Google Search Console Tips
Google Search Console (previously called Webmaster Tools) is a free tool provided by Google for website owners to monitor performance and traffic. GSC also offers search engine optimization recommendations and fixes. Our SEO Office Hours recaps below cover a range of advice from Google to help you better understand and get the most out of this fundamental SEO tool.
GSC UI & API Use Same Data Source
Google Search Console’s UI and API both use the same data source, so any there shouldn’t be any discrepancies in data between the two.
Resource Loading Errors Within Mobile Friendly Test and GSC Don’t Reflect Indexing Errors
Within the Mobile Friendly Test and Inspect URL Tool, Google fetches all of the page content and embedded URLs including images, fonts and JavaScript, which can sometimes cause timeout issues. However, this shouldn’t affect the indexing of the content for search results due to caching and the use of older versions of files.
Image URLs Won’t Be Fetched in the GSC URL Inspection Tool
The URL Inspection tool in Search Console is based on search results and will therefore only display web pages. If Google recognises a URL is an image, it will not be fetched with the tool and will most likely display a ‘blocked by robots.txt’ message.
The URL Parameter Tool in GSC is Still Effective
Despite not currently being moved over to the new Search Console, the URL parameter tool is still effective to manage parameter crawling.
URL Removal Tool in GSC is Fastest Way to Remove a Test Site From Search Results
While there are several ways to remove a staging site from organic search results, including blocking Googlebot from crawling it or returning 404 or 410 error codes, John recommends using the URL Removal tool in GSC to remove it quickly.
How-to and FAQ Reports Now Available in GSC
Sites which feature the new How-to and FAQ structured mark-up will have access to these reports within Google Search Console. For more news and announcments from the Google I/O conference held last week, including updates to GSC, Lighthouse and Googlebot, check out our comprehensive recap of key takeaways for SEOs.
Google May Temporarily Test Displaying Sites to Users in Different Countries
Google will test displaying sites to users in different counties to see if the content is useful for them, so data in GSC may be affected by these temporary changes. You can usually identify temporary behaviour by checking the number of impressions seen for certain pages in different countries to see if it lower than what is typically seen.
Disrupted Index Coverage Report Data in April Due to Indexing Bug
Google’s indexing issues occurred from 9th-25th April and data in the Index Coverage report could not be shown during this time. John hopes to write a post clarifying how Google handles these types of situations internally.
Structured Data Not Displayed in GSC Isn’t Detected by Google
If structured data isn’t being displayed in Search Console reports then Google is likely not picking it up.
Use URL Inspection Tool to Fetch Live HTML & Check if Site Has Been Hacked
If it isn’t visually apparent that a site has been hacked but it’s ranking for unusual terms, use the URL Inspection Tool in GSC to fetch the live HTML of the pages that are ranking to check for hacked content that Google may be seeing.