USD, and the new value as 90. From now on, each time a user lands on the ‘Thank You’ page, Google will add a 90 USD value to its report, enabling you to calculate your total conversions.
Once you’ve calculated your conversions and investments, you can use the ROI formula to calculate the return you’re getting on your investments.
Remember, SEO ROI isn’t immediate, but with perseverance and continuous strategy optimization, you’ll begin to see the difference in your rankings. Your managers will also appreciate the clear demonstration of ROI’s direct influence on the company’s bottom line. Playing the SEO ROI game is indeed a worthwhile endeavor!
And as a bonus, you can actually use some tools to boost content’s ROI. Don’t miss the opportunity to leverage them!
Users’ engagement level is a vital SEO KPI that indicates how users interact with your SaaS solutions. This includes tracking web traffic and click-through rates. High engagement often indicates an increase in quality leads, making it crucial for SaaS SEO.
The umbrella term ‘User Engagement’ comprises several sub-metrics such as:
User Engagement refers to the period in which users actively interact with your website or application. Google begins recording user engagement time when a user starts a new session. The time stops when:
To access these engagement metrics, navigate to Reports > Acquisition > Traffic Acquisition.
Aim to increase your KPI by striving for a 70% scroll depth and actively responding to user queries. Engaged users are potential customers and brand ambassadors!
Understanding the importance of tracking non-branded vs. branded searches for your Saas SEO KPIs is key. Non-branded searches reveal effective keywords and reflect your SEO success. For example, an increase in non-branded search traffic can indicate growing brand awareness.
Conversely, branded searches, hold high conversion potential, reflecting your brand strength, regardless of their direct link to conversions. Ranking number one for your branded keywords prevents loss of traffic to competitors and indicates your team’s effectiveness over time.
Click-through rate (CTR) is a ratio showing the number of users who click on your site link after viewing it on a Search Engine Results Page (SERP). If 10 out of 100 people who see your site on a SERP click to visit, you have a 10% CTR. CTR is vital because:
It provides insights into visitor intent and your page performance, indicating conversion potential.
Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) represents the total marketing and sales expenditure divided by the number of new customers acquired. If your marketing campaign costs $10,000 and attracts 100 new clients, your CAC is $100.
CAC indicates the cost-effectiveness of your marketing and sales efforts. If you’re over-spending per customer, your business model might require adjustment.
The churn rate reflects the percentage of customers lost over a certain period and is crucial for determining product stickiness and customer satisfaction.
Here’s how to calculate it:
If you start with 100 customers and end with 80, your churn rate is 20%. Minimize this percentage to single digits! A high churn rate indicates potential issues that require immediate attention.
So, now that you know what metrics and KPIs to track, it’s time to figure out how you can improve them. In this section, we’ll focus on four different tools, Semrush, Ahrefs, GSC, and Google Analytics.
We’ll first put Semrush and Ahrefs head to head, then talk about the advantages of using GSC or Google Analytics.
For keyword research and website audits, Semrush and Ahrefs are top-notch tools. Semrush excels with organic traffic insights and automated link building. Ahrefs, on the other hand, offers comprehensive keyword tools and backlink monitoring.
Now, when you juxtapose the two on various levels, you get:
| Pros | Cons |
| Convenient for on-page SEO if you already use Semrush | Complex and limited writing assistant |
| Extensive ranking factors, seamless integration with Google Analytics, and SEO writing assistant | Lacking sufficient WordPress tools and compatibility with other applications |
Pricing: Starts at $119.95 per month.
| Pros | Cons |
| Places a significant emphasis on domain authority | Isn’t the best for keyword research |
| Includes traffic checker and SEO health monitor tools | Doesn’t have as many SEO analytics tools |
Pricing: Starts at $99 per month.
Google Search Console and Google Analytics (GA4) are invaluable SEO tools that can significantly enhance your SaaS platform’s ROI. They offer insightful analytics into your website’s performance and areas that need optimization.
Some of their top features include:
| Pros | Cons |
| Provide a comprehensive view of site performance | Rely excessively on Google services |
| Are free to use and offer immense analytical capabilities | May need technical expertise to navigate advanced features |
| Facilitate tracking visitor behavior | Lack real-time data |
| Help evaluate SEO strategies with real data | Display inconsistent data occasionally |
| Provide alerts and regular reports | Have a complex initial setup process. Can be challenging to understand Google Analytics |
In essence, these tools are instrumental in customizing your SEO strategies for enhanced engagement and improved ROI.
To ensure the prosperity of your SaaS enterprise in all aspects of SEO, it’s crucial to concentrate on your SEO KPIs and strive to obtain exceptional scores. Investments in resources such as time, money, and energy are vital to the success of any business, including SaaS.
If your ambition is to catapult your SaaS company to extraordinary heights, ensure that perfection is reflected in your services, products, content, and marketing strategy. Remember that tools like Outranking can become your allies on this journey. They can shoulder half your workload, enabling you to deliver meticulously researched, high-quality content for impeccable on-page SEO.
So why wait? Sign up today and start your ascent towards unparalleled success — because for your SaaS venture, the sky is truly the only limit!